Posted on 11/03/2007 5:48:24 AM PDT by Neville72
I’ve got an old mule and her name is Sal
Fifteen miles on the Erie Canal
She’s a good old worker and a good old pal
Fifteen miles on the Erie Canal
The “space elevator” is a great idea, but it cannot happen without a better “heavy lift” orbital rocket system than the “space shuttle”. One has to come before the other.
what sort of music would be playing in this elevator?
What happens if a plane flies through this “nano-cord” or a terrorist manages to cut it?
It's a lousy idea. You'll need lateral thrust to get the elevator moving at orbital speed.
The author conveniently overlooks the fact that the Erie Canal was probably a failure from a commercial standpoint. It wasn’t very long before the railroads rendered it obsolete.
Another bad idea depending on not thinking about the whole (sort of like the prius, wind generators, biomass fuel).
cb, bsase with honors, ut 1970.
The music of the spheres...
I want to boat down the Erie Canal some day.
How come?
Same here. I’d like to do the same on the Mississippi River, too.
Low bridge, everybody down
Low bridge for we’re coming to a town
And you’ll always know your neighbor, you’ll always know your pal
If you’ve ever navigated on the Erie Canal.
They're called "flight plans" and "flight corridors". Of course, terrorists are another story. I suspect any such engineering project will probably have some of the best anti-aircraft protection in the world.
Wow, what a revelation. You'd better write Arthur C. Clarke immediately, and let him know.
Hint--it won't be built from the ground up.
See post 15.
Wife and I and another couple sailed from Two Harbors, MN to Rouge Steel on Lake Erie some years ago. We were guests aboard an Interlake steamer. The 5 am transit through the Soo Lock was very neat. Chow on board was enormous...
Somebody's been ignoring potential energy and the amount that would have to be stored in form of Mass in orbit in order to pull up the mass in the cable car. You're really just storing up all the energy you would otherwise expend putting the usable mass in orbit. Plus, each use would degrade the orbit of the space structure and require energy to maintain the orbit, probably more than would be required to put up what you wanted in the first place(efficiency losses).
One efficiency you have forgotten is that ground energy can be used for running the lifts and, if necessary, navigation. Think nice LONG wires. Ground energy is dramatically cheaper than rocket fuel, safer, and does not have to lift itself.
Hint--after it's built, and as the elevator rises, it will need to be provided with lateral thrust to get it going from 1000mph at Earth's surface to 17,000+mph at orbit.
Without that constant lateral thrust, your ribbon will take on the shape of a giant letter "C".
Fortunately, your kind is a minority compared to the visionaries who look at life from the other side and think about how things can be done.
But, please don't let me discourage you...you are needed to anchor the other end of the bell curve. If it wasn't for folks like you, we might already be in space and be exploiting faster-than-light travel.
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