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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
 Posted - 10/21/2005 : 19:26:18 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dr. Mabuse
Wouldn't it be better to manufacture the nanotube in space and lower it down from orbit, down to where ever the ground-station will be?
That's the "classic" idea: start with a large satellite at geosynchronous orbit. Then, simultaneously extend the elevator "substrate" both towards Earth and away, in a "balanced" fashion which keep the center-of-gravity of the system at the satellite itself. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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markie
Skeptic Friend
Canada
356 Posts |
Posted - 10/24/2005 : 12:18:19 [Permalink]
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Here's an update: Since there was no robotic climber that climbed all the way up the cable there was no prize money. Bummer. Perhaps if they had used lasers instead of just spotlight there may have been better results. Until next year...
quote:
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Oct. 24 (UPI) -- It sounds like science fiction, but a competition was held during the weekend for the design of a "space elevator."
A three-day competition at NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif., ended Sunday, but with no winner.
Competitors tried to design a "space elevator"' -- a platform rising above the Earth's atmosphere along a super-strong ribbon of carbon nanotubes. The elevator would carry cargo into space at a much lower price than do rockets today.
The seven "robot climbers'' entered in the competition didn't ascend more than a few dozen feet up a tether attached to a giant crane, the San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News reported, therefore none performed well enough to win the $50,000 grand prize.
But the Mercury News noted the competitors broke a barrier of sorts by proving the idea is not just science-fiction fantasy.
Two teams developed space elevators that were able to rise along the tether using power converted from spotlights.
"It was amazing to watch these silent machines gliding on light,'' said Marc Schwager of the Spaceward Foundation, which organized the competition. "Two college teams came in and showed industry how to build a space elevator."
Copyright 2005 by United Press International. All Rights Reserved.
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9687 Posts |
Posted - 10/24/2005 : 16:20:15 [Permalink]
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| Laser isn't very efficient to start with, I suppose that's why it was opted out. |
Dr. Mabuse - "When the going gets tough, the tough get Duct-tape..."
Dr. Mabuse whisper.mp3
"Equivocation is not just a job, for a creationist it's a way of life..." Dr. Mabuse
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 10/24/2005 : 16:27:32 [Permalink]
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quote:
Wouldn't it be better to manufacture the nanotube in space and lower it down from orbit, down to where ever the ground-station will be?
What Dave_W said.. and:
That is how they would get the initial ribbon into place. After that the ribbon would be expanded by smaller "crawlers" which would add more strands.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard
USA
4574 Posts |
Posted - 10/24/2005 : 16:37:44 [Permalink]
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I wonder why the fundies haven't already decried the effort to build a space elevator another doomed "Tower of Babel?"
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"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman
"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie |
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Randy
SFN Regular
USA
1990 Posts |
Posted - 10/24/2005 : 17:23:47 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by H. Humbert
I wonder why the fundies haven't already decried the effort to build a space elevator another doomed "Tower of Babel?"
Right after the I.D./Evolution trial in Pennsylvania, maybe that's next on their to-keep-dumbing-down-society things to do list.
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"We are all connected; to each other biologically, to the earth chemically, to the rest of the universe atomically."
"So you're made of detritus [from exploded stars]. Get over it. Or better yet, celebrate it. After all, what nobler thought can one cherish than that the universe lives within us all?"
-Neil DeGrasse Tyson |
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