Talk:Mass Drivers

TOC

I have no idea what Jarogers means by "TOC". --FARTHERRED 8:10 Central daylight time

TOC is a command for the wiki engine telling it how to handle the table of contents. Frequently its automatic selection for where to put it is in the way or inconvenient, so we frequently specify where to put it. -- Strangelv 15:28, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I left instructions as to how to modify it within the article itself as a comment. Comments are not visible when the article is displayed and can only be viewed when editing the article code. Jarogers2001 03:27, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Dust from L2

That the three body problem in celestial mechanics in not solvable in general is well known, but I can get a specific reference. I have seen articles that present interesting results for the Earth moon system, but have not located them when looking for them recently. Simply, particles left to drift near the L2 point with a small relative velocity are each in an individual trajectory but not in any of the special cases in which there is a repeating path. There are classes of trajectories for which the fate is to intersect the surface of Luna in less than a month. There are similar classes intersecting Earth's surface. Some trajectories are ejected from the system into independent solar orbit. Some trajectories hang around the Earth moon system for years before finding one of these eventual fates. It would be expected that dust and grit particles released from breaking fiberglass bags of sifted fraction of regolith would enter all such trajectories unless precautions are taken to prevent that. --FARTHERRED 8:10 Central daylight time

Flashbulb Rocket

If I remember correctly, the circularizing velocity for the mass driver described in "FIRST MASS DRIVER" is about seven meters per second, less than one thousandth of the mission delta v for Earth to low Earth orbit. This should be well within the range of oxygen aluminum rockets that people should one day be able to produce on Luna. As for the flashbulb rocket in particular it is essentially a solid fuel pressure feed oxidizer rocket in which the exhaust gas is the excess oxygen. Igniting this rocket should be no more difficult than igniting a flash bulb. The particular fuel/oxidizer mixture that melts open the valve to the oxygen tank need not be exactly thermite. The Aluminum oxide threads coated with aluminum and or magnesium would need coatings of silicon oxide and or silicon on some to control burn rate, allow pressure build up in the combustion chamber and allow transfer of heat to the excess oxidizer. This would be a single use rocket for which the electronic timer and battery or capacitive storage device would be salvaged. Another sort of rocket might do as well. --FARTHERRED 8:10 Central daylight time

More Flashbulb Rocket

Versions of a flashbulb rocket have been suggested in which the combustion chamber would be within the oxygen tank. Both the combustion chamber and oxygen tank would be radially symmetric about the axis of rotation of the spin stabilized spacecraft. An aluminum coated glass film plug might stop up the expansion nozzle to prevent sunlight from entering the combustion chamber before ignition. A pressure relief valve would maintain temperature in the insulated oxygen tank. --Farred 03:41, 27 October 2008 (UTC)