B
bz
[email protected] wrote in @g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:
Unforetunately, you almost certainly can't scale up the voltage
significantly.
You will get arcing if you go up on the voltage, rather than ions.
Even if you could scale up the voltage, you would have two MAJOR problems.
1) arcing between the cables, the cables to the grid, or from the discharge
points to the grid.
2) xrays radiation generation. When you have voltages over about 33 kV, you
start getting significant soft x-ray generation when electrons accelerated
by such a potential are stopped. Dental x-ray machines use 70 kV. If you go
to mega volts, you will be making very hard x-rays.
That reminds me of one other problem. Weather. Humidity.
The launch site will need to be in an area with very dry climate.
High humidity, clouds, or rain, will be very bad for such a device.
--
bz
please pardon my infinite ignorance, the set-of-things-I-do-not-know is an
infinite set.
[email protected] remove ch100-5 to avoid spam trap
Just as with electrical power transmission over long distances, you
will use very high voltage, probably in the megavolt range, that is, if
you want to lift megakilos.
Unforetunately, you almost certainly can't scale up the voltage
significantly.
You will get arcing if you go up on the voltage, rather than ions.
Even if you could scale up the voltage, you would have two MAJOR problems.
1) arcing between the cables, the cables to the grid, or from the discharge
points to the grid.
2) xrays radiation generation. When you have voltages over about 33 kV, you
start getting significant soft x-ray generation when electrons accelerated
by such a potential are stopped. Dental x-ray machines use 70 kV. If you go
to mega volts, you will be making very hard x-rays.
In the demonstrations for small lifters, kilovolts were used to lift
only a few grams a few feet.
Since the lifter uses air for its reaction mass, you could use a
higher acceleration than that normally used for rockets to reach
orbital velocity at a lower altitude so the air is at sufficient
density. But this would reduce the lift capacity. That is, if you
accelerated at 3.6 g's, you could lift one third the mass than at 1.2
g's.
Or you could use a shallower trajectory than that used by rockets so
that most of the acceleration phase stays in the lower atmosphere. But
this would necessitate a longer and heavier cable.
Probably a combination of these would be optimal.
That reminds me of one other problem. Weather. Humidity.
The launch site will need to be in an area with very dry climate.
High humidity, clouds, or rain, will be very bad for such a device.
--
bz
please pardon my infinite ignorance, the set-of-things-I-do-not-know is an
infinite set.
[email protected] remove ch100-5 to avoid spam trap