- #1
gutemine
- 59
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Hi !
I was pointed to this forum to get some help and technical advice and verification of a new kind of low cost Space Tower: the Space Hose.
In a nutshell it is about using a lightweight hose made from PE foil which is blown trough from the bottom and is using the frictional forces of the flowing air to produce continuous lift for supporting the weight of the hose.
It was designed as an alternative approach to solving the N-prize problem which is about putting a 9,99 gram satellite into space for 9 orbits and winning
£ 9999,99 when staying within the £ 999,99 budget. Because of the "geostationary" orbit a space tower offers it would mean keeping the tower upright for a total of 9 days.
You can find a brief presentation including most of my poor math in the attached PDF file.
I'm aware that this approach is not a very realistic one due to the huge stability problems when going for a single hose, but the math showed that it could be feasible to support a 100km hose and the needed raw material and energy consumption would be within the N-prize budget, hence I think it is worth sharing with you.
By using plain air at a reasonable blowing speed as the medium for continuously transfering the frictional force to the hose it overcomes most of the limitations of the existing inflatable space tower and the space fountain concept.A head diffusor is making the air blowing out sidewards on top with only a small downward momentum to support the payload and prevent tearing the hose.
Have fun reading the slides and input is welcome because I'm pretty sure that I must have done something fundamentally wrong in my math!
gutemine
PS: Sorry, for the bad graphics and the funny comments in the slides - I had to compress heavily to get below the 256k limit of N-prize the forum for attachments and the N prize spirit which originates from the halfbakery is also about the entertaining value of potential solutions
I was pointed to this forum to get some help and technical advice and verification of a new kind of low cost Space Tower: the Space Hose.
In a nutshell it is about using a lightweight hose made from PE foil which is blown trough from the bottom and is using the frictional forces of the flowing air to produce continuous lift for supporting the weight of the hose.
It was designed as an alternative approach to solving the N-prize problem which is about putting a 9,99 gram satellite into space for 9 orbits and winning
£ 9999,99 when staying within the £ 999,99 budget. Because of the "geostationary" orbit a space tower offers it would mean keeping the tower upright for a total of 9 days.
You can find a brief presentation including most of my poor math in the attached PDF file.
I'm aware that this approach is not a very realistic one due to the huge stability problems when going for a single hose, but the math showed that it could be feasible to support a 100km hose and the needed raw material and energy consumption would be within the N-prize budget, hence I think it is worth sharing with you.
By using plain air at a reasonable blowing speed as the medium for continuously transfering the frictional force to the hose it overcomes most of the limitations of the existing inflatable space tower and the space fountain concept.A head diffusor is making the air blowing out sidewards on top with only a small downward momentum to support the payload and prevent tearing the hose.
Have fun reading the slides and input is welcome because I'm pretty sure that I must have done something fundamentally wrong in my math!
gutemine
PS: Sorry, for the bad graphics and the funny comments in the slides - I had to compress heavily to get below the 256k limit of N-prize the forum for attachments and the N prize spirit which originates from the halfbakery is also about the entertaining value of potential solutions
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