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Engineering
Aerospace Engineering
Can the thrust of Ion Thruster be increased at the cost of speed?
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[QUOTE="Benjies, post: 6823643, member: 692155"] You are referring to propulsion systems that are casually referred to as "deep space engines". These engines are not used for anything on Earth as the thrust/weight makes them unsuitable to move mass on earth when compared to chemical propulsion systems. In electric propulsion, your ions are always passing through "a medium", as you put it- it's just a question of what medium you put your propellant through. Electrostatic, Electromagnetic, or thermal mediums. Thermal-medium thrusters are still applied in space, and meet some of the criteria you are looking for (sacrificed efficiency for higher thrust/weight). These engines, however, still aren't operated on Earth to produce useful work or move mass. Nozzles do not impact your propulsion unit. Think about the function of a nozzle: expand propellant and increase velocity. The temperatures seen within electric propulsion units is so high that the system can no longer be modeled as a solid, liquid, or gas- rather, it is a 'plasma'. Some "other thing". Not sure we know how to expand plasma flows: the propulsive unit spits stuff out at incredibly high velocities, and we call it good at that, without a nozzle. If you want to have more leverage over your propellant flow, try identifying inefficiencies with your anode/cathode (electromagnetic or electrostatic), or your resistor (electrothermal). [/QUOTE]
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Can the thrust of Ion Thruster be increased at the cost of speed?
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