Undergrad Questions about the Voyager spacecraft

[sophiecentaur]

To travel to interstellar space requires the final speed and highest speed without return and slow down.

I read this and was planning a reply. A dismissive polite reply has been made, pointing out that it's largely nonsense except for as an incremental step (one further than Voyager). But a very useful mission could be throwaway. It would need a massive robot laboratory and a seriously big transmitter to return a vast amount of data - and a selfie with our first extra-terrestrial.
Missions within the Solar System would benefit from a return trip - not just with humans but with retrieved material. I don't really subscribe to the urgency of sending humans everywhere. From the high success rates of modern robot systems, I have to conclude that they are far far better value. Also they don't have the public trauma when space travellers die in service; robot fails don't have to lead to a halt in the flow of finance for space investigations.

 

[glappkaeft]

How would you propose to launch a spacecraft weighing 10^9 kg into space?

I'm more impressed with a mass ratio of 1 to 1000000.

Also even if we assume no payload, hand wave away the mass of the structure and tanks and use all the dry mass for ion engines and electricity generation that will be one amazingly slow accelerating rocket.

 

[hutchphd]

"Ah, but we're going at night!"