NASA confirms that the Electro-Magnetic Drive works

[RagnarokDel]

Some of you may remember a few month ago there was a big talk about this. Most were sceptic but it seems that NASA confirmed the claims.

Quote

The best conventional Hall thruster can produce 60 millinewtons per kilowatt which is an order of magnitude more than the emdrive that was tested.

Light sails and photon propulsion (zero propellant propulsion) produces two orders of magnitude less the emdrive. 3.33-6.67 micronewtons per kilowatt.

What's the most interesting is the fact that it already beats other propulsion ideas like light sails. If I understand this right, it means that interplanetary travel could become much cheaper since you could just using solar panels to power this unlike conventional thrusters. Imagine SpaceX's Mars colonization spacecraft using this instead of much larger gas tanks?

 

Source: http://www.nextbigfuture.com/2016/11/new-nasa-emdrive-paper-shows-force-of.html

 

You can read the papers directly there

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7kgKijo-p0ibm94VUY0TVktQlU/view

[paradigm249]

so who is going to become ironman first?

[TheRandomness]

So basically, a KSP ion thruster? Because if so, holy shit that's cool. 

[Ronda]

Quote

New NASA Emdrive paper shows force of 1.2 millinewtons per kilowatt

So, it would take a megawatt to produce 1.2 newtons. Wow, that's enough to lift a chocolate bar! /s

I get that it being fuel-less is a big deal, but that's pitiful.

[paradigm249]

18 minutes ago, TheRandomness said:

So basically, a KSP ion thruster? Because if so, holy shit that's cool. 

indeed. think of all the possiblities... KSP irl. without spending millions

[RagnarokDel]

17 minutes ago, Ronda said:

So, it would take a megawatt to produce 1.2 newtons. Wow, that's enough to lift a chocolate bar! /s

I get that it being fuel-less is a big deal, but that's pitiful.

For all you know, better designs could be significantly more  efficient. If not it could be useful for corrections and stuff like that. I assume the fact that it doesnt have to use propellant can be useful in other ways. Imagine a spaceshit that stays within the confine of the solar system until it builds up enough momentum to reach 5% of light speed and then travels to a close star. Sure it's still takes a hundred years or whatever, but on the other hand, it doesnt take 10 000 or 15 000.

[Miguel Batista]

1 hour ago, RagnarokDel said:

For all you know, better designs could be significantly more  efficient. If not it could be useful for corrections and stuff like that. I assume the fact that it doesnt have to use propellant can be useful in other ways. Imagine a spaceshit that stays within the confine of the solar system until it builds up enough momentum to reach 5% of light speed and then travels to a close star. Sure it's still takes a hundred years or whatever, but on the other hand, it doesnt take 10 000 or 15 000.

This will be useful for micro probes and r&d for now. Later, we will see.

[tlink]

2 hours ago, RagnarokDel said:

Some of you may remember a few month ago there was a big talk about this. Most were sceptic but it seems that NASA confirmed the claims.

What's the most interesting is the fact that it already beats other propulsion ideas like light sails. If I understand this right, it means that interplanetary travel could become much cheaper since you could just using solar panels to power this unlike conventional thrusters. Imagine SpaceX's Mars colonization spacecraft using this instead of much larger gas tanks?

 

Source: http://www.nextbigfuture.com/2016/11/new-nasa-emdrive-paper-shows-force-of.html

 

You can read the papers directly there

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7kgKijo-p0ibm94VUY0TVktQlU/view

wasn't the idea behind light sails also shooting a laser at it to boost it? i think that idea is still far more viable than just solar panels.

[Prysin]

3 minutes ago, tlink said:

wasn't the idea behind light sails also shooting a laser at it to boost it? i think that idea is still far more viable than just solar panels.

also far more vulnerable. As the sails speed increases, dust specs can tear it to shreds on impact. Mostly due to the sails having to be very light to be put into space (even if made by heavy materials and assembled in space).

 

 

[tlink]

34 minutes ago, Prysin said:

also far more vulnerable. As the sails speed increases, dust specs can tear it to shreds on impact. Mostly due to the sails having to be very light to be put into space (even if made by heavy materials and assembled in space).

 

 

yea thats true, the real problem doesn't seem to be speed but time. 

[Jovidah]

3 hours ago, Ronda said:

So, it would take a megawatt to produce 1.2 newtons. Wow, that's enough to lift a chocolate bar! /s

I get that it being fuel-less is a big deal, but that's pitiful.

Remember there's no drag. So once you put these things into space, pretty much any extra 'lift' / momentum you put into it is retained. So over time it all keeps adding up. Admittedly, it takes time, but for longer missions it can be really useful. You pretty much get 'free' acceleration.

[Lurick]

51 minutes ago, tlink said:

yea thats true, the real problem doesn't seem to be speed but time. 

Damn time and it's evil communist ways! We must stop it at all costs, build a wall around it to stop it from getting to us!

[Prysin]

54 minutes ago, tlink said:

yea thats true, the real problem doesn't seem to be speed but time. 

solar sails generate speed over time. However reliability and predictability, in addition to "what is plan A-B-C-D-E-F-G" is what makes it unlikely for solar sails to ever work. Perhaps as a supplement/fuel saver for other kinds of propulsion. But not the way things are now.

[TidaLWaveZ]

NASA confirms that the Electro-Magnetic Drive works, can't confirm the 1969 moon landing.

[Master Disaster]

37 minutes ago, TidaLWaveZ said:

NASA confirms that the Electro-Magnetic Drive works, can't confirm the 1969 moon landing.

Other than the reflector array they left there and regularly fire lasers at to measure the distance between us and the moon you mean?

[Ronda]

1 hour ago, Jovidah said:

You pretty much get 'free' acceleration.

As free as getting a light fusion reactor capable of continuously producing megawatts of power into space along with implements for capturing hydrogen.

[Squirrel724]

4 hours ago, Ronda said:

So, it would take a megawatt to produce 1.2 newtons. Wow, that's enough to lift a chocolate bar! /s

I get that it being fuel-less is a big deal, but that's pitiful.

The thing about space is that there is very little acting against your thrust. On earth that amount of force is completely useless but in space it can move anything. You wouldn't get large amounts of acceleration but you will still eventually end up going very fast. Add to that the fact that you never really have to stop for anything in space and instead basically "park" a ship by putting it into orbit around a body and you can maintain that momentum essentially forever.

Just look at how Apollo got to the moon. They used a large booster to put the spacecraft into orbit around earth. When they were lined up correctly they used a comparatively small thruster to push the craft out of earths orbit and just coasted out to the moon. There they "parked" the command module in the moons orbit and sent the LEM down to the surface. To get home they did the same in reverse. This engine would be used during the time you would be coasting between bodies to decrease the time spent traveling.

[TidaLWaveZ]

58 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

Other than the reflector array they left there and regularly fire lasers at to measure the distance between us and the moon you mean?

 

It was meant as a joke but if it were faked it would have been just to claim that NASA was first and superior to the Soviet Union.  They could have easily faked the original and actually landed on the moon a little later.

[BuckGup]

When do we get warp drives?

[Ronda]

11 minutes ago, Squirrel724 said:

-snip-

You're assuming the spacecraft has a powerful energy source that doesn't run out of fuel for years. And you're assuming it weighs less than the mass of conventional rocket fuel that would have an equivalent effect on the total travel time

[RagnarokDel]

3 hours ago, Jovidah said:

Remember there's no drag. So once you put these things into space, pretty much any extra 'lift' / momentum you put into it is retained. So over time it all keeps adding up. Admittedly, it takes time, but for longer missions it can be really useful. You pretty much get 'free' acceleration.

Even in space there's friction, not a lot of it but there's hydrogen and other gas.

[rashdanml]

7 hours ago, RagnarokDel said:

For all you know, better designs could be significantly more  efficient. If not it could be useful for corrections and stuff like that. I assume the fact that it doesnt have to use propellant can be useful in other ways. Imagine a spaceshit that stays within the confine of the solar system until it builds up enough momentum to reach 5% of light speed and then travels to a close star. Sure it's still takes a hundred years or whatever, but on the other hand, it doesnt take 10 000 or 15 000.

This is exactly the usage scenario. EM drives will need a significant boost in performance to come anywhere close to being able to get a large payload into space. Once in space though, you don't need much force to make minor or even major corrections to trajectory, as there's no resistance. The benefit of EM would be that it could fire off for much longer with enough reserve power for significantly larger corrections, as opposed to conventional rocket thrusters (which can't fire for too long as they'll burn through fuel quickly). 

[goodtofufriday]

7 hours ago, Ronda said:

So, it would take a megawatt to produce 1.2 newtons. Wow, that's enough to lift a chocolate bar! /s

I get that it being fuel-less is a big deal, but that's pitiful.

The weight of fuel is a large part of the difficulty in getting out of the atmosphere. The weight of fuel is also a large part of the weight of the structural integrity. Conventional combustible fuel is also a large part of failures due to extreme vibrations and variance, including the extreme temperatures.

 

Removing conventional fuel is a massive leap for space travel. So while that power may not seem like a lot, its a massive step forward in eliminating such a large host of problems with how we currently get into space.  

[rashdanml]

26 minutes ago, RagnarokDel said:

Even in space there's friction, not a lot of it but there's hydrogen and other gas.

Not ... quite. The gases are typically clustered around planets or other objects. There is literally nothing, period, in space. Any gas at all would transmit sound, and there's none of that in space. 

[Stadin6]

8 hours ago, TheRandomness said:

So basically, a KSP ion thruster? Because if so, holy shit that's cool. 

ion thrusters are real tho. the EM drive is completely different