Magnus effect fuel cell skyhooks

[farmerben]

 

Got ideas from reading this https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=38109.0

 

The Magnus Force is proportional to angular velocity times velocity.  Where conventional lift is linear  squared.  Magnus force gives very aggresive maneuvering at low velocity.

In the case where buoyancy equals gravity and no thrust is applied, the object will do a vertical spiral until its velocity equals 0.  

If thrusters or propeller blades are attached with camshafts we can control spin and linear velocity.  A tail would also be very useful.

If fuel cells are used we can harness atmospheric oxygen, or compressed air in header tanks, at altitudes beyond where normal combustion is possible.   The bulk of the vehicle is a thin skinned hydrogen balloon, with no internal baffling.  So having some massive parts (fuel cell, compressor, thruster assemblies) counter rotate gives more control to balance the gondola and payload.  

One other neat feature of this design is that composite balloon material can be made from conductors or materials that hold a lot of static electricity.  So the rotational kinetic energy can be engaged to a Van de Graff generator, raising the potential between the surface of the balloon and the bottom of the gondola to about a million volts.  

 

 

[Zeiss Ikon]

You do realize you're talking about a million volt static generator full of hydrogen, right?  Hindenburg would have been much worse if it hadn't happened almost at ground level...

[farmerben]

46 minutes ago, Zeiss Ikon said:

You do realize you're talking about a million volt static generator full of hydrogen, right?  Hindenburg would have been much worse if it hadn't happened almost at ground level...

Now, now, you're not going to win any Darwin awards with that type of talk.  I'm curious what the worse version of the Hindenburg explosion is and why, it's not obvious to me.  

 

Still trying to salvage this idea I dug up ... a mix of 92% helium, and 8% hydrogen is not combustible at all.

http://www.wrightbros.com/pdf/Helium_HydrogenMixture.pdf

Fuel cells can operate on these mixtures and not lose helium.  How low power/weight, and efficiency, I don't know.  

https://phys.org/news/2014-05-proton-exchange-membrane-fuel-cells-recover-high-purityhelium.html

[Nuke]

what about an inner hydrogen bag inside a helium bag. helium would act as a buffer gas to the hydrogen (which is going to leak out through any material) and occupy a shell around the lifting bag. if a high enough hydrogen concentration is detected in the helium buffer, just vent it through a solenoid valve at the top of the buffer bag (if the whole thing is spinning this might get difficult and might require multiple valves) and replace it with compressed helium from a tank somewhere. 

Edited November 17, 2019 by Nuke

[Zeiss Ikon]

2 hours ago, farmerben said:

I'm curious what the worse version of the Hindenburg explosion is and why, it's not obvious to me. 

If the fire had occurred at a significantly higher altitude, even a few hundred meters (as opposed to mooring height, with the gondola only about twenty meters above ground level, so that it was still mostly floating when the disintegrating frame and envelope lowered it to the ground) there would have been no survivors, instead of only a couple dozen fatalities.  As it was, the last survivor among the passengers and crew (a child of about eight years on that day) just died this past week, aged 90.

[sevenperforce]

23 hours ago, farmerben said:

Now, now, you're not going to win any Darwin awards with that type of talk.  I'm curious what the worse version of the Hindenburg explosion is and why, it's not obvious to me.  

Still trying to salvage this idea I dug up ... a mix of 92% helium, and 8% hydrogen is not combustible at all.

http://www.wrightbros.com/pdf/Helium_HydrogenMixture.pdf

Fuel cells can operate on these mixtures and not lose helium.  How low power/weight, and efficiency, I don't know.  

https://phys.org/news/2014-05-proton-exchange-membrane-fuel-cells-recover-high-purityhelium.html

Inner hydrogen balloon, outer helium balloon, run the helium balloon's contents through an ICE to maintain low hydrogen levels?