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@the_Demongod A lot of what is being talked about is described quite well, and quite entertainingly, in this book: http://library.sciencemadness.org/library/books/ignition.pdf Its a useful reference if you're perusing these fora, this is at least the third time I have posted that link! Well worth a read

I think you pretty much nailed it on the head about the turbopumps just there

This is all I have to say on this matter.

Is that supposed to say "i5" or is it really an oldskool pentium chip?

Can you please censor the word "spaceflight" it is one of my trigger words. hueheuheuehuehue

As far as I know, turbulence increases mixing, rather than preventing "clean" mixing, I would imagine that the environment within the combustion chamber results in almost instant and complete. Pressure-wise, the pressure that your engine is able to achieve at the injector is one of the things that directly limits thrust, ie: you must design your combustion chamber not to produce pressures in excess of this, otherwise you get catostrophic deconstruction. The higher pressure you can generate, the higher pressure you can allow to develop in the combustion. Turbopumps are essentially rocket-powered anyway, so no problems there. Is "premature" ignition a thing? I mean once the fuel is in the combustion chamber I'd imagine that anything that isn't burning is only reducing performance.

Yup, good point too. That and the fact that they freely admit that their hypothesis is un-disprovable seem to indicate that they are still a fair ways from a reasonable explanation.

Seems to be suggesting that it is a "photon drive" with an invisible exhaust. Honestly, this was one of my first thoughts about it - not all of the exhaustive maths and explanatory science of course, I'm not claiming superior foresight here, just that in the absence of any other explanation, and the very low forces involved, photons leaking out of the device makes perfect sense. That it is "reactionless" thrust using previously unknown physics has always, and still does, seem the least likely explanation. I will continue to reserve judgement. Thing is, if it is photon thrust, wouldn't a hot rock in a bucket do a better job? The device can't be getting any more thrust from a photon than any other photon would produce, that much seems certain. Doesn't this mechanism suggest that the EmDrive is just a pretty rubbish way of shining a very small amount of microwaves in a certain direction?

Wahahaha! Really? That is pretty cool. Almost too cool for Elon Musk. He can't have thought of it... Seems like a waste of good material for a barge though, what about the...umm..I dunno, real dang spaceships!

I dunno, in the movie they do kinda stop.

Hi All, So I'm still not getting anywhere running the experiments. After setting up a station, the right click menu on the experiments has no option to do anything. To be clear, I have remotetech, and this is what I mean by "setting up a station": SEP central module connected via the power plugs to 4 experiment modules (all power cables properly "linked" KAS-wise). 4 of the little solar panels and a small battery attached to SEP module. I "force open" the antenna and set a target. I have tried setting the target as mission control, as the lander that brought it and as an orbiting comms satellite (all leading back to MC via remotetech). I have an engineer (lvl2) and a scientist (lvl1) present, and I have one of the screwdriver tools, and the usual KIS attachement tools. I cant figure out what I am doing wrong? I "surface attach" things (by holding "H") when mounting things on the ground. I have a fair few mods, are there any known incompatibilities that could do this? I'm pretty sure everything is installed correctly. If I "switch to" the station itself, there aren't any options in the right-click menus to run experiments here either. Right-clicking the Central Module though, the Remotetech SPU does register as un-connected, even when the antenna is targetted at a vessel that has a connection back to MC. Any help would be appreciated Thanks!

Yeah, I know that current physics doesn't cover what happens at the singularity, if there is one, and that you can cross the event horizon of sufficiently large BHs without too much fuss. But its not like "Oh we don't know so ANYthing could happen, even fairlytails and princess castles!!!" Its more like "We aren't quite sure what happens to the infinitesimal chunk of degenerate matter you will be crushed into."

I like launch escape systems, one of my favorite parts of KSP is complex sequences of triggered events, a launch escape being a good example. BUT, I never suffer a kerbal to die! If I have a CATO I revert and re-design or re-fly. Also, my launch strategy is pretty conservative, I rarely have an incident on launch. So I have a bit of a conflict there, I cant bring myself to build a LES and purposefully scrag the launch so I can use it, that just goes against the grain. So I end up having massively complex booster seperations with drougue chutes, sepatrons, sequential staging, ooh, I LOVE those "smartparts" which can trigger staging automatically. If I ever do put a LES on something, the most use I get out of it is jettisoning it in space

Yes? What about it?

How can "complexity" overtake the entropy it is exporting though? It always has to create a little more disorder than the order it gains, disorder grows faster than order. You can always decrease entropy by exporting it out of the system, but if the system is the universe, there is nowhere else to export it to. The entropy of the universe always increases. If a tree falls in a forest with nobody around to hear it, does it make sound? Yes, because the tree still vibrates the air around it which propagaets away in a series of pressure waves, which is the very definition of sound. Ergo, the Earth is still pretty even if humanity disappears, because our presence is not necessary for the definition of a word to remain constant. **edit** Thats weird, my response to the below was merged upwards...ok.

Is the "exploding bases" issue on any list for a fix? Sorry, I meant, "one ticket please, I want a window seat."

I am so very jelly That must have been pretty cool!

My humble stream-of-conciousness: All order created by life on earth is balanced by disorder created elsewhere. For example, I need food to continue ordering my molecules, to do this I must disorder enough food to pay for it. If you follow the food cycles down, you find that the main "order sink" of life on earth is the sun, atoms fuse (decreasing disorder) but in doing so they get very hot (increasing disorder by a larger amount). Some of that heat/light is used by organisms on earth to disorder their immediate surroundings and to order themselves. That order passes up the food chain to us. Life is only a *local* reversal of entropy, we have no special power over entropy.

Aw sorry, didn't pick up on that. Honestly though the combat is extra, all the other instrumental and flight modelling is top-notch, but Im not very familiar with the civilian side of the market so can't really say much else

They *definitely* go in "pointy" end down, 100% no doubt about it. If you look at how the shape of RVs changed over time, it exactly follows the progress made in hypersonics aerodynamics and heatshield technology. From photos and video of re-entering RVs you can see that they come in FAST and white-hot, in fact the curve of their trajectory is so shallow as to be almost invisible to the eye, that is how fast. This necessarily dictates a very small half-angle and a very small nose radius, ie: a sharp cone. They are/can be spin stabilised, but only to several RPM, this is not to hold attitude in atmosphere, but when they are released they must be placed into the correct re-entry attitude, the spin keep them stable until they enter. The internals of nuclear RVs are obviously classified, but it isnt' hard to imagine that the centre-of-mass can be easily engineered to be in the proper place for aerodynamic stability. The sorts of temperatures and heat impulses they endure are easily handled by ablative shielding, as others have stated, they only have to endure it for a minute or two.

"What does an astronaut do if he is sick inside his helmet?" "He pulls himself the heck together, thats what he does."

OMG gotta give a special shout out to new blockbuster XMEN Apocalypse. Spoilers I guess: I faceplamed so hard everyone thought I was applauding. (not really but omg)

My first thought is - wouldn't you just kinda "project" the vomit downwards towards your chest, where hopefully it would cling/soak into your clothes. Also, you're a spaceman dammit just swallow it back down what are you up to being sick!

IMO ONLY - Macs have always been the choice for those who [have big wallets and...] are less computer "savvy", ie: their best feature is usability, but you pay through the nose for it (both in terms of cost and software availability/compatibility). My other half just got one of these from work, and it is realllly nice. The screen is excellent, and the keyboard works really well. Could you run KSP on it though...I don't see why not? RAM might be a problem...

One thing I have a need for is a smaller set of landing legs for micro-landers. Payload switching for tanks integrated into stock would be excellent. Basically they need to take about 20 of the most highly rated mods and integrate them (surface science and hand tools hello!). Or at least develop stock interpretations, a-la remotetech. Another rover body or two wouldn't go amiss. Its hard to suggest other parts because I have added in so many via mods I cant tell which are stock any more.