Neil1993

I use Newton's laws in my job on a daily basis. If they were wrong I, and any other engineer or scientist, would sure as hell know. If you're so sure it will work, spend your own money, develop the concept, and put it in space. Just be careful and don't try to get anyone to fund you. Getting investments for perpetual motion machines is fraud in some places.

I have 2 videos of rockets that I launched. The first was from 2015. and the second was from exactly a year later in 2016. Enjoy:

Could you maybe provide links to your articles? It might make it easier for others to explain it to you.

Or, as unlikely as it may seem sometimes, cooperation is at the core of all human endeavours.

It won't move. Let's just gloss over the technical magic of having a ferro-fluid which will change phases on a whim. In fact, it isn't necessary to consider a ferro-fluid at all, given the system you are proposing. I'm not sure if you realized this, but Iron is already ferromagnetic. Having an electromagnet on the ship is essentially the same as tossing a ball from your left hand to your right. When your ball leaves your left hand (this is your gun system) you gain some momentum. However, when you catch it with your right hand (your electromagnets) The ball imparts the momentum it has gained to you in the opposite direction, thus negating the forward momentum you gained from throwing the ball. Also, you can't stop anything "Instantly." I agree with the many previous people who have pointed out that there are only so many ways we can tell you that the laws of conservation of momentum exist. If you are still having trouble understanding that, then I don't know if there is anything we can do.

No. I think we're just all replying because it's fun

But aren't Flat-Earthers the Flat-Earthers of mechanisms and machines too?

One great way to determine if this is actually a feasible system is to try the following thought experiment: Imagine how cheap or easy this is to build and test. Is it cheaper and easier than regular rocket motors? Given the diagram, I would say yes. Can it be made very light? I would also guess that it could be. Based on these factors, does it seem that it will be more effective than a traditional engine? If you determined in 1. that it is more effective, then ask yourself why so many space agencies with such considerable resources and so many ideas have yet to try anything resembling it. Short answer: it doesn't work Edit: While I understand that some very great and disruptive ideas can come from individuals, remember that for every individual with a great idea, there are a million more with bad ideas. If you ever have an idea which you think has great merit, then I suggest bringing it to experts in the field, rather than posting it on a forum.

I think simply stating "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction" and then PROPERLY applying this within the proposed concept is enough to show that the internal forces cancel out and this concept will get you nowhere. Remember, while rockets use this same principle (called Newton's third law), THEY LEAVE SOMETHING BEHIND. This is the burned fuel. The rocket pitches out tiny bits of this fuel very quickly and, in return, gains tiny bits of momentum. Because accelerating the particles takes a force, an equal and opposite force MUST act upon the craft. QED

Kind of? No one really knows. The light reaching you will be highly red-shifted, so you won't really be able to see anything. Also, no useful discussion can reall be had about what happens after crossing the event horizon. As far as we know, physics as we know it ceases to matter at that point

My personal favorite is the following: "Failure is not an option, but it is a possibility"

It sounds like you may be using evidence from the movie. I'll have to take your word for it since I actually haven't seen the movie (this is an even more terrible sin when you consider the fact that I had received tickets to a pre-screening but have them to some friends because I had too much work that night). It might be possible that the OMS system that was removed were just the sections used for attitude adjustment or it was like Luke suggested where they just removed redundant components.

OMS systems aren't designed to put out huge amounts of Delta-v. Rather, they are for fine attitude and translation adjustment and quick response. It is conceivable that eliminating this system rather than using it in flight would result in a net gain in Delta-v.

Whoops! good catch!

I saw an interesting lecture by Kip Thorne. He actually went over a few of the things that were wrong in Interstellar and were changed for theatrical effect. This includes: Passing through the wormhole. It was all dramatic when, in reality, it would have been unnoticeable if you weren't looking out a window The Accretion disc on the wormhole, which should have been red-shifted on one side and blue-shifted on the other. Nolan didn't think it looked good There were more things but I can't name them off the top of my head.

They might be the first to patent this (in a patent-troll-ey manner) but Lockheed Martin has already been on the fusion hype train for a bit. Just check out what they have on their website. Whether or not it will be feasible, the amount of nice graphics and actual hardware indicates that they're at least making an effort.

My first exposure to this idea was actually at the International Space Development Conference last May. By the time they rolled up, we had already heard the idea of using "Energy Beams" so much that it had become a running gag for my colleagues and I. The concept of beamed power is actually being slapped on to a lot of concept studies in a way that almost makes them seem like a Deus Ex Machina. This is a little different, however, seeing as the beamed power aspect is central to the craft. In the end, I have a feeling that by the time everything is developed for this craft to work, there will be more viable and practical technology available. I guess we'll just have to see.

Actually, here was the article about them: http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Students_Hope_3D_Printed_Rocket_Engine_Will_Break_Records_999.html

We bought a commercial solid motor. We haven't the facilities at our University to go mucking around with rocket fuels. The motor we bought had an Ammonia Perchlorate Composite Propellant.

One team did have a pure liquid fuel engine (I think) but I don't think it ended up flying.

The data we collected from a commercial Stratologger sensor indicated a constant temperature from ground to apogee. Since the sensor uses temperature and pressure to calculate altitude based on an International Standard Atmosphere model (I think) the final altitude reading was skewed. We're trying to avoid these kinds of issues in future rockets Not sure at which altitude maxQ was encountered. Since there was no supersonic flight, we weren't too concerned about it.

For those of you who asked, here's the video of the launch: enjoy!

How many years has your team been competing so far?

I think we had at least one of each of those at this year's IREC!

Honestly, they were all pretty good! I didn't get a chance to find out, but how did your payload work? (Also, did you spot me while you were there? I was the guy with the black cowboy hat!) The reason why the fins ended up that way is an interesting story. Originally, the payload weights were distributed differently, but then our payload team changed their minds a bit and things had to be moved around. This small change actually made the rocket overstable! Most of the other parts had already been manufactured, but we still had to CNC route the fins. So I just swept them forward on the CNC trace until the stability was back where we wanted it. It incurred no extra cost and took all of half an hour (and the final product looked extra cool). A good engineering decision if I do say so myself.