Spinlaunch?

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AntennaGuy United States of America
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Spinlaunch?

#1

Post by AntennaGuy »


This rather ambitious (to be kind) launch concept:
https://www.spinlaunch.com
has been pretty intensely criticized:
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/20 ... gshot.html
and

Hmm... Ok, any oblong shape or soft material as a payload (like a human) is a problem here. Aside from crushing it, while its center of mass might go in a straight line when released, it will continue to rotate/tumble after you let go of it. So you can't just point it straight ahead and then let it go... And that vacuum window in the video seems to have the thickness of paper. Holding vacuum in Earth's atmosphere (~ 14.7 psi) while spanning a large flat aperture requires something thick and strong. Not to mention the instant imbalancing of your centrifuge once you release the payload, and... Oh well.
:rocket: :rocket: :popcorn:
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KathyNS Canada
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Re: Spinlaunch?

#2

Post by KathyNS »


I was skeptical the first time I heard about this. The amount of G's the payload would have to endure in the spin-up would be insane. It would have to leave the launcher at hypersonic velocity, which means it would lose speed rapidly as it climbed. And it would have to include a sizable rocket to get it up to orbital speed before it fell back to Earth. The rocket of course would have to be solid-fueled, since no tank of liquid fuel is going to stand that kind of G load.

I didn't think of the angular momentum of the payload, but I did consider the unbalanced centrifuge. The thing would shake itself apart on the first launch test, launching all kinds of debris on suborbital trajectories, landing randomly all over whatever state it is built in

The physics just seemed ridiculous.
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Re: Spinlaunch?

#3

Post by AntennaGuy »


O.M.G.:
https://spacenews.com/spinlaunch-raises-71-million/
“We get asked a lot about the g’s,” he said. “It’s a very gentle 10,000 g’s.”
:doh: :eek: :angry-banghead: :angry-cussingblack:
:sigh: :sigh:
* Meade 323 refractor on a manual equatorial mount.
* Celestron C6 SCT on a Twilight 1 Alt-Az mount
Prof. Barnhardt to Klaatu in The Day the Earth Stood Still: "There are several thousand questions I'd like to ask you.”
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