Ah, not exactly buying that whole Moon Elevator thing... it still makes good sci-fi...
But, I did find a gem of a real video on YouTube...
This shows the Tether deployment that was part of STS-75 way back in 1996...! Confirmed a bunch of things for me...
Check out that curve (they call it a...
I had wondered the same... and that orbital observation is correct... It appears that the lower end is dominated by centripetal forces of gravity - it's pulling forward... the upper end is in a lower gravitational gradient and not as dominant so it drags... End forces are tangential and along...
Interestingly, that does seem to be the preferred deployment... I've just come across some very interesting material from Shuttle Mission STS-75. It was a Tether Experimental Mission and it appears it was deployed in that profile.
Also, I did hear back from the JAXA KITE team. Currently, they...
Found some interesting baseline material in of all places - Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_tether
The entries are far-ranging from the topics of our discussions to the more scientific science-fiction - tether elevators, etc (and I don't say that negatively, because a lot of...
There seems to be several "camps" in the discussion. MFB thinks the tether structure should be considered as a rigid body like ISS (even though the tether is completely flexible). Sophiecentaur thinks the tether will go into the desired orbital configuration and stay there (even though the...
Interesting thoughts about orbits. I had always assumed that the tether-end would actually be propelled into a different orbit - by standard means - Hohmann transfer orbit and so on. Now the idea that Janus proposed that the Tether experimenters wouldn't do that, but instead would just change...
https://www.plasma-universe.com/Electromagnetic_force
Well, I was hoping that the Physicists in this blog would tell us about that... But my understanding is the Electromagnetic Force - EMF - is the force that plays multiple roles in this situation... (1) the Earth's magnetic field and the...
and other questions...
First comment "Why": For a multi-mile tether length, you can't assume that the tether will just deploy by itself under low tension. It would have to be carefully designed to be so. When the propelled tether-end component started to propel away from the tether-source, if it...
Totally agree, a "sideways" tether deployment is out... And wouldn't expect "sideways" to be the plan... Would expect orbital deployment to depend on the goal of the tether mission. A higher orbited tether-end would be a be a drag (lower my source-end orbit), and a lower orbited tether-end...
Regarding tension... Would expect the tether to contain a non-conducting connecting support element and then a conducting bare wire which would not have to bear the forces of the physical source to end connection. The non-conducting component hopefully would not be taunt - this would have to be...
Well, I say that about tensile forces because "it depends", which is part of the lack of a "design" for tether deployment and de-orbit configurations.
1. If the tether is deployed in the same orbital plane - which I doubt - then I agree there would only be the force of the EMF - very small? If...
Okay, agree... so three things...
(1) On orbit, the tether is orbiting at that velocity, and if it is 1-2 km long, there must be a fair amount of tensile force along the tether. Can it be calculated?
(2) We must modify the earthly test model... Consider this, an enterprise hard disk drive...
Here's an experiment: spin a long wire at 18,000 MPH though a magnetic field and see what happens. Can really do that on earth... must appropriately modify..
Ionosphere: the layer of the Earth's atmosphere that contains a high concentration of ions and free electrons and is able to reflect...
Hi guys, sorry I've been away. Can we pick it up with "economics". Good thoughts and believe you're correct, but we should also consider the investment side. How much would you invest in a Tether Experiment let alone a Tether Service? JAXA just invested ?? millions and got a return of "zero"...
:oldcool:
Good question 1oldman2, and thank you for digging up the Abstract. To answer your question, it is the same thing that showed up in the Abstract... OLD AGE - it's over 10 years old. Where is anything new - there isn't. And no offense to the Abstract writers, it appears that most are...