Elevator on da Moon

[Anonymous No.5007961]

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/michaellaine/space-elevator-science-climb-to-the-sky-a-tethered

Thoughts on kickstarter as a method to fund cool research? My vote: crowdsource everything.

Also space is cool...

[Anonymous No.5007974]

>>5007961
we had this thread yesterday...

[Anonymous No.5007986]

Correct me if I'm wrong. In order for this thing to work. Whatever is floating out in the space will be attached to earth using this space elevator thus making it not an orbital object and more of attached object?

[Anonymous No.5007988]

>>5007986
But you can launch things from it.

[Anonymous No.5007991]

>>5007988
Then wouldn't this space elevator be better to the moon.

[Anonymous No.5007993]

>>5007991
You can launch things to the moon from it.

[Anonymous No.5008000]

>>5007991
[sarcastic response]Yes. If you can build a ground terminal that can go around the Earth near the equator once every month.[/sarcastic response]

[a less sarcastic response]No, because the strength of material needed is orders of magnitude higher than physically possible.[/a less sarcastic response]

[Anonymous No.5008002]

>>5008000
wouldn't the same apply for space station?

[Anonymous No.5008004]

Why are they using batteries? Even the Nasa sponsored competitions required them to rely only on lasers for powering the climber. Afterall, one of the many benefits of having a space elevator is that you don't have to take your fuel up with you.

[Anonymous No.5008007]

For all things LEO the elevator is totally worthless.

[Anonymous No.5008009]

I think this funding method will promote projects which sound cool to edgy, facebook-posting, nerd-wannabies, but projects of real science will remain underfunded.
It's like populism in terms of science funding.

[Anonymous No.5008012]

>>5008009
This is everything that's wrong with this century

[Anonymous No.5008013]

>you don't have to take your fuel up with you.

Compare the angular velocity at height h to that needed to stay in orbit. Find the missing energy.

From a practical point of view the space elevator is mostly troll physics.

[Anonymous No.5008018]

>>5008013
>wants to use rockets to power an elevator
YOU are troll physics.

[Anonymous No.5008021]

The idea of a space elevator is neat but isn't possible with current technology.

The attaching rod must be in contact with both the moon and the earth at all times (it is even less viable if yo don't)
The material made from the attaching rod must be strong enough to survive thousands of gigatonnes of gravity at all times and the elevator's weight in transit
The flexability to not break every-time there is an upper-atmosphere windstorm that happens To put the metals below freezing point making the line brittle if it's a metal
The ability to interchange sections for maintenance and upkeep
The affordability to make it a good-enough idea to fund
The way of singular propulsion to break terminal velocity for the elevator and lastly :
Available resources to make sure the damn thing can actually be built.

>>5008018
and what other mode of prepulsion can it go by? magnetic lift? how are you going to integrate that into the system? pully? HA!
vacuum system? that'll be too expensive to maintain and if there's a breach you're fucked.

there is no right answer.

[Anonymous No.5008031]

>>5008021
>attaching rod
You... you're joking. You can't really be ignorant enough to think that a space elevator is a rigid structure? Right?

>propulsion
The current designs usually envision either conductive strips carrying power to the electrical engines of the climber or beamed power. Usually both for the sake of redundancy.

[Anonymous No.5008037]

>>5008031
than what would your idealistic structure be?
would you have it be a giant coilgun shooting you to the moon and back?

[Anonymous No.5008052]

>>5007986

Yup. The counterweight is slightly further out than geostationary orbit, so the tether actually pulls the object forward, which creates centrifugal force which keeps the tether taut, which allows us to pull stuff up with it.

[Anonymous No.5008057]

>>5008021

I've never heard of any space elevator that actually attached to the moon. Most have just used a non-rigid structure up towards a counterweight orbiting the earth some distance away (not the moon).

Also, none I've heard of have ever used anything but essentially wheels climbing up a rope powered either from the surface by lasers or from an electrical current on the rope like a tram.

[Anonymous No.5008059]

>>5008037
A ribbon or a tether. Hanging from the near-geostationary asteroid that works as the spaceside terminal.

[Anonymous No.5008062]

>>5008021

>attach to both earth and moon

you know the moon does this thing called orbiting right?

[Anonymous No.5008068]

>>5008062
and there's a thing called a geosynchronous orbit.

[sage No.5008069]

>>5008062
different speeds

[Anonymous No.5008071]

>>5008068
The moon is not in geosynch orbit.

And his point is that the elevator is not even supposed to go to the moon, only up to geosynch orbit, to a convenient asteroid put there by humans.

[Anonymous No.5008075]

>>5008071
alright, so the asteroid is in orbit with the earth, what does the asteroid do then?

[Anonymous No.5008080]

>>5008075
It expends its momentum to haul stuff into space I guess.

[Anonymous No.5008082]

>>5008075
Like I said, it functions as the other terminus for the elevator ribbon/tether/cable. It's the counterweight, balancing out the pull on the ribbon and the climbers by Earth's gravity.

[Anonymous No.5008085]

>>5008082
so the asteroid is tethered to the moon?

[Anonymous No.5008093]

>>5008021

Actually, no.

You don't attach it to the moon. That's stupid, because then your front end of the rope would coil around the earth, or you would try and accelerate the moon so a month takes a day. That's unfathomably silly.

So instead we bring in a near earth asteroid to slightly outside geostationary orbit. This way, when you attach a tether to it, you only need to accelerate it to geostationary angular velocity. Since we can pick the position of the counterweight for ourselves, we can pick the capacity of the elevator.

The strength of the tether needs to be no more than twice the gravitational force *on the tether*, plus the force you want to exert on the elevator cart(s). The counterweight keeps itself in orbit for free.

Because most the tether has to do is hold itself up, it's also very easy to have redundancies. If a carbon nanotube wire with a diameter of a millimeter can keep itself in space, why not have a thousand of them, all in one bundle?

True, shear forces are a problem. But if you have a thousandfold redundant system, you can afford to put countermeasures along the tether, such as rockets (against shear stress) and repair crew carts and, yea, pullies.

The affordability, and, more importantly, profitability, are the biggest reasons why we aren't already building the damn thing. The necessary resources - carbon and asteroids - exist aplenty, and with Manhattan-level funding, mass production of carbon nanotubes would be invented within two years.

[Anonymous No.5008103]

>>5008075

Oh my fucking god you dense motherfucker, here I just drew this for you.

[Anonymous No.5008108]

>>5008103
nice circle you got there

[Anonymous No.5008114]

>>5008108

Thanks, I tried to capture all of Earf's features.

[Anonymous No.5008121]

>>5008103
>Earf
Welcome.

[Anonymous No.5008122]

>>5008114
would space station suffice instead of some asteroid?

[Anonymous No.5008133]

GUIS GUIS! WE HAVE NEW BREAKTHROUGH TECHNOLOGY. NOW ALL WE NEED IS 8000 DOLLARS.

BUUUUUT IF WE GET 3 MILLION DOLLARS. WE'LL THROW IN A STUDY!

[Anonymous No.5008134]

Can someone explain to me what this elevator is used for? Keep it simple, i'm kind of slow.

[Anonymous No.5008140]

>>5008134
Nothing. It doesn't exist.

if it did exist it would provide provisions to space station make cost of launching things to Mars or other places cheaper since we don't have to pay for fuel to boost that baby out to orbit first.

[Anonymous No.5008146]

>>5008140
Thanks anon.

[Anonymous No.5008145]

>>5008134

It's basically a ribbon attaching the Earf to a counterweight in space. A package climbs it using an electric motor powered remotely either by lasers. This allows a lightweight object to climb up into space at a constant speed so that you don't have to deal with escape velocity, friction, rocket stages or any of that shit. No more chemical rockets = much reduced cost of sending shit to space. Also makes it easier to retrieve things from space since you can lower them in the same way and not have to deal with burning up in the atmosphere and shit.

It has a lot of unresolved problems though and would be a colossal engineering task to build and maintain.

[Anonymous No.5008152]

>>5008134
Imagine a rope that goes from the ground up into space, with a giant weight on the space end. Because the earth is spinning, centrifugal force keeps the weight out in space.

That's the premise of a space elevator. What is it used for? If we had a space elevator, we could just ride the elevator up into space anytime we needed to get there. We wouldn't ever need to launch rockets or shuttles, just ride an elevator up.

This is good because we'd be able to lift so much more into space. Shuttles only have a small bit of room for cargo.

[Anonymous No.5008177]

>crowdsource everything
>defund nasa
>give your money away anyways
>pretend it's a better way of doing things

Fucking humans. Why don't we just rename the IRS to Kickstarter?

[Anonymous No.5008176]

>>5008152
Right but surely there are huge problems with a huge fucking elevator connected between earth and the moon... Isn't the moon receding from us slowly?
I dont know enough about the moons orbit of us but is it consistant such that the elevator wouldnt get wrapped around the world?

[Anonymous No.5008179]

>>5008176
The moon also isn't in geostationary orbit. And it's really, really far away. At least it's tidally locked to earth so it always shows the same face, but that wouldn't help much as it spins around the earth every 28 days.

[Anonymous No.5008183]

>>5008179
So this is plain pants on head retarded unless we sync the speed at which the moon orbits with the speed at which the earth rotates?

[Anonymous No.5008190]

>>5008183
>>5008176
NOT MOON
IT'S NOT AND NEVER WAS SUPPOSED TO CONNECT THE EARTH TO THE MOON

[Anonymous No.5008191]

>>5008183
>>5008179
>>5008176

No retards, the counterweight the elevator is attached to is NOT the moom. Refer to
>>5008103

[Anonymous No.5008195]

>>5008183
It would be easier to wrap the whole equator of the earth with a giant space station that followed the moon to keep it always in the same part of the sky.

So this whole fucking elevator would be built on a train, traveling at about 1000 miles an hour.

[Anonymous No.5008238]

>the elevator is from earth to moon and thus impossible
>the elevator is a rigid structure and thus impossible
>the climbers would carry their own fuel and thus impossible
A collective Fuck You to anyone who still thinks any of these.

[Anonymous No.5008290]

>>5008238

impossible with currently predictable technology, and incredibly inefficient even if it did work. carrying you own fuel does not make it impossible but makes it much less useful as not having to carry fuel up was one of the main reasons to build one of these in the first place.

from earth to moon has the problems of huge distance, picture shows the distance and how long it takes light to travel that distance. also the moon is not geocentric. material strength is obviously a problem and we don't know anything that could take the stress.

none of this is necessarily impossible, but far beyond our reach. yeah it can and should be researched, but expecting to make one of these any time soon is just plain stupid.

[Anonymous No.5008299]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9Do3dz9TR0

Let's go moon guys. This gon be gud!

[Anonymous No.5008307]

>>5008290
Hey, fuck you.
As has been said, by me and others, many times, the space elevator is not from earth to moon.

It's from Earth to orbit or from Moon to Moon orbit.

The climbers will be externally powered.

Colossal Carbon Tubes seem to have the tensile strength to make all this possible. Now we need to invent a process to make them in bulk, with as few defects as possible.

[Anonymous No.5008313]

>>5008307

the post i replied to specifically said earth to moon. i don't care about the rest. how about you learn to read and shut the fuck up before telling anyone else to.

[Anonymous No.5008316]

>>5008313
The post you replied to was intended to underline the fact that the space elevator is not supposed to be from earth to moon as well as two other misconceptions that have plagued this thread.

So it indeed seems that YOU are the one having problems with reading comprehension.

[Anonymous No.5008452]

This happens when you release an object from the elevator.

Below about 2/3 of the GEO radius it will hit the Earth's surface.

This is what most elevator fans do not want to understand.

[Anonymous No.5008470]

>>5008452
I personally am a stair fan. Why aren't we building space stairs, or better yet, a space escalator? A space escalator would have the added benefit of being faster than a set of space stairs.

[Anonymous No.5008632]

[Anonymous No.5008639]

>>5008452
No, it is you who does not understand. No one is talking about unpowered travel to space. That is ridiculous. The mere thought that you could have a rope going up into space, attach something to it, and have it magically ascend is beyond retarded. This is why every post in this thread describing it has been talking about using a laser powered climber.

tl;dr: You sir are and idiot.

[Anonymous No.5008648]

>>5008152

If you're just shipping cargo up, why not just scale the elevator down to where tensile strength is achievable, make like 5 of them, and send shit up that way?

[Anonymous No.5008808]

>>5008648

The mass of the string has enough weight to break itself, that's why it requires carbon nanotubes.

[Anonymous No.5008835]

>>5008075

It makes your mother's dildo float away?

[Anonymous No.5008837]

>>5008632

Calculate the mass of steel required if 1m = 1kg

[Anonymous No.5008857]

>>5008639

You are a prime example of those who do not understand. It's not about climbing, it's about achieving orbital velocity.

The space elevator idea is mainly based on ignorance regarding simple orbital mechanics.

I would really like to know how many space elevator fans think you become weightless because you leave the atmosphere.

Imagine you want to use the elevator to get a satellite into a low earth orbit like that of the ISS, some 300km. At that height the orbital velocity of the space elevator is

vo=w*ro=2π*6.678e6m/86164s=487m/s

but to stay in orbit the satellite will need

vo=sqrt(G*M/ro)=7728m/s

which means you need a real launch platform, fuel, people, and all this reliably functioning in the vacuum of space. Doesn't seem realistic to me.

You could lift the satellite to a heigher orbit and launch from there, but then you have a complicated transfer orbit which also requires a veritable propulsion system.

So what's the point of a space elevator if it only replaces the first stage of a rocket?

[Anonymous No.5008871]

>>5008837
A 5cm rotor would be more like 15,7kg/m.

Depending on the design, that would amount to 23,5 to 47,1 metric kilotonnes.

[Anonymous No.5008874]

you know what would be meag cool? to first have a 4chan fund where we collect 10k$, THEN we send it to kickstarter and name one of the robots something lulzy, like Niggerjew 3000

[Anonymous No.5008885]

>>5008857
The elevator itself works as a satellite for almost half the globe.

When you have an elevator, you're supposed to CLEAR OUT all orbits that might intersect it.

Build three elevators and you have almost the whole surface of the planet covered. The few spots not covered can be dealt with by high-altitude blimps.

Also, even if you did for some reason want to put up a satellite into a lower orbit, you can lift it into the elevator and launch it with a booster from above the atmosphere, which would save you the cost of hauling all that fuel through the thick atmosphere itself. Again, a lot of savings.

[Anonymous No.5008899]

Ok, guys. Have you even read something about this project?

They're not planning to build an space elevator in Earth, but in the Moon.

Lower gravity, no atmosphere and stuff.

[Anonymous No.5008906]

>>5008899
I know, but some wigger misunderstood the concept and thought the plan was to build a fucking tower from the earth to the moon.

Then me and some others tried to inform him and a few others who thought he knew his shit.

Then it went the way of every SElevator thread ever, with some jerkass pointing out every flaw ever, and the rest pointing out how these flaws can be overcome. Then along comes some other jerkass who fails to read the thread and points out the same flaws and...

Ad nauseam.

[Anonymous No.5008913]

>>5008837

It's better than the 35,000 km long cable needed for a space elevator.

[Anonymous No.5008923]

>>5008899

Wait, what? Why do we need help getting stuff off the Moon? The Moon's gravity is feeble, you could probably get stuff off of it's surface with a trebuchet.

[Anonymous No.5008932]

>>5008923

What I've read is that they state that rockets are way more expensive that using this space elevator.

[Anonymous No.5009116]

>>5008923
But it still DOES have gravity. And to get out from that takes fuel, which in turn has to be hauled up from Earth and landed gently onto the Moon.

Savings, see?

[Anonymous No.5009200]

I just think there's far easier ways of getting off the Moon than by building a huge space elevator to Earth-Moon L1. A track 1,000 km long along the surface of the Moon could get stuff into orbit at a leisurely 3G.

[Anonymous No.5011077]

bump

[Anonymous No.5011093]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ4Qp2xeRds&feature=g-user-u

this