Space.. The Final Frontier closer each day?

I just read this article and this could be cool, perhaps we will be seeing other planets very soon!

http://trekmovie.com/2010/02/06/editorial-president-proposes-bold-new-approach-to-exploring-the-final-frontier/

Hate to be the bringer of bad news, but we're not going to be seeing any extrasolar planets in our life time. It takes at least a human life span to get to our closest star, alpha centauri, on sub light speed if i remember correctly. And our sub light speed is very far below light speed. Very very far. The best we can hope for is mars or some other planet in our system.

Not entirely true, NASA is developing the Ion Engine, it starts at like 4 MPH but increases over time and if they were to launch it now, by 2020 it would have gained so much speed it would be at Alpha Centari, but i have my own design for a space engine wich i will get a paton on.

Actually, Evil Person, thats where your wrong. They already have ION engines. They sent a space probe to another galaxy already, or they're planning too. A plus about ION engines is that they has unlimited energy, unless something goes wrong in the engine, but thats rare, and it hasn't happened to NASA's ION engines, yet. There predicting a lot of stuff of what would happen. It also gives off no pollution, I see in the future of planes using ION engines instead of Jet Engines. Or thats what I think planes will use.

By 2020? Are you frakking kidding me? Ion engines dont do light speed. Hell, i doubt they do half lightspeed. It would take 5 years at full lightspeed (which is impossible unless the string theory turns out to be true, and even then, it would take several generations to make a fully working lightspeed engine small enough to fit in a ship), and 10 at 50% of lightspeed. An ion engine cant do 50% lightspeed.

And you're making plans for an engine that you want patented? Snap back to reality, rocket science is one of the hardest sciences there is.

none of you actually read the article did you?

I did. And i think it's a good idea letting the private sector take over at least partially. The private sector is always more effective, since they have a better motive, money.

But, like i said, the best we can hope for is mars.

yeah, but if they do manage to develop an advanced propulsion system in say 10-15 years, Mars would become weeks, and the Asteroid belt would only be months and Jupiter in around a year, and then once the tech is there, it will no doubt be quickly expanded upon. I'm not talking start trek and sending civilians into deep space, but perhaps in the next 100-150 years the fanning out through he solar system.

Thingy wrote:By 2020? Are you frakking kidding me? Ion engines dont do light speed. Hell, i doubt they do half lightspeed. It would take 5 years at full lightspeed (which is impossible unless the string theory turns out to be true, and even then, it would take several generations to make a fully working lightspeed engine small enough to fit in a ship), and 10 at 50% of lightspeed. An ion engine cant do 50% lightspeed.

And you're making plans for an engine that you want patented? Snap back to reality, rocket science is one of the hardest sciences there is.

Well... there was a probe equiped with an ion boster which target was reach pluto in 2012, but the ion tecnology wasn't very well developed in 2001 and they canceled it due to budget... But it was restarted and named "New Horizons"... Here's the wikipedia page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons

But this one uses state of the art chemical rockets...

did i say it was an ion engine i wanted to get patened, no, also it is not a chemical rocket, it is not a rocket at all.

Evil Person wrote:did i say it was an ion engine i wanted to get patened, no, also it is not a chemical rocket, it is not a rocket at all.

Ok, so I hope you have made dozens of tests and such, cause they will only allow you to patent that only if you're sure it works... and if it is an ion engine, you would need to be billionary in order to build a functional one, cause... all the basic ones were the experiments with Ion Energy made by NASA...

What kind of engine is it then? And how does it work?

But anyways, if it's anything more advanced than the stuff you'll find in a toy train, you havent made it, and most likely will never make it. It takes one hell of a science team to make an engine even a tiny bit more advanced than the stuff we alredy have. And you're only a 12 year old. I doubt you got your pals to the treehouse and designed an engine better than anything NASA's labs have made so far.

Thingy wrote:But anyways, if it's anything more advanced than the stuff you'll find in a toy train, you havent made it, and most likely will never make it. It takes one hell of a science team to make an engine even a tiny bit more advanced than the stuff we alredy have. And you're only a 12 year old. I doubt you got your pals to the treehouse and designed an engine better than anything NASA's labs have made so far.

Well... I almost did it... but then NASA invented it one minute earlier (xD)

But yeah, you're right... it is needed an very high budget and an huge team to make a decent chemical rocket... So, EP... don't think you outsmart a governamental company...

OK, who keeps saying i am 12!!!!!!!! Anyway, i said wi WILL get a paton on it, and i didnt say i DID and or WAS getting a paton on it. Anyway i will not tell you how it works because you could steal the idea, lets just say it has some problems, like why it wont work with no oxigen.....hmmmm details.

Evil Person wrote:OK, who keeps saying i am 12!!!!!!!! Anyway, i said wi WILL get a paton on it, and i didnt say i DID and or WAS getting a paton on it. Anyway i will not tell you how it works because you could steal the idea, lets just say it has some problems, like why it wont work with no oxigen.....hmmmm details.

Must resist tempation to laugh... ahahahahahahahahabhahahahahahahaahahahahah! O crap... I've failed... xD

An Ion Engine isn't an explosion related one, like it's chemical cousin... it consists in aceleration of molecules with an EM Field until they become ionized molucules and escape from an orifice, pushing the ship in the oposite direction...

He didnt't say it's an ion engine. Probably some kind of fairy dust engine or an engine that runs on unicorn horns.

And sorry, i meant 13, or 14 or 15 or whatever. Same thing, it's still faaaaar to young to even make a half decent car engine.

Evil person. I would bet my entire life's earnings that you will never make an ion engine of your own desine. (and if i do what i want to for a living it will work out to apox. $4,000,000)

Evil person, can you tell me how fast the gravity of earth accelerates all objects (in meters)? (no one else answer)

32 Feet per second i think, but i am talking launch it from a space station on the Moon, i am estimating it will take a good 60 Years to atlease get the basic propulsion system online, and a good 20 to get the funding.

Do you know what you need for that? Study a lot (really!), go to College (Aeronautics, of preference), and the go to NASA, ESA, or something like that...

Btw, 32 feet/s is how many m/s?

that was way off. and i asked for it in meters. If you dont know that basic physics question then then there is no way you could have made your own ion engine. the force of gravity is its 9.8 meters per second
^2. you were close but you should have known the squared part (^2) as in x squared or (x^2)

but i will continue to play your game. What material do you ionize for maximum usage and why?

Well i never said it was ion, and it is a very basic design, i dout it even works. I would need 20 years just to get someone to even try to belive it works.

Anyway, you Ionise Plasma for best usage. (I think, i am not well versed in ion engins as that is not what i am working on)

why dont you tell us what kind of space engine you are working on. no one here will "steal" it.

well, i am not shure what type, but if you look at the thrust the regualr booster rocket makes when it leaves earths orbit, it uses 99% of its fuel. Since regular boosters do that they generate this speed: 17,500 MPH about (that is also high hypersonic speeds) so if you were to launch the rocket from space you would get to a planet that is 370,000,000,000 Miles Away in 24 Centuries. So i will not tell you anymore about the speed, that is a low estimate of speed. But i will tell you how i plan to get it to space, you know that thing, if you have tin foil, and you put copper wire on top of it and put a charge through the wire and it creates an energy field, this only works in an oxigen occupied space, so i would sue it to get the rocket to the high atmousephear. and launch the rocket there to get maximum flight velocity. it would nned veary large tanks of fuel though.

do you know how un realistic that sounds?

Yes, but i went to the NASA site to reasearch how fast there rockets go in orbit. and Reentering orbit and all that. then i devided the MPH by 24 hours, then the number of days by 365 to find years and then by 100 to find centuries.

well, i'm locking this thread as the intention of the possible expansion and thought of how cool this might be, just got ruined by you all