Because of the deleterious effects of galactic cosmic radiation, solar flares, zero gravity, and psychological stress, there is a strong motivation to develop high-specific-impulse and high-thrust spacecraft for rapid transport of astronauts between the planets. I present a novel spacecraft design using a large lightweight sail (spinnaker) driven by the pressure pulses from a series of nuclear explosions. The spacecraft appears to be a singularly competent and economical vehicle for high-speed interplanetary travel. Remarkably, the mass of the spinnaker is theoretically independent of the size of its canopy or the number or length of its tethers. Consequently, the canopy can be made very large to minimize radiation damage from the nuclear explosions and the tethers can be made very long to mitigate radiation hazard to the crew. I calculate the specific impulse of the nuclear explosive propellant as a function of the mass and yield of the explosives and the thrust as a function of yield and repetition rate. I show that the weight of the sail can be greatly reduced by tethering the canopy in many places on its surface and that the canopy mass is directly proportional to the bomb yield and inversely proportional to the number of tethers. The pressure from the nuclear explosion imparts a large impulsive acceleration to the lightweight spinnaker, which must be translated to a small smooth acceleration of the space capsule by using either the elasticity of the tethers or a servo winch in the space capsule or a combination of the two. Finally, I derive the optimum canopy shape and show that it will generally intercept about 2(pi) of the solid angle from the detonation point. Should the political questions connected with this unconventional use of nuclear explosives be favorably resolved, the invention will be a good candidate for propulsion in the Mars mission.


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    Titel :

    Some new ideas for nuclear explosive spacecraft propulsion


    Beteiligte:
    J. C. Solem (Autor:in)

    Erscheinungsdatum :

    1991


    Format / Umfang :

    17 pages


    Medientyp :

    Report


    Format :

    Keine Angabe


    Sprache :

    Englisch




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