Project Orion Ground Launch.

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ok sorry but my dad owned a machine shop and I have to say a 40 story shock absorber is not possible, think about it, the cost alone would out weight the dang project, to get the proper diameter to support the height of 40 story’s is unreal to think of building material wise, don’t even think about skipping on that part either by saying well it wouldn’t have to be that big we can use brace’s or retention wires like on towers, not possible either. Also look at what your saying about a shield just imagine how think it would have to be, and think of the weight, you really need to study some kinetic energy and se what happens to a human body before even thinking about this.

Plus the idea of blowing up a nuke under your ass is the same as shoving one up your ass and blowing it up, do you really think you can ever find someone willing to do this I don’t think so.

Also imagine what a nuke would do to the ice shelf its in enough trouble today as it is, do you really want to help it along are you that big of a extremist in your adventures that you would be willing to destroy Antarctica’s eco system and damage the ice shelf all at the same time to try and further space adventure the cost just is not worth it.
 
oh sorry to say but 10 tons would be no where never the weight of a 40 stroy tall shock absorber, better try closer to 150 - 300 ton if not more But i would say a whole lot more if you want material that can withstand a nuke blast
 
ProjectOrion said:
No atomic bomb has ever accidentally detonated
Certainly, but no fusion bomb has been exposed to multi-million degree plasma, which is what we're talking about in the case of your blast shield failing in some way. Just out of interest though, could you tell me how many tons of HE are needed for the number of bombs you are proposing?
 
What the plan relies on as well, is a detonation frequency at launch, of around 1 per second, although I have heard this figure being doubled, or quadrupled. So the launch system has to eject a nuke every second, and detonate it at a precise distance from the shield. Of course, some sort of mechanism has to shield the next nuke in the pipeline from the blast of the first, or the nukes have to be able to withstand the ablation from the detonation of their predecessor.

So, problems, ... have we ever design a nuke that can withstand a nuclear blast from another device with the same yield? Can we make a mechanical device, some sort of blast resistant iris, flap, door or shield, that can open and close fast enough, and reliably?

How are the nukes detonated as well? Timed explosions, one presumes, so something triggers them in the magazine prior to ejection. Meaning there is no feedback from any failsafe system should the shield fail.

Anyway, how does this beast steer? So far, I've seen no proposed guidance method for it. It could go straight up, but weighing what it does, conventional thrusters wouldn't be able to turn or slow it. Only having thrust at one end, which isn't vectored in any way, means it can only move in one direction. Just how was it going to park itself in orbit?
 
phlogistician said:
What the plan relies on as well, is a detonation frequency at launch, of around 1 per second, although I have heard this figure being doubled, or quadrupled. So the launch system has to eject a nuke every second, and detonate it at a precise distance from the shield. Of course, some sort of mechanism has to shield the next nuke in the pipeline from the blast of the first, or the nukes have to be able to withstand the ablation from the detonation of their predecessor.

So, problems, ... have we ever design a nuke that can withstand a nuclear blast from another device with the same yield? Can we make a mechanical device, some sort of blast resistant iris, flap, door or shield, that can open and close fast enough, and reliably?

How are the nukes detonated as well? Timed explosions, one presumes, so something triggers them in the magazine prior to ejection. Meaning there is no feedback from any failsafe system should the shield fail.

Anyway, how does this beast steer? So far, I've seen no proposed guidance method for it. It could go straight up, but weighing what it does, conventional thrusters wouldn't be able to turn or slow it. Only having thrust at one end, which isn't vectored in any way, means it can only move in one direction. Just how was it going to park itself in orbit?

Good points. This whole idea is more ludicrous the more you think about it. :eek:
 
the shield its self would out weight the entire craft think about it a nuke blast is super hot and will melt metal, you can't just weld a bunch of pieces of metal plate together to get your proper thickness needed to withstand the heat from one blast, you would have to have a cast and poor the molting metal in but then again it would be so big and weigh so much you couldn't even move it, even if you could move it from the casting how are you going to get it to antarctica a ship ya right it would sink the ship when you put it on the ship.
 
almost forgot yes US nukes can withstand a blast from another nuke but it makes them none fuctional for some reason, plus what are you going to use to shield the electronics from the EMP that the nukes gonna produce
 
What have you provided in this debate Q? Apart from snide remarks.

What's the point? I've seen your obsession with Orion over the years get torn apart by everyone, just like Phlogy is doing now. I've already spent time on the Orion forum teaching a thing or two to those nutters who are also obsessed with the project. They too had no idea what they were talking about.

You and the other nutters simply don't get it.
 
cardiovascular_tech said:
almost forgot yes US nukes can withstand a blast from another nuke but it makes them none fuctional for some reason, plus what are you going to use to shield the electronics from the EMP that the nukes gonna produce

I don,t quite get this withstanding nuke blasts bit Cardo. But an excellent point about the EMP . Mind you, its not that hard to overcome. Virtually all military vehicles are what they called sceened for EMP. Basically all the wiring ,electronics is wrapped in a form of Faraday cage. So they can add that lot to the all up weight- should add what, 500 tons? ;)
 
Heres the other aspect I think hasn't been explained that well by pro-Orion types;

The nukes are stored in the body of the spacecraft, and ejected one by one. They must pass through space, between the shock absorbers, and exit through a hole in the pusher plate, travelling a further, what was it, 40m before detonating.

So let's think about timing. How long are these shocks again? 40 stories? say, 2 or 3 metres each, so average 100m, ... plus the 40m on the other side. Each nuke must travel 140m before detonation. One presumes armed as it leaves the craft.

Now, even if these nukes could be made to withstand a blast from another, they still couldn't be deployed too close to each other, or the detonation from one nuke would push on the other, so they have to be on opposite sides of the hole in the blast plate, and preferably, this hole is sealed with an iris. So either, we have to push a single nuke from the space craft at 140m/s so it travels the appropriate distance in 1 second before detonation, OR, we could reduce this rather large velocity by having two in the air at the same time, ... but then, if we have an iris in the blast shield, timing is very important, as the blast shield moves when the detonation occurs, shortening the flight time on the craft side of the shield for the nuke, and this distance has to be longer than the distance on the other side, to allow the other nuke to get to it's detonation distance, and allow for the iris to close.

So, that iris is proving problematic. but without it, we can't really have two nukes in the air at the same time, so we're left with slinging a nuke at 140m/s out of the back of the craft. That's fast. I guess some of the mechanical energy from the springs could be used, but that gives us a ballistic launch, of the nuke, and no control once launched. It's hot, and flying.

Of course, if that figure of 1 launch per second is replaced by the other numbers, say, 4 launches per second, we're talking shoving a nuke at 560m/s. Now that is really quite fast.

So, I'd love to see the schematics for the delivery system, and love to see these problems solved in ProjectOrions own delivery system plans. Because no matter where you eject your nukes from, you have to give them at least 40m/s speed, if launching at the pusher plate. I guess you could use the momentum of the plate returning to it's extended position to lob them out? In which case, you're storing nukes in the structure that is taking the full force of the blast!

And I'd still love to know how this thing is going to be steered.
 
LOL OH deary me, i'm nearly pissing myself with laughter here. I just have a vision of a huge flying junkyard spitting nukes out of its ass every point dot of a second with some poor sod hanging on to the molten remains of a control stick whislt his kneecaps are being hammered through his skull with a force of about 1000000000g his teeth are shattering in his skull and some joker in mission control is saying" Orion , you are go for throttle up" Yeh, how the fuck is he gonna steer a fecking nuke?? and its not just one!! its loads of them!!
Is there any wonder NASA pulled the plug on this one?
"so slotty, we hear you have an idea for a spacecraft?"
"YUP, i sure have"
"So tell us about it"
"Well, i have an idea to get us into space by spitting nukes out the back of the ship and riding the blast waves to the stars"
" Clear your desk- your fired!" :D
 
Come on Orion, you want me to believe that this is a feasible idea. How would you steer? What about g forces? what about radiation control ? What substance would be utilised to contain the integrety of the spacecraft with nukes exploding under it? I've been waiting 2 weeks for a reply
 
Ain't gonna get a reply slotty old chum, 'cos we've been asking killer questions.

See, 'Project Orion' was a 'what if' that got out of hand. "Nukes would provide far too much of an impulse for a conventional rocket, hmm", says theoretical physicist chuffing on his pipe, "why not make the rocket 1000 times larger! Hmmm impulse/1000 hmmm, those numbers are survivable. Hmmm what sort of rocket can we make if it's 1000 times heavier, hmmm, a really bigh one and launch loads of stuff, hmmmm!"

Unfortunately, his baccy must have gone out before he got the difficulties of guidance and orbital insertion.

This always happen on forums. You ask the killer question, and the person you ask is never gracious enough to admit defeat, they just go quiet for a while, and then pop up later with the some old crap and try to sell it someone else.

Project Orion has probably scoured every source for Orion schematics, and realised, that guidance isn't covered on a single one. Can't use conventinal thrusters, because the thing is too damned heavy, and that only leaves, ... more nukes! Orion only had one shield, and that wasn't shown to be gimballed, so so he's fucked.
 
Thanks for the info phlog. Shame. It was getting interesting. I'm still a bit of a newbie here really, i probably expected too much in way of a reply, so thanks again in pointing out what a harsh world it can be here at sciforums. ;)

Hey, i have an idea for a lead balloon! :D
 
Phlogy

Thats typical of Wayne, he spams forums for a while with Taylors book in tow, believing every word of it, and when it comes time to answer the tough questions, Wayne dissapears.
 
Shame. This was getting so funny, but on a serious note, your right. Ask a sensible question....get no reply. :confused:
 
sorry but my dad owns a metal fab shop and we have built some pretty big things he just did not have any concept of the amount of weight he was really talking about to withstand a single nuke blast let alone hundreds or even 10 for that matter its just not possible right now to build something that can be light enough to get it in orbit that can withstand that much stress and blast pressure a series of nukes would produce. But it is a shame he left without trying to explain how he thinks it might work.
 
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