Electric Sail

[kaublezw]

I"m curious what the EU community thinks about this form of space propulsion : http://www.space.com/31063-electric-sai ... ation.html

From the article,

But it's not clear yet whether or not e-sails are feasible. An e-sailing probe would need to be equipped with a device called an electron gun to keep its wires positively charged (otherwise, electrons arriving via the solar wind would scuttle the propulsion system).

The team isn't sure how much energy would be required to run an electron gun on an e-sailing craft. Two competing models of how materials charge in a plasma give very different results, Johnson said: One model suggests it's a reasonable amount and the other implies that there's no realistic way to generate that much energy onboard.

Does anybody have any knowledge on the different models they are referring to and which one if any is more in line with EU model?

[D_Archer]

The e-sail is just wires positively charged.

They know that the positive charge will dissipate in the plasma environment of the Sun, this is inline with EU and normal plasma physics.

What they seem to have trouble with is to determine how much energy it costs to keep the wires positive, they do not mention what these 2 different models are.... so hard to judge.

Good to see they will do plasma experiments...

My bet is that the model that requires the most energy is correct. This would be inline with asteroids losing positive charge when moving away from the Sun in the EU model.

Regards,
Daniel

[Aardwolf]

More exited by this;

http://mic.com/articles/128043/what-is- ... .KODjcKEy8

[seasmith]

EM Drive Developments - related to space flight applications - Thread 6
« on: 12/11/2015 02:48 PM »
This is a thread - Thread 6 in the series - focused on objective analysis of whether the EM Drive (a cavity resonating at microwave frequencies) reported "thrust force" is an experimental artifact or whether it is a real propulsion effect that can be used for space applications, and if so, in discussing those possible space propulsion applications

. http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index. ... ic=39004.0


Aardwolf, (above is from the forum linked in your mic.com link)

It's in effect an RF 'laser/maser' and they are trying to design a resonant cavity & driver combination to amplify the reflected output, as a laser does optically.
They are working to increase the resonant "Q', while containing and Focussing the relatively sloppy microwave emission.

Compared to "optical" frequencies, there are a lot more mass and geometry interactions (with resultant losses and inefficiencies).
It took quite a while to tune up a really good laser; but they seem to be real smart people and will probably sort it all out eventually.

I'm "exited" and excited.

[DJunqueira]

I think that EM Driver is more likely to work.
http://emdrive.com/

Other form of propulsion is Z-Pinch Thruster
YouTube video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=p ... 5jRvzTPL4A

What would this Electric Sail device do when space changed its charge?

[D_Archer]

What would this Electric Sail device do when space changed its charge?

Vaporize

Regards,
Daniel