Hyperloop motherfuckers!...

[Unisaw]

Yeah, he did that today, as in, over a month ago.

Actually - the lateral move was done Tuesday:

"In a divert test on August 13, SpaceX’s vertical-landing Grasshopper tried out its first lateral move."

[Eraser]

That's not what the article is about though.

[Unisaw]

Read this and STFU:

Space Safety Magazine

[LawL]

Uniball

[Chupacabra]

Old news. Elon Musk [. . .] already said the idea is too ambitious and he's abandoned the idea altogether.

I wonder at what point he realized or decided that.

[Eraser]

I dunno, but in all honesty, after re-reading his statement about it, I understand that he meant it's too ambitious for him personally, because he's spread too thin with his work on SpaceX and his other endeavors. So I'm not sure if he thinks some other gazillionaire might make it happen sometime or if it's technically/financially not feasible.

[Tsakali]

it's because he is too busy. the technology is easy for today's standards. nothing new really, just re-engineering/combining of a bunch of basic and well understood technologies.

[obsidian]

nothing new really, just re-engineering/combining of a bunch of basic and well understood technologies.

I wouldn't trivialize it down to that either. That's like saying building a car from scratch is easy because you can look up on the internet how a combustion engine works. There's still a significant amount of design, engineering and testing required.

[scared?]

I had my own personal hyperloop built for the family. We go from here to austin in 5 minutes...1 hour to NYC...jellus?...

[Tsakali]

nothing new really, just re-engineering/combining of a bunch of basic and well understood technologies.

I wouldn't trivialize it down to that either. That's like saying building a car from scratch is easy because you can look up on the internet how a combustion engine works. There's still a significant amount of design, engineering and testing required.

sure, but it ain't describing a space elevator or fusion power. It won't be built in a back yard somewhere, yes it will require a professional effort but it's hardly ground breaking stuff.

[losCHUNK]

Speaking of fusion -

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/ ... -1.1491854

You could say the space elevator is based on technology we have availiable and why it's been touted in a lot of the proposals n all, because it actually seems viable as far as nutty tech goes and could possibly work if we threw buckets of money at it, it's basically a 80km+ rope.

I would say it's on par with how it would change the world and the technological achievement, providing a near supersonic speed across statewide distances in intervals of minutes would render airplanes obsolete and at a cheaper price than a train network will completely alter our lifestyles, but the truth is we don't have a working prototype nor any idea if it will actually work, wether the train will levitate using the airbags or how they will be designed, wether a large vacum can be maintained with a portable motor, wether that motor can be run by solar technology or wether the drag will be reduced enough to meet any of the predicted numbers, like I said many people have played with the idea in the past and all ideas have stayed on paper.

It's a crossover with a maglev system n all which is basically a rail gun and they have never been constructed for these kinds of speeds, how are we meant to believe that this will be a cheaper system than the already expensive system that it's based on that doesn't require the extra tubes, turbines, hoverpads or initial investment to work any of this crap out. The last 'hyperloop' that proposed a maglev system predicted speeds half of what is suggested whilst running in a complete vacum as opposed to a partial vacum n all.

The biggest bullshit I can see is how solar panels will power entire levitating trains in mini vacums minutes apart from each other on the highest powered commercial rail gun at near supersonic speeds across the length of California and beyond. That would make concorde look like a piece of piss.

Like with the space elevator, it may or may not be achievable if you threw buckets of money at it.

[seremtan]

the space elevator is ... basically a 80km+ rope.

nope

a space elevator's centre of mass would need to be outside the Earth's gravity well, which would mean it would need a counterweight extending well beyond that into space, to prevent it collapsing to the ground. it would be a hell of a lot longer than "80km+"

(inb4 pedantic Chunk points out that "80km+" contains all distances between 80km and infinity)

[losCHUNK]

Well the orbit platform would need to maintain an orbit velocity equivalent to the Earths spin ?, I just checked Google knowing that there are satellites that maintain orbit like this and they're 35786km from the Earths surface, so a little longer than 80km but far better than half way to Mars ?. Once it reaches this point the counterweight becomes un necessary by making the platform huge, heavy and full of mass.

For arguments sake objects have an upwards pull away from Earths gravity for every inch above geosynchronous orbit equivilent to the pull of an object towards Earths gravity for every inch below the level of geosynchronous orbit, assuming equal mass across its length. So at the very most the distance would have to be 35786km x2.

The distance could probaly be altered by using different orbits / velocities and altering the length of space rope too. As an example you could half the distance by changing the orbit pattern to elliptical so it becomes semi geosynchronous, but that gives another headache, or you could just speed the platform up. That'll do it.

[seremtan]

just read this

[losCHUNK]

I have , you said the object would have to escape the Earths gravity which would only be true if the object had no velocity and then couldn't be tethered to Earth. The goal of the counterweight is to maintain an orbit similar to the moon. Only using the satelitte distance as a base n all, the lower you are the faster you need to go, with a longer and heavier counterweight, but that'll be basically countering the unequal mass on the rope.

[plained]

is that real?

I would not stand there!

Well you did ask...

That was geat thx man

[losCHUNK]

If

1: we drill a mile long hole straight down into the ground
2: divide in half, suck all the air out to make a vacum in the top then
3: pressurise the bottom as much as we can then
4: place a donut in the middle enclosed in its own chamber with doors both sides, making sure it's a snug fit for the hole

when the doors are opened reckon we'll get a donut into space ?

I call it the the hypervalue

[Eraser]

Wouldn't work.
They won't be able to decide on the flavor.

[losCHUNK]

That's the beauty of my design, we can stack multiple donuts from a variety of suggestions.

[scared?]

Fuck u...