I don’t know how viable this is but there is something both visceral, simple, and super futuristic about this whole idea.
I don’t know why but I’m excited about this idea.
I don’t know why but I’m excited about this idea.
They cannot fling things to orbit, they can fling things very fast but a (smaller) rocket is still needed to finish getting to orbit.
and G Forces are extreme so this is only suitable for payloads that don't mind extreme G forces.
On reentry from orbit vehicles are going mach ~25.
The drag and resulting heat production at sea level would not be as easy to deal with if you were zipping along at Mach 25 right after launch. Even supersonic aircraft don't run full speed (for a whole host of reasons) at sea level.
Anyway, the earliest patent I could find was a steam centripetal launcher in 1918. It never went anywhere and it has been followed by a number of improbable reinventions that all faded away.
NASA and the US Army tried again in 1982 and thought they could put a 60g projectile down range at 3 km/s. Mach 8. Guns and rockets could perform as well or better with simpler systems and the idea was shelved.
https://patents.google.com/patent/US1332992 https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1982ITM....18..209F/abstra...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAczd3mt3X0
He...encourages caution. It's one thing to call a technology "debunked", another to say it's very difficult or that it has a low probability of success.
The founder has little demonstrable understanding of physics, and their demonstration video was misleading.
If SpinLaunch's idea was practical, it would've been in use for decades already. The company seems unaware of this... for now.
I look forward to watching SpinLaunch's progress.
About what? Most of his recent content is clickbait debunking videos about stupid ideas that no serious person has ever taken seriously.
"Solar Roadways Debunked" Yeah no fucking shit.
And here we are talking about spinlaunch.....
Obviously scientists are not perfect, but you seem to imply that most of his videos are incorrect. I can't see any evidence to support that, but I'm happy to be contradicted.
There are many mentally deranged people who have published papers and are "scientists".
That's true, but it could be interpreted as a distraction from the fact that you haven't provided any evidence to support your claim.
In my experience, few mentally deranged people have a good understanding of physics. Even fewer have published in 'Nature'.