an idea for your ridicule

On Mon, 9 Feb 2004 16:30:51 GMT, (Henry Spencer)
wrote:
Yes, you really need some way to do it in a liquid, preferably a
reasonably pure one (the problem gets easier if the atomic hydrogen is
dissolved in a larger amount of ordinary LH2, but the performance is
greatly reduced). Schemes using strong magnetic fields to help have been
suggested, but nothing has worked out very well.

I'm not a chemist, or paid much attention in class...

What if you could find two stable hydrogen bearing molecules that when
combined, released a pair of temporarily free H which combined?

Just an idea.

Sander Vesik writes:

Henry Spencer wrote:

The latter. If memory serves, even at SSME pressures, flame temperature
is limited more by dissociation of the reaction products than by energy
available. To put extra energy into the exhaust of a good rocket engine,
you need to use non-thermal means. (Running an electromagnetic thruster
on the exhaust of a NERVA, with the reactor supplying the power, has been
suggested.)

Would "microwaving" the output of a LOX/LH2 engine work? After all, the
exhaust is water, and you already have fast-spining turbopumps powered
by gas turbines to which you only need to attach more stuff. Or is this a
crackpot idea?

There are these two annoying things called the Fisrt and Second Laws of
Thermodynamics. The First Law implies that the energy for "microwaving"
the exhaust has to come from somewhere. Since the only source of energy
in a chemically fueled vehicle is the chemical fuel, running some of the
propellant through a gas-turbine generator takes propellant away from
the main engine, decreasing the amount of potential thrust-producing
reaction mass available, which cuts into the total impulse. Furthermore,
the Second Law of Thermodynamics guarantess that the amount of energy
re-injected into the jet by the "microwaving" process must _ALWAYS_ be
less than if you'd simply burned the propellant in the engine in the
first place. Hence, your proposal actually _hurst_ performance two ways,
unless you have some magic lightweight source of non-chemical energy
available to heat the propellant...


-- Gordon D. Pusch

perl -e '$_ = \n"; s/NO\.//; s/SPAM\.//; print;'

On 13 Feb 2004 23:09:28 -0600,
(Gordon D. Pusch) wrote:

Sander Vesik writes:

Henry Spencer wrote:
Would "microwaving" the output of a LOX/LH2 engine work? After all, the
exhaust is water, and you already have fast-spining turbopumps powered
by gas turbines to which you only need to attach more stuff. Or is this a
crackpot idea?

SNIP
Hence, your proposal actually _hurst_ performance two ways,
unless you have some magic lightweight source of non-chemical energy
available to heat the propellant...

You could always leave the microwave/laser/whatever enegy emmitter
behind and let it shoot into the engine to provide the thrust boost.

In article ,
James G wrote:
I'm not a chemist, or paid much attention in class...
What if you could find two stable hydrogen bearing molecules that when
combined, released a pair of temporarily free H which combined?

I don't think this works, alas -- it's seriously uncommon to find anything
that will release free H.
--
MOST launched 30 June; science observations running | Henry Spencer
since Oct; first surprises seen; papers pending. |