Airships to orbit?

Workable? Or just another flight of fancy?

"This airship flies from the upper atmospheric station to orbit. It uses hybrid chemical/electric propulsion to slowly accelerate and reach orbit.

"A two mile wide station parked at 140,000 feet is the new way station to space. The station acts not only as a port for the orbital airship but also as a research center, construction site and tourist destination."

See:

http://www.jpaerospace.com/atohandout.pdf

&

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...spaces-founder

On Jul/4/2020 at 18:29, wrote :
Workable? Or just another flight of fancy?

"This airship flies from the upper atmospheric station to orbit. It uses hybrid chemical/electric propulsion to slowly accelerate and reach orbit.

"A two mile wide station parked at 140,000 feet is the new way station to space. The station acts not only as a port for the orbital airship but also as a research center, construction site and tourist destination."

See:

http://www.jpaerospace.com/atohandout.pdf

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...spaces-founder

I wouldn't dismiss this as fantasy. But I would like to see thermal
heating analysis and a few other things before saying it will work.
Flying at near orbital velocity for hours in an atmosphere thick enough
to give lift is tricky to say the least.


Alain Fournier

On 05-Jul-20 8:29 am, wrote:
Workable? Or just another flight of fancy?

"This airship flies from the upper atmospheric station to orbit. It uses hybrid chemical/electric propulsion to slowly accelerate and reach orbit.

"A two mile wide station parked at 140,000 feet is the new way station to space. The station acts not only as a port for the orbital airship but also as a research center, construction site and tourist destination."

See:

http://www.jpaerospace.com/atohandout.pdf

&

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...spaces-founder


Would need to see some numbers for this.

Will it actually be able to rise to 200,000 feet using buoyancy?

More questionable, is whether it is possible to accelerate such a body
to orbital speed using low thrust. As its speed rises, so will its
altitude, but also so will the drag from the residual atmosphere. It is
far from clear that it can achieve orbit that way.

Sylvia.