Nuclear powered airliners

In article . com,
kert wrote:
Japanese researchers have flown a model-size plane powered solely by
microwave beam, from the ground.
http://www.kurasc.kyoto-u.ac.jp/plas...s/milax-e.html

Note that -- as that web page explains -- Canadian researchers did that a
couple of decades ago. (Unfortunately, because of the shifting winds of
politics, it wasn't followed up.)
--
spsystems.net is temporarily off the air; | Henry Spencer
mail to henry at zoo.utoronto.ca instead. |

Alex Terrell wrote:

Pat Flannery wrote:



The first one in flight:
http://davidszondy.com/future/Flight/atomforpeace.jpg
I've got the copy of Mechanix Illustrated that has that gizmo in it. :-)



OK Then - show me a plane powered by lasers from a solar powersat!



Latch onto a copy of Leik Myrabo and Dean Ing's "The Future Of Flight"
from 1985- it's chock-full of them.
(Baen Books, ISBN 0-671-55941-9)
Me, I want one of these:
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaver.../1805/ion.html
I'll hover about glowing in the night dressed as a alien Gray, hurling
bull penis walking sticks at unsuspecting passerbys and occasionally
using the electrically charged downwash to create crop circles. :-)

Pat

Jim Logajan wrote:


and select a starting period of 1/1/1962 (the earliest period covered by
the database) and "Blimp or Dirigible" for the Category field, only 24
accidents records exist (compared with 672 for balloons and 132997 for
airplanes). Only two of the airship accidents involved fatalities. In one
of those the fatality occurred when two ground crewmen literally ran into
each other on the ground while chasing after a tow rope. The other fatal
accident occurred when the pilot fell from it.



Of course there were those little incidents with the Roma, Shenandoah,
Akron, and Macon...
You are going to need something big to carry a nuclear reactor due to
the shielding requirements, and it'll be more of a rigid dirigible than
a blimp.
Given the size of the envelope of a large dirigible, solar power would
make more sense than nuclear power.
This would work particularly well if you built it in a lifting body
shape like a Dynairship: http://www.aereoncorp.com/.pages/DYNAIRSHIPII.html
During daytime flight, surplus electrical power is used to disassociate
water into hydrogen and oxygen; at night, these power fuel cells to
drive its motors. The gaseous hydrogen could be used for added lift if
desired (I assume it's mainly full of helium) or both could be liquefied
for more compact storage.

Pat

Henry Spencer wrote:

It's been seriously proposed -- a couple of conventional jet engines for
takeoff and landing, and a cruise engine on top, with a window transparent
to an IR wavelength that's blocked by the water vapor in the lower
atmosphere. (A lot of safety issues go away if the beam *cannot* reach
the ground.)



Wait'll you see this thing- how about forward flight using _no fuel at
all_?:
http://www.fuellessflight.com/index.htm
It tacks through the air like a sailboat tacks into the wind- first it's
lighter than air, and climbs at an angle; then it cools down, becomes
heavier than air, and descends at a angle...then it warms up, and starts
climbing again.
There was a strange dirigible design called the Aerion that was suposed
to work something like this; it was tested in the 1860's (no, not
1960's..._1860s_) and became the concept basis for this:
http://www.aereoncorp.com/.pages/aereon3.html

Pat

Jim Logajan wrote:

and select a starting period of 1/1/1962 (the earliest period covered by
the database) and "Blimp or Dirigible" for the Category field, only 24
accidents records exist (compared with 672 for balloons and 132997 for
airplanes). Only two of the airship accidents involved fatalities.
Now compare miles traveled.

Without looking at the numbers, I'd take a wiled guess that a single
modern airliner (that is, a single aircraft, not just one model) has
exceeded all miles traveled by manned derigibles in the entire history
of flight.

Jim Logajan wrote:

As to the safety history of airships - if you go to the U.S. NTSB aviation
accident database page:

http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/query.asp

and select a starting period of 1/1/1962 (the earliest period covered by
the database) and "Blimp or Dirigible" for the Category field, only 24
accidents records exist (compared with 672 for balloons and 132997 for
airplanes). Only two of the airship accidents involved fatalities. In one
of those the fatality occurred when two ground crewmen literally ran into
each other on the ground while chasing after a tow rope. The other fatal
accident occurred when the pilot fell from it.

And of course the fact that there is only a bare handful of blimps or
dirigibles flying (and usually only when conditions were good - no
attempts at flying through storms) couldn'y *POSSIBLY* explain why
there are fewer such accidents than the zillions of balloon and
kilozillions of aircraft flights in the same period.

Idiot.

D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.

-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL

Derek Lyons wrote:

And of course the fact that there is only a bare handful of blimps or
dirigibles flying (and usually only when conditions were good - no
attempts at flying through storms) couldn'y *POSSIBLY* explain why
there are fewer such accidents than the zillions of balloon and
kilozillions of aircraft flights in the same period.



The Navy operated a lot of blimps from WW II into the 1950's in a ASW
role. They actually had a pretty good safety record for total hours
flown. They were slow enough that crashes didn't cause fatalities due to
speed of impact, and if punctured generally fell to earth at a pretty
low velocity.
Still, you wouldn't want to be in one in a thunderstorm- up and
downdrafts would make anything you could do with their low engine power
pretty much ineffectual.

Pat

Henry Spencer wrote:
In article . com,
Alex Terrell wrote:
OK Then - show me a plane powered by lasers from a solar powersat!

It's been seriously proposed -- a couple of conventional jet engines for
takeoff and landing, and a cruise engine on top, with a window transparent
to an IR wavelength that's blocked by the water vapor in the lower
atmosphere. (A lot of safety issues go away if the beam *cannot* reach
the ground.)
--
Sounds interesting. Did they propose photo voltaics, or direct heating
of a heat engine?

"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
...

The first one in flight:
http://davidszondy.com/future/Flight/atomforpeace.jpg
I've got the copy of Mechanix Illustrated that has that gizmo in it. :-)

You know, there's something about that era and spotlights in all the
pictures....



Pat

Alex Terrell wrote:

Henry Spencer wrote:


In article . com,
Alex Terrell wrote:


OK Then - show me a plane powered by lasers from a solar powersat!


It's been seriously proposed -- a couple of conventional jet engines for
takeoff and landing, and a cruise engine on top, with a window transparent
to an IR wavelength that's blocked by the water vapor in the lower
atmosphere. (A lot of safety issues go away if the beam *cannot* reach
the ground.)
--


Sounds interesting. Did they propose photo voltaics, or direct heating
of a heat engine?



Direct heating. Or at least by way of high temperature heat exchangers.
The system was very similar to nuclear-powered turbojets, except for the
source of heat.

--
"The only thing that galls me about someone burning the American flag is how unoriginal it is. I mean if you're going to pull the Freedom-of-speech card, don't be a hack, come up with something interesting. Fashion Old Glory into a wisecracking puppet and blister the system with a scathing ventriloquism act, or better yet, drape the flag over your head and desecrate it with a large caliber bullet hole." Dennis Miller