Subject:
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Re: Hypothetical design question
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.space
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Date:
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Wed, 25 Jun 2003 03:57:22 GMT
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Viewed:
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690 times
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In lugnet.space, Spencer Nowak wrote:
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If you spin anything around without curving or coming to a complete stop,
you’ll be sorry. Inertia still applies in space, and at the speeds probably
used, a 180-degree spin will turn the entire crew into little puddles on the
back of their seats.
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You’re forgetting four things. First, there’s no atmosphere, and the main
reason for making long banking curves like that is because you can’t make abrupt
vector changes in an atmosphere. That’s not a concern in a near vacuum.
Second, no, you can’t do it with capital ships, but with little tiny snubcraft
you can. Except dinky little ST shuttles still fly like 40 foot cabin cruisers.
Third, as long as the pilot is in or near the center of rotation (like on a
Starfury), and as long as the craft as a whole continues to travel in the same
direction as it was before the spin (like Starfuries do), they won’t experience
any more inertial stress than they would on a Sit-N-Spin (heck, fighter jet
pilots probably experience more G-forces than a Starfury pilot would). And
fourth, NASA asked Straczinski if he’d mind them stealing his design for some
sort of orbital cargo mover (he approved, on the singular condition that if they
ever do, it must be called a Starfury). They never made any such queries to
Paramount for Starfleet shuttle designs. The Starfury, with some delicate
computer control systems (you want something that can produce exact
counterthrust to stop any rotation or movement without sending you in the
opposite direction), is a perfectly feasible orbital design that could be built
today. The ST shuttle is not.
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Hypothetical design question
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| (...) If you spin anything around without curving or coming to a complete stop, you'll be sorry. Inertia still applies in space, and at the speeds probably used, a 180-degree spin will turn the entire crew into little puddles on the back of their (...) (21 years ago, 25-Jun-03, to lugnet.space, FTX)
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