star trek tng

[MRT144]

Is it theoretically possible to have a mass at the center of the ship that could generate its own gravity that could be contained . Obviously ships would be constructed as spheres as to maintain some semblance of sanity in space.

[Lorizael]

Getting your gravity from mass is probably a bad idea, because the more massive your ship, the more energy it takes to accelerate.

[MRT144]

Getting your gravity from mass is probably a bad idea, because the more massive your ship, the more energy it takes to accelerate.

And I guess as you approach the speed of light, it would be even more ridiculous.

[Lorizael]

Indeed.

For a sphere with the same square footage as the Enterprise's interior and 1 gee of gravity at the surface, you're looking at a mass a quarter kilometer wide that weighs as much as a mountain and is a couple thousand times as dense as the core of the Sun. Not terribly practical.

[regexcellent]

Is it theoretically possible to have a mass at the center of the ship that could generate its own gravity that could be contained . Obviously ships would be constructed as spheres as to maintain some semblance of sanity in space.

Short answer, no.

The most sensible shape for a spaceship with gravity is some kind of donut.

[The Mad Monk]

If the ship is capable of approaching 1G of thrust continuously (or approaching continuously), and can be reasonably expected to do so most of the time (during normal operations), any shape that has the deck perpendicular to the direction of thrust will do.

[DaShi]

Don't make fun of O'Brien. Instead, follow him to DS9.

Where he's constantly tortured.

[Lorizael]

If the ship is capable of approaching 1G of thrust continuously (or approaching continuously), and can be reasonably expected to do so most of the time (during normal operations), any shape that has the deck perpendicular to the direction of thrust will do.

That really only makes sense for interplanetary travel. 1 g of thrust continuously is quite a lot, really. That gets you to .1 c in about a month. If we're talking about an interstellar craft, then you're definitely not accelerating most of the way. (It's hard to extrapolate 1 g continuously much further, however, because once relativity kicks in, it takes more force to maintain the same acceleration. For example, at .6 c, it takes twice as much force to maintain the same acceleration as it would when you're not moving relativistically.)

[The Mad Monk]

Yes, I played Traveller and MegaTraveller.

[Lorizael]

Heh. I'm just doing my homework...

[MrFun]

Has anyone heard of this guy, and this website?

[Ben Kenobi]

Is it theoretically possible to have a mass at the center of the ship that could generate its own gravity that could be contained . Obviously ships would be constructed as spheres as to maintain some semblance of sanity in space.

Not to generate 1 G of force. The problem there - is that even if you had something that could generate 1 G of force - would be dealing with the variations across the ship.

Say you have a point - now you have 1G of force acting all along the ship in different directions. It would crush the ship.

This, btw is the reason a Mars Mission hasn't been done. Getting there and getting back. We'd actually be better off instead of dumping rovers - caching large amounts of fuel on Mars.

[Ben Kenobi]

That really only makes sense for interplanetary travel. 1 g of thrust continuously is quite a lot, really. That gets you to .1 c in about a month. If we're talking about an interstellar craft, then you're definitely not accelerating most of the way. (It's hard to extrapolate 1 g continuously much further, however, because once relativity kicks in, it takes more force to maintain the same acceleration. For example, at .6 c, it takes twice as much force to maintain the same acceleration as it would when you're not moving relativistically.)

At .1 c you'd be looking at a 40 year trip to interstellar distances. You'd hit .3 in about 4 months or so, and about .6 in a year assuming a constant thrust. At .6 c - it would be about an 8 year trip. You don't really need to go faster than .6 c in order to travel interstellar distances.

We could actually do an interstellar craft with 1950's technologies just using this technique. The reason we haven't isn't because it's not doable but because of the gravity well that we are in.

[The Mad Monk]

That really only makes sense for interplanetary travel. 1 g of thrust continuously is quite a lot, really. That gets you to .1 c in about a month. If we're talking about an interstellar craft, then you're definitely not accelerating most of the way. (It's hard to extrapolate 1 g continuously much further, however, because once relativity kicks in, it takes more force to maintain the same acceleration. For example, at .6 c, it takes twice as much force to maintain the same acceleration as it would when you're not moving relativistically.)

The last time we discussed something like this.

[MrFun]

Has anyone heard of this guy, and this website?

.