Solar Sail Propulsion: The Future Of Space Travel!

Robert H. Goddard couldn’t believe his eyes: his rocket went finally up to an altitude of 41 feet in 2.5 seconds and landed 184 feet away. It was March 16, 1926, a date that changed the world. Forever. Today, the Goddard Rocket Launching Site National Historic Landmark commemorates the site of the world’s first successful liquid-fueled rocket. You can find it in Auburn, Massachusetts. The original launch site is indicated by a granite marker. 

Almost 97 years have passed by since that day, and nowadays, the majority of unmanned rockets that deliver spacecraft and satellites to Earth orbit or on interplanetary expeditions use a liquid propulsion system, just like Goddard’s rocket. But humans like to look further, and ever since that day, they have been thinking of ever better solutions: for instance, we want to go outside the solar system and reach other stars. To do this, we might need solar sails.  
As Goddard himself said, “The dream of yesterday is the hope of today and the reality of tomorrow”. 
 

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Credits: Nasa/Shutterstock/Storyblocks/Elon Musk/SpaceX/ESA/ESO/ Flickr

Video Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
01:32 What are solar sails?
03:10 Solar sails material
05:16 The spinning disk sails
05:50 Echo 1

#insanecuriosity #Solarsail #space

[InsaneCuriosity]

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[shawns]

For some reason people don't know about the 1 realistic method for interstellar travel. If a ship travels at a constant 1g acceleration rate it would get to Alpha Centauri in just 3.6 ship/7.3 Earth years, and this includes turning the ship around halfway to decelerate. This is by far the fastest way we can get to other worlds and the ship would have gravity the whole way. It would achieve about .95% light speed after about 1 year. A 10 ton ship would need a mere 10 tons of continuous thrust.
All that is needed for this is a fission rocket that can put out thrust for long periods and does not consume hydrogen or xenon (you can't bring 500 tons of that with you).
Uranium and plutonium are jittery atoms that are on the verge of fissioning by themselves, there should be a way to get them to fission in a linear fashion. What's needed is a controlled, time released nuclear explosion. 1 kg of uranium has the same enegy as 120, 000 tons of coal and plutonium has more than that, only a small amout would be needed for the trip.
In an atomic bomb fission occurs when neutrons hit the nuclei of uranium or plutonium atoms, this is because they will not tolerate an increase in mass. Due to the equivalence of mass and energy the same should be true if you infuse them with energy. This might be as simple as having negatively charged atoms coming into contact with positively charged atoms, or perhaps with laser energy.
With the constant 1g acceleration method a ship can span the entire diameter of our galaxy in 24 ship/113, 000 Earth years. Systems with stars similar to our sun can be reached in under 10 ship years. More info can be found on Wikipedia or watch the video "best method for interstellar travel"

[LoveHandle]

“We must leave this planet.” -Stephen Hawking.

[petery]

We proved this technology works two years ago with the LIGHT SAIL mission. If I could ask Elon Musk one question it would be. "Why are you not exploring LIGHT SAIL technology to power your ships from earth to mars rather than messy propellent ?"

[tayzonday]

Maybe it can do a wide orbit around the sun with the sail at an angle so it can pick up speed — then use a store of chemical propellant to break orbit and head off in a desired direction.

[reactionsu]

and nasa have launched the ACSSS! so exciting to see the progress made

[splinterdavies]

A spiderweb of receptors, lace. Hudge. Open areas have depth. It is tapered causing collision/heat out the back causing a vacume in the solar direction.

[fernandochaves]

I didn't know the heliogyro and spinning disc concepts. Seems that solar sails are the future of exploration... At least until we reach enough technology for manned long missions. I hope Starshot project to Proxima B become a reality.

[brucekemp]

This does sound like an interesting concept. By using Solar Sails, it may be possible to send some small probes into Interstellar Space. It will be interesting to see how far this concept goes.

[gabrielsierra]

What if a CME hits the sail, will it propel it or break it?

[tarekshorts]

Make a video about the 10 most valuable asteroids in the asteroid belt

[jonnekallu]

Why isn't anyone talking about the electric sail? It's simple and more versatile design than any solar sail.

[mm-dwrr]

Bigger, faster, quicker all sounds good to me. ✔

[dartda]

Wouldn't the sails be a huge area for dust particles to hit in interstellar space, maybe a more streamlined ship with a shield at the front made from plasma generated nano destructive hyper molecules that could incinerate the particles before they hit the ship, well actually I just made that up, but maybe something else

[Captain.AmericaV]

Instead of the object moving through space, it's possible to bend space so it moves to you, different theory but same result and much much quicker travel.

It'll take a lot longer to figure out but when they do, the universe is their oyster!!

[michaelanderson]

Solar sail within the solar system = 1 year max anywhere within the solar system.

[dumitrulangham]

Avatar Pandora anyone? Joking aside I love the idea of solar sails

[civfanatic]

Only if they designed already a spacecraft as large as a modern DSLR camera(or a football) and with a solar sail like a football terrain, we would be able to reach Proxima Cantauri maybe in less than 20 years! Good luck to us!!!😁

[gamingAustralia]

🤔Very interesting how something as thing as paper can help yet they don't go to most planets because they are to hot 🔥.
I think they are hiding secrets.