calbiterol

Pulse jet and PDE are basically the same thing, AFAIK.

Wow. Take that one outta context. I have to ask, was that intentional? Well, seeing as anyone can edit it, why doesn't someone here who knows what it's about go and fix it?

So, same concept, model airplane size. Here's a good site: http://www.aardvark.co.nz/pjet/faq.htm It's from the page of a guy that builds (relatively) large jet engines, PDEs, etc., for fun.

No. We just got done establishing that nukes are made with circuitry that will almost completely, if not completely, resist an EMP device - so, nothing would happen. Don't worry, scanning the page comes back to haunt everyone once or twice.

So do you want one for a model or full-size? And, either way, going for a normal jet engine is a heck of a lot less complicated than either a PDE or a turbojet. And as far as I know, PDE's aren't that bad.

I think you'd find it monstrously less difficult to explain your ideas if you used some punctuation.

Well, the purpose isn't so much to feel at home - I think it would be incredibly cool to be in (zero) g, aside from all the nausea and stuff, just because you could... well, float. The purpose of something like this would be to help prevent muscle atrophy. In my mind, at least, that's the main reason for using it. What would happen if you entered the spinning cylinder at its base's centerpoint (the center of the base circle)? Would you just sit there, or would coriolis forces push you to the outside, or would the air currents spin you and (slowly) push you outwards, or what?

Sounds like it'd be torture when someone started tickling you.

Out of curiosity, is there any way to reverse or stop this process? Aside from living in zero-gravity or spending your life in bed?

By the way, grant, it generally helps if you use some punctuation.

I've never seen them either, but... I'm sure there's a way. Somehow. That could make for an interesting problem right there.

A (rather large) space station is floating in Earth orbit, and maintains a 1-g artificial gravity by rotating a cylindrical section of the space station. Sound familiar? The classical sci-fi artificial gravity, using centrifugal force to push objects within to the outside walls of the station, which most of you have heard before. Now, given that hypothetical situation, what would happen if someone were to run in the opposite direction as the rotation? IE, the station is rotating clockwise and the runner is going CCW. Would this lessen the centrifugal force, and therefore the artificial gravity, placed upon the runner?

Ahah. Thanks, the extra explanation makes much more sense to me. One question, though, are the wheels on the inside of the tracks spherical or cylindrical?

Hmmm. Mezarashi, or Severian, could you explain the diagram to me? I'm rather interested, but I don't know what's what in the diagram. Alternatively, is there anything I could search for about this setup?

From when you wake up in the morning to when you go to bed at night, your spine compresses in the same way. Thus, you are always a bit taller in the morning (or whenever you wake up) than when you go to sleep. Which also explains why everyone is about an inch taller in space.

Maybe after a while, but they give it to you when you are coming out of anaesthetics (sp?) after surgery, so I don't think it's an immediate high. [Edit: Are we sure that burning hydrogen with gasoline isn't going to harm the engine? Those things are so complicated and so specialized... and so expensive... that I wouldn't want to test it. Plus, how are you going to get the hydrogen into the engine?]

Is this a normal, gasoline-burning combustion engine?

I always get into trouble saying blanket statements like that. Breathing in small amounts of pure O2 won't hurt you. Too much of most everything could be linked to cancer these days, so I'm not about to say all O2, even after inhaling it pure for a month, is healthy. Plus, pure O2 destroys vitamin C. And could potentially cause scurvy on a Mars colony. But that is a different story altogether.

Yes, purely based on the way that it's set up. Space is (more or less) frictionless. Conservation of momentum means that each particle emitted by the engine exerts an equal force on the craft. So every particle emitted is accelerating the craft - just, after the velocity of the particles is reached, the particles will still be moving in a forward direction even after being pushed out the back. I (kind of) understand, but I don't think I'm going to be able to put it into words.

Wait, what's the overall objective for this? And for oxygen collection, just set it up like a syphon - breathing in O2 is harmless - and be sure to have a section of the tube at the end going horizontal, like a J, so that the oxygen can rise or fall, depending on actual density of both the oxygen and the air.

Simple - they filled one container and pushed the gas out into the balloon. The only relatively safe way of doing this is by pusing each gas into the balloon seperately. It's like a one-cylinder compressor.

They have a massively different setup than you do. Just because there is only one vent doesn't mean that it can't catch fire. The hydrogen/oxygen mix coming out of the vent could quite easily catch fire, and if it did (no spark required, any number of things could do it), then the explosion will travel into your container, and kaboom, no more container, and no more electrolysis experiments for anyone near it - this stuff has potential to be deadly. It's the SAME fuel that's used in the space shuttle. They don't even mix the oxygen and hydrogen until it reaches the nozzle, where combustion is supposed to occur, and they do it in such a way that there is no way for the explosion (controlled, but an explosion nonetheless) to travel because there is no oxygen with the hydrogen. The setup you have is very, very dangerous, and quite possibly deadly. If your container is bigger than a coffee can, consider yourself very lucky that you have non maimed, severely injured, or killed yourself thus far. Please, I urge you, change your setup and collect the two gasses seperately!

Meh. That's not the point. Edward, wouldn't happen to have anywhere that I could get a custom-made PC motherboard? I've been "perusing" the standard ones, but most of them are just too... Big!

That's really... amazing. I had no idea JAXA was attempting anything like that. Wow. Mezarashi, I was well aware that you can't accelerate to the speed of light, and I'm assuming you were just saying that because your post was about accelerating to that speed. It makes sense, you were just covering your back. However, my question was more along the lines of what formulaterp answered. To be honest, it was so perfectly logical, that I was somewhat surprised that it's launched like that! ;-P So, it would be perfecly logical to make a "magnetic cannon" in space that shoots it on its way much like a maglev train, and further accelerate with the ion engine. Just a thought, not like it's happening any time soon.