A science challenge

[Nick]

(Before anyone starts telling me that airships all met with disasters, I must point out that modern airships are safer than airplanes.)

Even more to the point, they stopped painting the damn things with rocket fuel. . .

(hey, this was one we missed in the 'damming rivers' thread - 'The Hindenburg blew up because it was full of hydrogen')

[Nick]

How about a current luxury ship design except that its fuel would be hydrogen extracted from the water its crossing on.

Hydrogen fuel cell power source - yes. Carrying it's own hydrogen reformer? No.

You use a geothermal, hydroelectric, or other land-based power station to get the hydrogen - and then just transport it on the ship like normal fuel.

(Think about it: a hydrogen reformer needs power. Where is it going to come from?)

[salm]

Airship! Zepeliners!

Have you seen the footage from the hindenburg?
Amazing.

Think of it like a luxury cruiser without the vawes making you seasick.

I really love the feel of the airships. Have you seen the aircarrier one that the US had in the 20's n 30's? It was an airship that carried 5 fighters (biplanes). That looks so cool.

(Before anyone starts telling me that airships all met with disasters, I must point out that modern airships are safer than airplanes.)

have you heard of the cargo lifter?


CL 160 - The technique

An airship containing helium, a keel and a crane

The CargoLifter CL 160 is the first new giant airship in approx. 60 years and, at the same time, the largest airship worldwide with 260 meters in length and a volume of 550,000 cubic meters. The CL 160 is being constructed as a semi-rigid keel airship with a working heavy-load crane integrated inside the keel. Helium is used as a non-flammable lifting gas.
Due to its unique crane construction, the CargoLifter can load and unload without landing. While the airship hovers approx. 100 meters in midair, the load will be lifted and lowered via anchor winches and four anchoring points. And in order for the total weight and flight characteristics of the airship to remain constant, the freight will be exchanged with ballast water. CargoLifter reverts to approved solutions and existing know-how in its development and yet it is still treading new ground. New materials, technologies, machinery as well as construction and manufacturing processes are turning the »flying cigar« of old into a modern high-tech means of transportation.






CL 160 - Overview

Engineering: semi-rigid keel airship for transporting heavy loads
Measurements: 65 meters in diameter
265 meters in length
82 meters total height
Envelope volume: 550,000 cubic meters
Buoyant gas: helium
Basic weight: approx. 260 metric tons
Load volume: 50 meters x 8 meters x 8 meters
Payload: up to 160 metric tons
Average transportation speed: 90 kilometers per hour
Main field of deployment: pre- and post transportation,
continental mid-range up to 3,000 km
Long-range: up to 10,000 km


http://www.cargolifter.com/www/2002/rep ... ein_e.html

[SWPIGWANG]

Trans-alaska-Russia Bridge

then walk

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

well, more of an engineering one....

design a craft that can transport a large portion of people across the Atlantic in a cost-effective matter

It must be "echo-friendly", too

Speed is only a secondary factor

Old slave transport ship. Except make it hydrogen powered or something. You didn't say the passengers had to get there in any comfort. Sure you'd want to spray down the compartments with antiseptic spray and have a few fans for ventillation, but all those people packed into one boat . . . that's gotta be cost-effective, right?

Then send their luggage over via railgun sled. Just don't aim at the ship though.

[neoolong]

Kill them and then cremate them. Use that process to power a boat to carry them across the ocean. It may not be that ecologically sound, but it'll carry enough people to make up for it.

Honestly, a solar powered boat helped along by a bunch of slave rowers.

[SWPIGWANG]

Question: would high efficiency properllers powered by bicycle connected to it be more efficient than rowing?

[victorhadin]

Big fecking raft with a sail, maybe some seats. Cheap, eco-friendly, made of biodegradable materials and almost certain to result in passengers eating each other, which brings us back to recycling again.

[victorhadin]

Question: would high efficiency properllers powered by bicycle connected to it be more efficient than rowing?

In theory good, well-designed oars if well-used would be more efficient, but in practice usage generates more excess friction than the bicycle-propellor arrangement simply from the rubbing of the oar on the side of the boat.


EDIT: Educated guess. May not be correct.

[Nick]

Question: would high efficiency properllers powered by bicycle connected to it be more efficient than rowing?

In theory good, well-designed oars if well-used would be more efficient, but in practice usage generates more excess friction than the bicycle-propellor arrangement simply from the rubbing of the oar on the side of the boat.

Hmm. . . I'm speculating here, too, but wouldn't oars have the problem that they aren't doing any useful work when they are on the backstroke (out of the water), but the rower is still expending energy to move them?

With the propellor arrangement, it seems like more work would be transferred to the propellor (assuming high efficiency linkages of course - electrical linkage might conceivably be more efficient than mechanical).

And this only pushes the problem back a step - you then have to carry enough food for your cyclists. Starving people make poor energy sources. . .

TANSTAAFL! The bane of engineers the world over!

[SWPIGWANG]

uh the oars could have low friction hinges and spring return mechanism to conserve power used in the back stroke.....

[Zoink]

Well this is what I thought of:

ST WAY: Set up a large array of solar panels in space, beam the energy to the ship via a microwave beam. Warning: Don't go above-deck except to cook food!

SW WAY: Build two large concrete walls between Halifax and France. Drain all the seawater between the walls. Pave the sea floor and bicycle to Europe. Have special tunnels for fish to swim through to satisfy the tree-huggers.

REAL-WORLD WAY: Use a regular ship and burn fuel. Buy "pollution credits" from some third-world country.

[NecronLord]

Railgun sleds. You never said they had to arrive intact.

Err, wouldn't that cause a horrendous amount of damage from the recoil (ERASER RAILGUNS!!! )

[SWPIGWANG]

ST way

A subspace mutifrequency object relocation device powered by technobabblium with hensibenburg compensator together with subquantmum scanner disintergrate the object require of transportation and remateralize the said object.

40K way

WARRRRRGGGGAAAA!!!!!! and start piling bodies over each other to fill up the atlantic :p

[Singular Quartet]

The Culture method: Rebuild the planet, so that there is no Atlantic Ocean.

Yes, I'm fairly sure they could actually do that. Its just a matter of gettuing a few contient classes in orbit and moving the contientnts closer together...

[NecronLord]

The Culture method: Rebuild the planet, so that there is no Atlantic Ocean.

Yes, I'm fairly sure they could actually do that. Its just a matter of gettuing a few contient classes in orbit and moving the contientnts closer together...

To be honest thats more of a ST:WOK soloution, the culture would simply displace them, they don't [generally] do things the hardest way they can.

[NecronLord]

40K way

WARRRRRGGGGAAAA!!!!!! and start piling bodies over each other to fill up the atlantic :p

You mean IoM, The necrons would do it the culture way, only melevolently

[The Dark]

Giant slingshots. Cheaper than the railgun. Of course, getting that much rubber might violate the green rule...

If not that, then pull a SBY and create an atmosphere-traveling starship out of a sunken wreck of a battleship that's been on the ocean floor for 40+ years (SBY = Space Battleship Yamato, in case anyone doesn't know).

If all else fails, threaten a Vietnam-style draft in both the US and Canada...they'll swim across of their own accord!