Sci-Fi Spaceship Aerodynamics
POSTED BY: cljohnston108
UPDATED: Friday, July 2, 2010 14:25
VIEWED: 13551
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Hello,
I think there is strong evidence to suggest that the 'gravity drive' in the Firefly verse does more than provide gravity aboard ships.
I think that some of the effects of gravity upon a ship can be negated somehow, perhaps allowing for much slower/softer re-entries than otherwise possible.
Otherwise there's no way to reconcile the ability of these ships to navigate an atmosphere without becoming a fireball.
--Anthony
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Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Hello,
I think there is strong evidence to suggest that the 'gravity drive' in the Firefly verse does more than provide gravity aboard ships.
I think that some of the effects of gravity upon a ship can be negated somehow, perhaps allowing for much slower/softer re-entries than otherwise possible.
Otherwise there's no way to reconcile the ability of these ships to navigate an atmosphere without becoming a fireball
That follows my thinking as well. the Gravity drive reduces the effective mass of the ship. In effect, Making it lighter than it is.
I have the Serenity Blueprint set and it hints that the the Mass of a firefly is a bit more than a loaded 747 (and about the same size)
And Kaylee's comment about Serenity having more then a few ceramic parts in her during Jaynestown fits with the ship having some sort of ceramic heat shielding.
Also using thrust from the engines during reentry may keep the speeds out of the high heat hypersonic realm and just in the lower heat supersonic range. Sort of like the "Shuttlecock" mode that Rutan's Spaceship One used to keep reentry speeds slow. Instead of drag, Serenity uses thrust.
The wing mounted turbines I think work as mixed cycle scramjets. Drawing in air in an atmosphere to increase thrust (At a lower fuel penalty) and as the ship gets higher, and the air thins, switch over to a single mode Fusion thruster.
When Serenity goes for "hard burn" the massive release of particles from the aft end is probably (in my theory)the charged particle stream of the Radion Core engine that provides most of the ship's thrust in vacuum.
Since Anti-gravity is a given in the firefly 'Verse (Floaty islands anyone? Or the Hover mule)
Anti-grav surely gets the Shuttles into the air. And once moving at a good clip, the wings need not be very large. For example. Look at the wings on a cruise missile. very small in comparison to the rest of the craft. Big wings are needed for takeoff. Small for cruise. Therefore if you use anti-grav for takeoff, small wings would be fine for the rest of the flight. As for extending them in space (as seen in Out of Gas) There's probably control jets at the tips giving more "leverage" in the roll axis.
Being a lifting body helps too.
Just my thoughts. Your opinions and mileage may vary.
Brian
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I don't think I understand the conundrum assumed in this thread.
Space Shuttle has a delta form merely to have wings to glide down to a landing strip in a fairly controlled fashion. This makes the re-entry heat shielding a greater problem to overcome, not less.
Previously, small capsules merely fell over the ocean and hopefully splash-landed - I'm not sure if the chutes would have helped them if they perchanced upon a remote island for pancake landing.
Both of these were free-fall, without braking thrust. They both exited the earth's gravity field with monsterous external fuel tanks, subsequently dumped.
Firefly exits atmo under her own power, power she retains aboard all the time, not jettisoned. if adequate power to exit atmo, then surely adequate power to slowly enter atmo, even less needed.
The dual-purpose of Firefly having a large flat bottom to 1. provide large transport capacity and 2. for large heat sheilding surface seems reasonable. The primary purpose of heat shielding is to increase the speed of re-entry, such that it takes less time than re-entry under tremendous thrust.
Or am I missing something?
all matters of aerodynamics are for intra-atmo travel, not inter-atmo transition.
Quote:
I think there is strong evidence to suggest that the 'gravity drive' in the Firefly verse does more than provide gravity aboard ships.
I think that some of the effects of gravity upon a ship can be negated somehow,
The tech part of the new story in Firefly: Still Flying with the KayLee & Wash story expands upon this idea of using grav technology.
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Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Otherwise there's no way to reconcile the ability of these ships to navigate an atmosphere without becoming a fireball.
Heat from re-entry is due to friction with the atmosphere. Spacecraft use all their fuel/propellant reaching orbit, so they need the atmospheric drag to slow down for reentry. There's a lot of friction at orbital velocities.
Serenity doesn't have that problem. It can slow itself and reenter the atmosphere at a much lower velocity, less friction, less heat. No need for gravity drives.
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"Serenity doesn't have that problem. It can slow itself and reenter the atmosphere at a much lower velocity, less friction, less heat."
Hello,
It can, but it doesn't. We've seen the re-entry, and it is not a process where the ship or engines are turned and firing away to slow their descent. Without any active slowing measure, the ship will fall towards the planet, hit that naughty re-entry speed, and start up the hot seat.
Thus, something else is happening. If they are slowing down, it's not through the function of any reaction drive on the ship. It must be via the only invisible drive ever mentioned. The gravity drive.
--Anthony
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Quote:The Definitive Word on this IMO.
Originally posted by citizen:
Serenity doesn't have that problem. It can slow itself and reenter the atmosphere at a much lower velocity, less friction, less heat. No need for gravity drives.
The laughing Chrisisall
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Quote:Yes it is. Serenity. Opening scene (just before the port buffer panel takes flight). We see the thrusters ignite just as it hits atmo (I woulda' fired them a bit before, personally, but I'm not Wash).
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
It can, but it doesn't. We've seen the re-entry, and it is not a process where the ship or engines are turned and firing away to slow their descent.
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We applied the cortical electrodes but were unable to get a neural reaction from either patient.
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Quote:Clearly, you're not interested in an "interesting" landing.
Originally posted by Cybersnark:
(I woulda' fired them a bit before, personally, but I'm not Wash).
The laughing Chrisisall
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Hello,
Just broke out the DVD and re-watched the opening. Can't complain about having to watch it again, so I'm satisfied to be wrong.
The engines do turn to ignite as the ship starts to get glowy.
--Anthony
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Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:Quote:Clearly, you're not interested in an "interesting" landing.
Originally posted by Cybersnark:
(I woulda' fired them a bit before, personally, but I'm not Wash).
OTOH, my ships don't tend to fall apart around me.
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We applied the cortical electrodes but were unable to get a neural reaction from either patient.
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