Mission to Mars: Orion nuclear propulsion (remastered) – Orbiter Space Flight Simulator 2010 – Video




Mission to Mars: Orion nuclear propulsion (remastered) - Orbiter Space Flight Simulator 2010
-- Original uploaded on September 2, 2009 -- en.wikipedia.org Project Orion was the first serious attempt to design a nuclear pulse rocket. The design effort was carried out at General Atomics in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The idea of Orion was to react small directional nuclear explosives against a large steel pusher plate attached to the spacecraft with shock absorbers. Efficient directional explosives maximized the momentum transfer, leading to specific impulses in the range of 6000 seconds. With refinements a theoretical maximum of 100000 seconds (1 MNs/kg) might be possible. Thrusts were in the millions of short tonnes, allowing spacecraft larger than 8106 short tonnes to be built with 1958 materials. The reference design was to be constructed of steel using submarine-style construction with a crew of more than 200 and a vehicle takeoff weight of several thousand tonnes. This low-tech single-stage reference design would reach Mars and back in four weeks from the Earth #39;s surface (compare to 12 months for NASA #39;s current chemically-powered reference mission). The same craft could visit Saturn #39;s moons in a seven-month mission (compare to chemically-powered missions of about nine years). A number of engineering problems were found and solved over the course of the project, notably related to crew shielding and pusher-plate lifetime. The system appeared to be entirely workable when the project was shut down in 1965, the main reason being given that the Partial Test ...

By: rseferino1

Follow this link:

Mission to Mars: Orion nuclear propulsion (remastered) - Orbiter Space Flight Simulator 2010 - Video

Related Posts

Comments are closed.