Hi,
Flying in circles to simulate gravity
Ok, This is assuming that when the ship is accelerating @1G, the floor
is set up so that the crew feels 1G of acceleration on the aft bulkhead
making that the 'Floor'. So, flying from planet to planet, you would
walk around on the 'floor' and feel perfectly normal.
Now, we want to stay in orbit, or just stay in one location. By putting
a slow rotation on the ship you are pointing the drives in a varying
direction. When you have made a full circle, your net acceleration is
zero. Thus you haven't moved anywhere.
Well Tony, I did say a SLOW rotation now didn't I? Acutally, I was
considering flying in a circle say... a couple kilometers in diameter...
I'm too lazy to figure out what the coliosis forces would do, but if
1 km is too small, then 2 km should be ok.
Think about it like this: 1kg Bead on a string. whirl the bead around over
your head so that the bead is feeling 9.8m/S^2 in centripetal acceleration.
Ok, now imagine your bead is now a 1kg spaceship. Instead of the string
pulling on the spaceship with a force of 9.8 neutons, the ship's engines
are pushing it with 9.8 neutons. As long as the ship's nose is pointed at
the center of the circle and is accelerating at 1G, you will stay right there.
Ok now expand the scale. Now you have a 30 meter long ship accelerating
at 1G. Sure you'd want the diameter of the rotation to be much longer.
But you are not rotating in such a way that the center of rotation is within
the body of the ship.
Trust me it works. (Hey you're at MIT! I'm at Auburn! You're supposed to
be smarter than me!) :-) :-)
BTW, it was always my impression that a Radiation counter in megatrav would
detect particulate radiation. Thus it is useless in finding stars. In
order for a TL 9 ship to jump, you will need some sort of telescope, and
the closest thing in MT is the Light Intensifier.
Mr. Scott
1=[(-1)^2]^1/2=(-1)^1/2*(-1)^1/2=i*i=i^2=-1
1=-1 QED