NASA: Microwave thruster actually works

[Hack-Hook]

I have the uneasy feeling that while it may work in theory the thrust generated by the EmDrive would be less than the thrust from photons hitting the solar panels providing the engine with energy. So it might never really work better than a plain solar sail, based on just solar power.

Solar sail have a small problem and that is in space not all photons come from the sun . and as you distance from sun the density of the photons decrease and so the power of engine

 

[Globenim]

Solar sail have a small problem and that is in space not all photons come from the sun . and as you distance from sun the density of the photons decrease and so the power of engine

The same problem you will face with the proposed solar panel idea. That could be solved with batteries saving the energy from solar power, but then the battery space might as well have been used for currently more efficient solid fuels. It might only pay off in the very very very long run. I would propose different energy sources than solar power, but then again solar power is the most long term versatile energy source we can bring up to space at this time.

 

[gambit]

A healthy dose of skepticism is in order, no ?

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS) - Anomalous Thrust Production from an RF Test Device Measured on a Low-Thrust Torsion Pendulum

To start off, NASA did not 'confirm' anything.

Now...There is a difference between a small team of researchers inside NASA who conducted an experiment and found 'something' versus when NASA officially initiated a study, allocated resources to investigation, and finally put its stamp of approval on the outcome. The latter DID NOT happened.

Both types of discovery happens on a regular basis in the private technology heavy sector and in companies whose R/D efforts are constantly vital to their existence. Depends on the information found, sometimes if whatever found is esoteric enough, it will be shared to the scientific community at large, sometimes if the information is deemed crucial for business competition, it will be kept secret for further investigation.

In my industry, semicon manufacturing, specifically NAND memory, you guys have no idea what Samsung or Intel or Toshiba -- who invented the NAND cell structure -- have in their labs. But whatever they have, right now the likes of Amazon, Ebay, the NYSE, the Shanghai Stock Exchange, and thousands of other data intensive businesses are preparing for the next generation of storage technology, while their data centers are STILL transitioning to the current solid state storage technology. They do not know or at best have a good idea of what that new technology is, but they are getting ready anyway.

So if you are curious, there are plenty of public debate on what this small team of researchers found. And if you are a Chinese nationalist, take a deep breath and relax. It is too early to cheer and use NASA as somehow validation of Chinese technological prowess.

 

[TruthSeeker]

NASA's Impossible Space Engine Is Total BS
Posted by Tom Hartsfield August 8, 2014

Last week NASA released results of a test on a new space engine design. It seems to produce thrust without burning fuel. Is the impossible science fiction of the future now possible?

A simple picture of the proposed idea reveals its fundamental absurdity. Grab a friend and a hop into a car with a back seat (not like that). You push on the windshield repeatedly, while they push on the rear window just after every time you push on the front. Now, does the car roll forward? NASA is claiming that it might.

Peer a little deeper into the story and a forest of red flags start to appear. The design of the engine is disarmingly simple, but conceptually doesn't make sense. There are lots of equations to confuse the average reader. NASA didn't actually build the engine. It was given to them completely built from a design that has been criticized, refuted, discredited and described as a fraud by physicists.

NASA's test? Conducted by a guy who believes in warp drives. The second test of validity? A study published by an unknown researcher in a fourth-rate academic journal and never cited by anyone else.

Even worse, the control engine that was supposed to produce no thrust produced the same thrust as the test engine. When a "null" experimental control doesn't produce a null result... well, that's very bad.

Looks like NASA got duped.

According to Roger Shawyer and Guido Fetta, the peddlers of the EMDrive or Cannae drive, the engine works by bouncing microwaves back and forth within a metal container. The claim is that by making one side of the container bigger than the other, more thrust is deposited on that wall. Face that wall to the back and the engine pushes forward. What's the flaw?

The total energy flux of a wave doesn't change except for dissipation as it goes back and forth. Translation: the same amount of energy is deposited on the front of the engine as the back of the engine. You cannot possibly get net energy out of a system with no additional energy input. In reality, the net force is zero, producing zero thrust.

Once the basic idea is busted, the creators resort to true BS. First, they claimed relativistic electrodynamics explained the device's power. Then they switched tacks and claimed that vacuum quantum energy is the key. Science seems to refute these findings as somewhere between implausible and nonsensical. What other extraordinary evidence can we look for to support this extraordinary claim?

How about the only other test of the engine? Great scientific work is not always published in top journals, and sometimes fraudulent work is. However, better work from better researchers generally tends to be published in a select few well respected journals. This academic test was not published in one of the 10 best publications in physics, nor one of the 50 best, nor even one of the 500 best. It was published in a journal ranked 688th in the field, a place where weak research findings go to quietly die. This publication isn't even translated into English, the universal scientific language of the Earth.

Finally, common sense can be a last check: the smell test. Extracting free energy with no loss of fuel? Does this sound plausible? I leave that to you. Personally, I'd bet my salary against it. Not that that's much money, mind you.


Tom Hartisfield is a physics PhD Candidate at the University of Texas.

NASA's Impossible Space Engine Is Total BS | RealClearScience

 

[MadeintheUSA]

Good. China takes the lead again!

Roger Shawyer first unveiled his EmDrive thruster back around 2003

The idea was first confirmed by a group of Chinese scientists back in 2009

2009 comes before 2003?

 

[Echo_419]

NASA's Impossible Space Engine Is Total BS
Posted by Tom Hartsfield August 8, 2014

Last week NASA released results of a test on a new space engine design. It seems to produce thrust without burning fuel. Is the impossible science fiction of the future now possible?

A simple picture of the proposed idea reveals its fundamental absurdity. Grab a friend and a hop into a car with a back seat (not like that). You push on the windshield repeatedly, while they push on the rear window just after every time you push on the front. Now, does the car roll forward? NASA is claiming that it might.

Peer a little deeper into the story and a forest of red flags start to appear. The design of the engine is disarmingly simple, but conceptually doesn't make sense. There are lots of equations to confuse the average reader. NASA didn't actually build the engine. It was given to them completely built from a design that has been criticized, refuted, discredited and described as a fraud by physicists.

NASA's test? Conducted by a guy who believes in warp drives. The second test of validity? A study published by an unknown researcher in a fourth-rate academic journal and never cited by anyone else.

Even worse, the control engine that was supposed to produce no thrust produced the same thrust as the test engine. When a "null" experimental control doesn't produce a null result... well, that's very bad.

Looks like NASA got duped.

According to Roger Shawyer and Guido Fetta, the peddlers of the EMDrive or Cannae drive, the engine works by bouncing microwaves back and forth within a metal container. The claim is that by making one side of the container bigger than the other, more thrust is deposited on that wall. Face that wall to the back and the engine pushes forward. What's the flaw?

The total energy flux of a wave doesn't change except for dissipation as it goes back and forth. Translation: the same amount of energy is deposited on the front of the engine as the back of the engine. You cannot possibly get net energy out of a system with no additional energy input. In reality, the net force is zero, producing zero thrust.

Once the basic idea is busted, the creators resort to true BS. First, they claimed relativistic electrodynamics explained the device's power. Then they switched tacks and claimed that vacuum quantum energy is the key. Science seems to refute these findings as somewhere between implausible and nonsensical. What other extraordinary evidence can we look for to support this extraordinary claim?

How about the only other test of the engine? Great scientific work is not always published in top journals, and sometimes fraudulent work is. However, better work from better researchers generally tends to be published in a select few well respected journals. This academic test was not published in one of the 10 best publications in physics, nor one of the 50 best, nor even one of the 500 best. It was published in a journal ranked 688th in the field, a place where weak research findings go to quietly die. This publication isn't even translated into English, the universal scientific language of the Earth.

Finally, common sense can be a last check: the smell test. Extracting free energy with no loss of fuel? Does this sound plausible? I leave that to you. Personally, I'd bet my salary against it. Not that that's much money, mind you.


Tom Hartisfield is a physics PhD Candidate at the University of Texas.

NASA's Impossible Space Engine Is Total BS | RealClearScience

Dammit i thought i maybe able to see a enterprise like ship in my life