The judging panel must include a profession stage magician. Some extravagant claims in the past have been debunked this way, because they see things that observing physicists have missed.
Claimed it could fly for eons at the equivalent of 450 million miles an hour
Its inventor calculates that an interstellar probe would take ten years to reach two-thirds the speed of light, which he sees as pretty much the limit of how fast we could practically travel.
The Daily Mail article on Mr Shawyer reports"Its inventor calculates that an interstellar probe would take ten years to reach two-thirds the speed of light, which he sees as pretty much the limit of how fast we could practically travel."Which is presumably where the "450 million miles an hour" comes from.
When I tracked down Mr Shawyer to his base in Havant, Hants, he said he was pleased Nasa was ‘having fun’ with his creation and felt some vindication after years of scepticism.
Given the known physics this violates the question naturally rises "why didn't we notice anything related to this before?"
Quote from: Hanelyp on 05/14/2015 07:53 pmGiven the known physics this violates the question naturally rises "why didn't we notice anything related to this before?"Likely, the effect was so small that no one noticed it before. In this case, someone was looking for just such a result.
If one were to use an alblative shield of some sort ahead of the probe and a huge solar sail during decelleration, the probe could arrive after achieving nearly 3/4 C, and decellerate enough to make a more leasurely pass through the starsystem. (Mind you, this also assumes a turn over along the course, in conjunction with the use of the solar sail).
For the second time in two weeks, the Daily Mail is reporting on EM Drive.This second article is pretty much a summary of the principles of the concept and the objections raised against it in pure layman's terms. The overall tone is neutral (with a gleeful hint of 'who knows what else THEY aren't telling us!').Still, It's odd that the DM should report on this twice in such quick succession. The first article was, oddly enough, heavily drawn from the threads here on NSF. I'm wondering if the Rothschilds (who ultimately own Associated Newspaper Group) may have invested some cash in EMDrive and are trying to talk it up.
The Daily Mail article on Mr Shawyer reports"Its inventor calculates that an interstellar probe would take ten years to reach two-thirds the speed of light, which he sees as pretty much the limit of how fast we could practically travel."
Quote from: A_M_Swallow on 05/14/2015 11:17 amThe Daily Mail article on Mr Shawyer reports"Its inventor calculates that an interstellar probe would take ten years to reach two-thirds the speed of light, which he sees as pretty much the limit of how fast we could practically travel."How does he reconcile that with his "because the EmDrive obeys the law of conservation of energy, this thrust/power ratio rapidly decreases if the EmDrive is used to accelerate the vehicle along the thrust vector"? (#18 in http://emdrive.com/faq.html)~Kirk