Could be used on land, too! Drive outright up to the HIF or, later on with the BFS, right up to the launch pad.
Don't forget to evict the eels first ...
...my thoughts led to a faster drone ship with ability for higher sea states similar to a LCAC...
Quote from: Rocket Science on 02/04/2017 05:06 pm...my thoughts led to a faster drone ship with ability for higher sea states similar to a LCAC...Unsure if an hovercraft can handle high waves. For some reason (not only fuel saving), you don't see long range hovercraft. I would expect that the very high center of gravity would make them crap with big waves.Checking "Sea State" classification, the largest hovercraft in the world (Zubr-class) can only handle a sea state of 4.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_state That means only up to 2.5 meters, which is kind of pathetic compared to the barges. Even my small 25ft sailboat can handle more than that.The other problem is that the largest hovercraft is too small, you would need to develop the largest hovercraft ever, that would not be cheap.
A hydrofoil can be a better choice.It reverts back to a normal barge during landing, but can scurry back fast once done.Of course what am I saying, an F9 can land on a moving hydrofoil, it's just a matter of some software and active homing - I mean - Apollo already docked with Skylab at 8 km/sec, and that's like 1000 times faster than a hydrofoil.
Hovercraft are built more like aircraft, not like ships, because they are held off the ground/water by a cushion of air maintained by high volume low pressure fans. One very big advantage the current ASDS has as a landing platform is that it is very big and very heavy, a feature not compatible with aircraft-style design.
A hydrofoil can be a better choice.It reverts back to a normal barge during landing, but can scurry back fast once done.
Of course what am I saying, an F9 can land on a moving hydrofoil, it's just a matter of some software and active homing - I mean - Apollo already docked with Skylab at 8 km/sec, and that's like 1000 times faster than a hydrofoil.
Quote from: meekGee on 02/04/2017 11:25 pmA hydrofoil can be a better choice.It reverts back to a normal barge during landing, but can scurry back fast once done.It cannot handle high seas in hydrofoil mode, so the advantage is none.
Quote from: rpapo on 02/04/2017 10:52 pmHovercraft are built more like aircraft, not like ships, because they are held off the ground/water by a cushion of air maintained by high volume low pressure fans. One very big advantage the current ASDS has as a landing platform is that it is very big and very heavy, a feature not compatible with aircraft-style design.The largest hovercraft is very large, 550tons fully loaded. And very ship-like.
Quote from: meekGee on 02/04/2017 11:25 pmA hydrofoil can be a better choice.It reverts back to a normal barge during landing, but can scurry back fast once done.It cannot handle high seas in hydrofoil mode, so the advantage is none.Quote from: meekGee on 02/04/2017 11:25 pmOf course what am I saying, an F9 can land on a moving hydrofoil, it's just a matter of some software and active homing - I mean - Apollo already docked with Skylab at 8 km/sec, and that's like 1000 times faster than a hydrofoil.Very misleading analogy. In-space docking is all about relative speeds between spacecrafts, not between spacecrafts and ground. They only move a few cm per second relative to each other, with no outside disturbance.F9 landing is more complicated by several orders of magnitude. As an example, in-space docking can be done manually, but landing the F9 cannot.
Since this is a la-la thread, why not...