Author Topic: FEATURE ARTICLE: Evaluating NASA's Futuristic EM Drive (Read 313421 times)

Chris Bergin · « **on:** 04/29/2015 06:00 pm »

Over two months of work went into this article, involving the methodical and patient work of several people involved with the massive EM Drive thread - with the goal of creating an accurate and understandable (it's still high level science) article to reflect the interest in this development.

There have been several articles - all feeding off our forum thread on this - but this is something we feel will be more of a full news overview article.

Article:
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2015/04/evaluating-nasas-futuristic-em-drive/

Written by José Rodal, Ph.D, Jeremiah Mullikin and Noel Munson - subedited by Chris Gebhardt. Thanks also Don Domonoske and member RotoSequence for the work in the special area where we built this article. We would obviously like to thank Paul March at Eagleworks for his interesting interactions on the thread, and the numerous other high level folk who may not be too obvious behind their usernames (standard for a forum - if only you knew some of the people behind usernames on the SpaceX and such sections!)

Main EM Drive Thread (now over 500,000 views):
http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=36313.0

Attached are larger versions of the some of the images - the ones hard to read/see in our CMS style - (more, when found, can be added to the thread).

rokan2003 · « **Reply #1 on:** 04/29/2015 06:24 pm »

Absolutely fantastic. Thanks so much Chris, and to the whole team here. You guys rock!

jcopella · « **Reply #2 on:** 04/29/2015 06:35 pm »

Thank you to the authors & editors of this article, and to the contributors on the EM thread for sharing your expertise. Well done, everyone.

NovaSilisko · « **Reply #3 on:** 04/29/2015 06:39 pm »

Wonderful. I've said it a lot before, but it makes me really happy to see this being handled rationally, scientifically, and skeptically. Good work, everyone involved.

kevinof · « **Reply #4 on:** 04/29/2015 06:45 pm »

Chris,
Spent the last hour reading this wonderful article (sitting in Regents Park!) . Love the engineering and the physics and looking forward to seeing this technology used in the future.

Great work by you and the team as NSF.

Tuts36 · « **Reply #5 on:** 04/29/2015 06:51 pm »

Thank you so much for this article. I've been aware of the EM Drive threadnought for awhile, and surmised that there was Something There from the sheer enthusiasm therein, but haven't had the time or the brains to make much sense out of it. Now I at least understand what the excitement is about!

Chris Bergin · « **Reply #6 on:** 04/29/2015 06:55 pm »

Quote from: kevinof on 04/29/2015 06:45 pm

Chris,
Spent the last hour reading this wonderful article (sitting in Regents Park!) . Love the engineering and the physics and looking forward to seeing this technology used in the future.

Great work by you and the team as NSF.

Thanks for the above and the other comments, although I really don't deserve any credit. All the work was done by the guys accredited in the opening post.

scienceguy · « **Reply #7 on:** 04/29/2015 07:03 pm »

Is the trip time to alpha centauri based on the space drive, or based on the power source?

Rocket Science · « **Reply #8 on:** 04/29/2015 07:14 pm »

Epic article!

I’m really looking forward to the tests...

Raj2014 · « **Reply #9 on:** 04/29/2015 07:15 pm »

Thank you for the article Chris, excellent work. This is great news. I hope there will be more testing done and hopefully this technology will be out soon.

tchernik · « **Reply #10 on:** 04/29/2015 07:16 pm »

I've read the old and new Emdrive threads complete, and I'm still enthralled reading this article.

Congrats for doing a very good overview!

Star One · « **Reply #11 on:** 04/29/2015 07:16 pm »

Thanks for that article all those who contributed to it. Nice to see the essence of what is spread across a huge thread condensed down to an easily digestible chunk.

corrodedNut · « **Reply #12 on:** 04/29/2015 07:17 pm »

To quote another thread: "Who are you guys?"

CW · « **Reply #13 on:** 04/29/2015 07:19 pm »

Fantastic work

.

Tuts36 · « **Reply #14 on:** 04/29/2015 07:20 pm »

Quote from: Rocket Science on 04/29/2015 07:14 pm

Epic article! I’m really looking forward to the tests...

Same here! Although they are going to have to relocate to Bozeman, Montana first.

cuddihy · « **Reply #15 on:** 04/29/2015 07:22 pm »

Great article Dr. Rodal, Mulletron, Chris, and others! Gets to the heart of the excitement!

teookie · « **Reply #16 on:** 04/29/2015 07:23 pm »

I've been binging on emDrive papers, theorys, and forum banter for the past few days. This is truly exciting stuff. We may be on the cusp of new physics and new possibilities. Many thanks to those who are making all this possible, and thanks for taking time to share it all with us on the forums.

I would like to throw out one question on the subject. The paper linked at the top of this thread, along with most of the forum discussions regarding possible emDrive applications have been focused on space travel. But wouldn't it be possible to use emDrives terrestrially as well? Think helicopters with no downdraft, levitating cars or trains. Heck, why not a emDrive SSTO vehicle? Are these concepts within the realm of possibility?

Cherokee43v6 · « **Reply #17 on:** 04/29/2015 07:31 pm »

Articles like this were the reason I first started lurking here and later started to participate in the forums.

Great read and really interesting. I look forward to seeing more on this very Star Trek technology.

Star One · « **Reply #18 on:** 04/29/2015 07:32 pm »

Before we gets lots of questions about terrestrial applications.

Quote

18.
Q. How can the EmDrive produce enough thrust for terrestrial applications?
A. The second generation engines will be capable of producing a specific thrust of 30kN/kW. Thus for 1 kilowatt (typical of the power in a microwave oven) a static thrust of 3 tonnes can be obtained, which is enough to support a large car. This is clearly adequate for terrestrial transport applications.
The static thrust/power ratio is calculated assuming a superconducting EmDrive with a Q of 5 x 109. This Q value is routinely achieved in superconducting cavities.
Note however, 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. (See Equation 16 of the theory paper). Whilst the EmDrive can provide lift to counter gravity, (and is therefore not losing kinetic energy), auxiliary propulsion is required to provide the kinetic energy to accelerate the vehicle.

http://emdrive.com/faq.html

CW · « **Reply #19 on:** 04/29/2015 07:35 pm »

Quote from: teookie on 04/29/2015 07:23 pm

I've been binging on emDrive papers, theorys, and forum banter for the past few days. This is truly exciting stuff. We may be on the cusp of new physics and new possibilities. Many thanks to those who are making all this possible, and thanks for taking time to share it all with us on the forums.

I would like to throw out one question on the subject. The paper linked at the top of this thread, along with most of the forum discussions regarding possible emDrive applications have been focused on space travel. But wouldn't it be possible to use emDrives terrestrially as well? Think helicopters with no downdraft, levitating cars or trains. Heck, why not a emDrive SSTO vehicle? Are these concepts within the realm of possibility?

If there is a mechanism to interact with the fabric of spacetime itself in a manner as the EM-drive type devices seem to do, then I think the imparted impulse on the virtual 'plasma' should show up in some suprising form or another in the vicinity of such a drive. I could imagine this effect as a 'gravity-like' interaction (maybe 'pulling' in front of the drive, 'pushing' behind the drive) with the surroundings. But hey.. let's first try and demonstrate that the new simulation code-predicted relation between input energy and thrust is observable.. shall we?