Science Forums 2

[Moontanman]

I prefer the idea of super strong to super light. A space ship should be strong, if it has to be heavy to be strong I prefer strong. But if it is heavy then how do you power it?

Since we don't have warp fields to lower the mass or antimatter to fuel the space craft what should we turn to?

The Saturn Five previously mentioned had engines that ran on liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. It was pretty much the best chemical rockets can do, the Saturn Five had a specific impulse of 450 Isp, the old Nerva nuclear rockets had a maximum Isp of about 900, pretty good but the reactor was so heavy if negated much of the increase.

What we need is a better and lighter power supply. The gaseous core nuclear reactor engine has an Isp of over 3000 to about 5000 that is as much as 10 times as good as the Saturn five rocket. This rocket can not only be operated safely but if it massed the same as the Saturn five rocket it could launch 2 million pounds of cargo into Earth orbit in one launch! Not only that it could also fly back down on it's own exhaust and carry cargo back to earth. It would be a true space ship, no multiple throw away stages. Just one space craft capable of doing almost anything we want it to do.