[ExI] Breakthrough Starshot - To The Stars!

Adrian Tymes atymes at gmail.com
Sat Apr 16 16:08:24 UTC 2016


On Sat, Apr 16, 2016 at 3:09 AM, Rafal Smigrodzki <
rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com> wrote:

> ### Yes, I know. But their plan could lead to a deceleration system.
>

There are quite a lot of things that you or I say they could do better,
which they have no intention of doing.


> ### The self-guided bullets I wrote about do have electronics. Why would
> mass be an issue for robustness under acceleration? We are talking about
> micron-thin objects. They tend to stand up to acceleration well. Why would
> the duration of acceleration matter for solid-state objects?
>

As mentioned in another post last night, it turns out they do have
electronics that can stand up to the acceleration - but the sail/optical
array is their big worry.  If the acceleration is at all uneven (which it
always is in, in human observation, for any accelerating force other than
gravity), then parts would be accelerated at slightly different rates than
adjacent parts, and the delta in Gs - which can be quite large if there is
a large overall acceleration - would tear them apart.
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