Solar sails Definition and 11 Threads

It seems as though two advantages to using a solar sail turbine system instead of solar panels would be (1) the sails may not degrade as quickly as the solar panels, and (2) a sail turbine system may be lighter than a solar panel (and therefore less expensive to launch into orbit). The drawback...

What are the current limitations with solar sails and why are they not used with greater frequency? I have heard of hydrogen blistering -- is that a significant issue?

Hi everybody, I would like to share with you a crewed interstellar spacecraft which I have designed and called Solar One. It employs a combination of 3 propulsion methods: nuclear fusion, beam-powered propulsion , and photon propulsion. Basically, several compact fusion reactors power a...

Hello, In the wikipedia article about solar sails the lightness number is mentioned and the calculation is the characteristic acceleration ac divided by the Sun´s local gravity (distance: 1AU): λ = ac / 5.93 why do they use 5,93 m/s^2 for the sun´s gravity and not 274 m/s^2?

Can an on board laser be used to propel a solar sail spacecraft if the laser is pointed at the sails ? Would Newtons third law affect the laser and maybe prevent the ship from moving ? Thank you for answering my very ignorant questions. NineNinjas911

So I'm working on this project for a inflatable solar sail (so a spherical solar sail) and we are really only verifying the deployment of the sail in space (from a cubesat)...We are doing a mock PDR and I need to find info on the sail we'll be using. My job is to find an "off the shelf"...

Solar sails use the push of photons on a mirror. Would it work to use the push of photons in the atoms in fiber optic cables so the question is would there be push and how much on 1 mile of a space train 50 feet wide with 1 foot thick of fiber optics. Here's how I think it would be nearly...

I'm working on a project on solar sails, and I was wondering if you could provide me with some information. I couldn't find much on the internet, except highly technical research. In fact, even the Wikipedia article is too technical for my purposes. If you know about this stuff or have any...

I briefly researched this and all i found out was that the light pushes the sail as it is reflected off of its surface. So i am left wondering how this is possible because photons apparently have no mass therefor they can't push anything. I'm sorry if this is ignorant i am no physicist...

can anyone explain to me what requirements are needed in order to escape to infinity so I can tackle part a? Thanks.

I have some questions about solar sails. Basically, what happens to the photon? I am under the impression that the "sail" is a giant mirror that reflects photons striking it. Since photons have momentum, they impart some of this momentum to this mirror. Is this correct? But that must mean...