Rim Transport System

In article <mBd2d.4141$bj2.2965@trnddc08>, jesus_x.TakeThisOut@mozillanews.org (jesus
X) wrote:

 > On 9/15/2004 11:58 PM David Lesher cranked up the brainbox and said:
 >
  > > Midst the atmosphere discussion, it came to me that the Rim Transport
  > > System has a major gotcha. If you go anti-spinward, and are willing
  > > to tolerate say 1.5 G; that's one speed. But if you want to go
  > > spinward.....
 >
 > I'm not sure I follow your point. Could you clarify?
 >

I saw his point immediately.

Normally you would slow your craft to orbital speed and after a brief
acceleration that will take you antispinward in free fall.

But if you want to go spinward.... how much heavier do you want to be?

Stephen

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steve.DeleteThis@antispam.sforbesa.cix.co.uk (Stephen Forbes) writes:


 >Normally you would slow your craft to orbital speed and after a brief
 >acceleration that will take you antispinward in free fall.

 >But if you want to go spinward.... how much heavier do you want to be?

Actually; you'd accelerate through 0G to say 1.5....

Another issue... My favorite Dennis the Menace cartoon shows him
standing at the bottom of the down escalator, asking "What do you
do when the basement gets full of stairs?" & the same applies here.




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On 9/16/2004 6:11 PM Stephen Forbes cranked up the brainbox and said:
 > But if you want to go spinward.... how much heavier do you want to be?

Ahh. Now I get it. It's a matter of relative speed. I was thinking he was
implying it wasn't possible to travel spinward at all. It's merely that
traveling spinward is going to be slower (relative to the Ringworld) at any
given g-force experienced. Thanks.

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jesus X wrote:

 > Ahh. Now I get it. It's a matter of relative speed. I was thinking he
 > was
 > implying it wasn't possible to travel spinward at all. It's merely
 > that
 > traveling spinward is going to be slower (relative to the Ringworld)
 > at any
 > given g-force experienced. Thanks.

And this really isn't a big deal anyway. Vehicles that use the rim
transport system can simply orient themselves one way or the other
depending on where the relative g-forces are going. You probably
wouldn't want to go antispinward all the way so they're in freefall,
despite what I recall it saying in the books, and you probably wouldn't
want to go all the way to two full gravities in the spinward direction,
though both would certainly be possible. You'd just go to some
increment of that, orient the vehicle appropriately, and your passengers
experience +-n gees during transit. Only relatively modest changes in
the centripetal acceleration would get you going at a pretty good clip,
since the rotational speed of the Ringworld is 1220 km/s.

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On 9/17/2004 4:31 AM Erik Max Francis cranked up the brainbox and said:
 > And this really isn't a big deal anyway. Vehicles that use the rim
 > transport system can simply orient themselves one way or the other
 > depending on where the relative g-forces are going. You probably
 > wouldn't want to go antispinward all the way so they're in freefall,
 > despite what I recall it saying in the books, and you probably wouldn't
 > want to go all the way to two full gravities in the spinward direction,
 > though both would certainly be possible.

No, actually, were I traveling antispinward, I'd actually prefer to go somewhere
between .5 and 1 g, because it's easy to acclimate oneself to standard or near
standard gravity, more so than 0g, and you'd get there a hell of a lot faster.
For going spinward, that's a little different. You'd have to accept traveling at
more than 1g, to use the rim transit system, or use a ship and not the rim
system at all.

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jesus X wrote:

 > No, actually, were I traveling antispinward, I'd actually prefer to go
 > somewhere
 > between .5 and 1 g, because it's easy to acclimate oneself to standard
 > or near
 > standard gravity, more so than 0g, and you'd get there a hell of a lot
 > faster.
 > For going spinward, that's a little different. You'd have to accept
 > traveling at
 > more than 1g, to use the rim transit system, or use a ship and not the
 > rim
 > system at all.

Well, if you _want_ to be light one way and heavy the other way,
certainly you can do that. I was presuming that most passengers would
prefer a uniform experience regardless of whether they were travelling
spinward or antispinward. Which is certainly possible simply by
orienting the ship.

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After rereading; I don't see the system can work at all.

The RTS was not near atop the wall; it was on the spill mountains.
And the loops were as much as 1E6 miles apart. How could the
payload NOT go in a straight line right through the floor?

Further confusion... how tall are the spill mountains? I seem to
recall them as being well below the wall...

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On 9/17/2004 8:17 PM Erik Max Francis cranked up the brainbox and said:
 > Well, if you _want_ to be light one way and heavy the other way,
 > certainly you can do that. I was presuming that most passengers would
 > prefer a uniform experience regardless of whether they were travelling
 > spinward or antispinward. Which is certainly possible simply by
 > orienting the ship.

How would one orient the ship going spinward to counteract the initial 1G? I
would think no matter how the ship was oriented, local "down" would stay put.

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jesus X wrote:

 > How would one orient the ship going spinward to counteract the initial
 > 1G? I
 > would think no matter how the ship was oriented, local "down" would
 > stay put.

I was meaning that you wouldn't have to pull negative gees.

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In article <cigetl$68q$1@reader1.panix.com>, David Lesher wrote:
 > The RTS was not near atop the wall; it was on the spill mountains.
The *entrances* for getting to the RTS were on the spill
mountains, down deep in the atmosphere. But I don't remember any
mention of if the travellers had to travel horizontally through the
mountains to get to the RTS or if they had to climb higher. If you've
got the technology for a Czalting brone and floating cities, then
airtight elevators are not exactly going to be taxing.


 > And the loops were as much as 1E6 miles apart. How could the
 > payload NOT go in a straight line right through the floor?
 >
The loops and the RTS are on the outside of the Ring. There is
no floor below them (except for landing stages at the spaceports/ RTS
ports.

 > Further confusion... how tall are the spill mountains? I seem to
 > recall them as being well below the wall...
 >
About a thousand miles. The spill mountains are cosmetic
additions to the basic scrith wall.

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Aidan Karley <aidan.DeleteThis@abuse.demon.co.uk.invalidated> writes:

  >> The RTS was not near atop the wall; it was on the spill mountains.

 > The *entrances* for getting to the RTS were on the spill
 >mountains, down deep in the atmosphere. But I don't remember any
 >mention of if the travellers had to travel horizontally through the
 >mountains to get to the RTS or if they had to climb higher. If you've
 >got the technology for a Czalting brone and floating cities, then
 >airtight elevators are not exactly going to be taxing.

Well...

  >> And the loops were as much as 1E6 miles apart. How could the
  >> payload NOT go in a straight line right through the floor?
  >>
 > The loops and the RTS are on the outside of the Ring. There is
 >no floor below them (except for landing stages at the spaceports/ RTS
 >ports.

First Luwee and Speaker knew of the RTS was the Map Room. It was
described as being between the mountain-tops and Speaker assumes
they put the vehicle into freefall [but would it be orbit?]. That
would work, I think. One way, however..do NOT miss your stop!

  >> Further confusion... how tall are the spill mountains? I seem to
  >> recall them as being well below the wall...
  >>
 > About a thousand miles. The spill mountains are cosmetic
 >additions to the basic scrith wall.

I thought Hindmost had followed a spillpipe over the montains and
down. It makes no sense to dump the flup at the top of the wall;
you WILL lose some vapor over the wall. But 100 miles up, it's a
different story.

Besides, I thought the spill mountains were a fraction of the size
of Fist-of-God.

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In article <ciho4h$m68$1@reader1.panix.com>, David Lesher wrote:
> Besides, I thought the spill mountains were a fraction of the size
> of Fist-of-God.
>
I don't think so. FoG is given as sticking up out of the
sensible atmosphere, but depending on your definitions that could be as
little as a couple of hundred km. Off hand, can anyone remember the
orbital altitude of Skylab? That nicely demonstrates that even quite
high, there is some sensible atmosphere - it just depends on how
sensitive your sensors are.

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<< From: David Lesher wb8foz.RemoveThis@panix.com >>


<< Besides, I thought the spill mountains were a fraction of the size
of Fist-of-God. >>

A tiny fraction. IIRC, the spill mountains are like 30 miles high.
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