LightCraft Launch Oct 2000 - laserbeam powered propulsion

[univerisan765]

Ok then, a question... since the air ignites to a plasma-state several times hotter than the sun, despite the parabolic reflectors, how much heat is obsorbed by the body? Does the plasma cool almost instantly once it returns to air, or does it dissipate at an even rate? Simply asking out of curiosity... :)

[hellomate639]

Well, I think we ought to consider the fact that a military laser recently cut through 20 ft of steel per second.

I would love to see how quickly you could accelerate this thing with a laser like that....

[fmsmonsters]

"...which heats the air to between 18,000 and 54,000 degrees Fahrenheit...--that's several times hotter than the surface of the sun."

I don't wanna imagine what will happen with atmosphere when they use something bigger

"How R u supposed 2 know? F...reaking men like u built the hydrogen bomb. Men like u thought it up. U think u're so creative. U don't know what it's like 2 really create something; 2 create a life; 2 feel it growing inside u. All u know how 2 create is death..." - Sarah Connor

[fmsmonsters]

@fmsmonsters I mean.... I love edge technology but when it does not affect the nature

[roidroid]

@fmsmonsters it's just heat, it's like a bolt of lightning.

[busterpiggle]

How would you stabilize a full sized craft without spinning it? Precisely balancing a payload would be almost impossible.

[Pooua]

@busterpiggle Large gyroscopes could be sufficient, but that would add a lot of mass just to stabilize the craft. Aerodynamic stabilizers could also be used after the craft is up to speed. Rockets could be used, or, perhaps some of the energy that propels the craft could be used for stabilizing thrusters.

[wavewash]

How will it continue to lift when it reaches a point that the atmosphere is too thin to allow for "igniting air" for propulsion?

[roidroid]

@wavewash If they can pick up enough speed while in the atmosphere, they can then "zoom climb" outof the atmosphere in a ballistic trajectory.

If more thrust is needed while in vacuum - the laser burns off a layer of ablative fuel painted onto the outside of the craft. This gives a more efficient thrust than normal chemical rockets.

[underworldx16]

@wavewash there will be a small amount of hydrogen fuel on board

[underworldx16]

@wavewash there will be a small amount of hydrogen fuel on board

[Nexstarcrazyness]

Asides from solar winds to power 'some' spacecraft, this technology would definitely prove useful for pushing craft around through zero gravity or perhaps moving payloads into place when building space architecture.

But I would doubt that this technology alone would be ideal for terrestrial takeoff.

[gbilios]

whats happening with this technology now?

[roidroid]

It's waiting for lasers to get more powerful, which is finally happening now.

Lightcrafttechnologies website has recently changed

Also here's some recently published articles (google them):

Wired - February 20, 2009: "Laser Powered Aircraft are the future of Flight. Maybe"

Nextbigfuture - July 30, 2009: "Laser Propulsion Tests in Brazil using Gigawatt Pulsed Lasers"

Centauri Dreams - September 14 2009: "Lightcraft: A Laser Push to Orbit"

September 15 2009: "Lightcraft Experiments Continue"

[gbilios]

thanks for the information!!

[dinmagic]

I do believe that today's lasers are powerful enough to lift up a full size lightcraft, I think the problem is that these lasers require large amounts of energy and they require large amounts of very toxic chemicals to get that energy. We'll have to wait until they bring a satellite that uses the Sun's energy to power up a laser. Who knows, this may be the next generation of flight. Sometime in the future the lasers will be small and efficient enough to be on the ship, propelling itself.

[sixstringmania]

sounds like fart

[teslaandlyne]

There might be an ether interaction when plasma is involved. If there is a Tesla solution to anti gravity ( which we do not know about) as he talked about his aircraft from 1910 to 1934, I'd say his craft would work on the ether system.

[peterntanya]

boats n hoes

[ccaptorchen]

lol... allot of conspiracy nut cases in the comment section. wake up fools, there is no such thing as anti gravity, at least not yet. over powering gravitational force by electromagnetic is not " anti gravity" the same way rockets are not consider "anti gravity" you just over powering it with a stronger force, since gravity is the weakest force.

[theprofit1138]

What if the mass of the light ship could be reduced to zero, how would this effect the speeds this craft could reach?

[roidroid]

i suppose it would enable the craft able to instantly attain light speed - and further.

Being able to manipulate mass is one of the prerequisites to theoretically being able to fold space, safely transverse wormholes, and create warp (ie: faster than light) travel.

It's kindof a holy grail of theoretical physics - any group who accomplishes it will likely win the Noble prise.

It's debatable whether or not it's possible.

[TRex443556]

Wow, and they got the 3 elements for success!

(I always knew there was one lost)

[Hansolo60]

Use Lorentz force for antigravity. That's the alternative of element 115.

[roidroid]

hey have you played the old game XCOM ? The first one, it's from 1993.

it is based on old ufology lore like you're talking about. It has Element 115 in it and everything. It's one of my favourite games.

watch?v=pwtPptYHXQ0

This is basically what it's like to play, but you gradually research stuff and learn more about the aliens and their equipment, you can start using their weapons. Things start out pretty simple though.

[Hansolo60]

He can't. The craft is using isotope 299 of element 115 that can't be found naturaly on earth. It's been mined right now on some planet in Zeta system and brought back by the secret astronaut corps, created by STARCOM.

This lightcraft is a toy compared to the antigravity technology, but is still better than primitive rockets.

[roidroid]

lol

i too have a design for an anti-gravity craft. But it runs on the farts of unicorns.

Unfortunately the illuminati have a monopoly on unicorn breeding and i am thus unable to fuel my anti-gravity craft.

The bastards.

[Serenia777]

Be aware that unicorns are VERY dangerous when they fart. These horns at the front are there for a reason !

[Hansolo60]

Bob Lazar spoke of far better crafts that are based on antigravity

[roidroid]

Then Bob Lazar should stop talking and start building.

[danishterminator]

That's pretty neat, but what happened to the company? The video reads year 2000?

[roidroid]

i'm unsure what happened to the company, but the technology/concept continues to be developed on many angles.

It is mainly dependent on increases in laser power. As lasers become more powerful, laser launch technology becomes easier to implement.

I have put a link at the bottom of the video description to the relevant section of the Next Big Future blog, that often has updates on the state of laser launch technology.

[Blaze200038]

holy crap, up to (about) 30,000 C? thats about as hot as an O class star (for those of you who don't know, thats the hottest/largest type of cataloged star)

[alexxerth]

i have studied this before i thought this would be a laser sail but this is even better a craft like this is one that could make it all the way to the centuari system and that is one thing that is really hard to do considering it is 4.33 lightyears away but this is awesome.

[filosophydude]

its kind of misleading to call it a light craft... initially i thought the laser is pushing the thing like a solar sail...

but it's really cool nonetheless, you dont have to carry the fuel on board, and the fuels needed to move the fuels..

[salemcripple]

that's the way i thought it worked at first too.

[quidproquo2004]

what are you talking about? The laser did push the craft up.

[Hansolo60]

Yes, but the air/space ship: TR-3B Astra exist. It uses some kind of field propulsion.

How close are we from revealing this thing?

[roidroid]

The lightcraft in this video isn't a conspiracy theory, it's well understood and verifiable science.

I think conspiracy theories about hidden technologies are a completely different discussion - not really related to scientifically understood and verifiable demonstrations such as the lightcraft.

Afterall - since this technology is understood, anyone can reproduce it. The original company becomes relevant only to patents.

Conspiracy theories in comparison, are generally non-verifiable.

[salemcripple]

"Conspiracy theories in comparison, are generally non-verifiable"

I would like to add that allot of conspiracy theories are complete and utter b/s to anyone with more than half a brain. And are generally created by people who have no clear understanding of what they are talking about. The "controlled demo 9/11" crowd for example. Any ways, that's just my two cents on the convo.

[Hansolo60]

No, roidroid, I'm not so interested in laser propulsion. But I was curious about the project and development.

I'm more interested in antigravity technology, and one company, which is working on it is GCT(Gravity Control Technologies) - you can check in Google. What worries me is that the company, like this, which is working on the 'Lightcraft', didn't update the website since 2007. I did sent them an e-mail, but no response. What do you think?

[roidroid]

Anti-gravity is snake-oil, i've seen a lot of false claims so i'm VERY sceptical. If any company tries to sell you an antigravity or free-energy device, be very very suspicious. Thus - My first guess is that your GCT(Gravity Control Technologies) company pretended to have a technology, scammed some people outof some money and then did a runner and/or they are in jail for fraud.

Antigravity is a huge claim for a company to make, did they back this up?

[Hansolo60]

I have proof that antigravity is real!

Go in you tube and see this: "UFO, never doubt again".

If you wish, we can jump there :P

[Hansolo60]

lightcrafttechnologies didn't update their website. Why?

[roidroid]

I'm not sure. Perhaps the company was mainly just to demonstrate the technology and they've done that now.

Perhaps after the successful test - that was prettymuch all they could do on a modest budget until higher powered lasers became available to take experiments further.

Perhaps you could look up professor Leik N. Myrabo and ask him what's going on with the technology (it seems it was his work). You can find him on google.

[Hansolo60]

Looks like all progressive projects are killed somehow... :(

[roidroid]

This technology isn't dead, far from it. It's been demonstrated as seen in this (and other) videos and the science is well understood.

I still hear the technology mentioned (quite seriously too) every now and again on the NEXTBIGFUTURE. COM blog. Check out their "laser" tag.

[roidroid]

sorry maybe "laser tag" is a bit confusing (there is a sport called laser tag!)

i mean this:

nextbigfuture. com /search/label/lasers

[Hansolo60]

nextbigfuture. com , as I see it, looks like more than conventional. And I also know about the Centauri Dreams blog. The word "Antigravity" is not well taken :D

[roidroid]

Anti-gravity would be great, i'd like to see it. But extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Stage magicians like David Copperfield regularly do anti-gravity stuff on stage, such stage antics are not however sufficient proof that anti-gravity exists. Unverifiable and non-reproducable anti-gravity experiments and UFO videos should be seen as the same - just stage antics, unless they can be proven.

[Hansolo60]

They did their best to hide the technology in order to keep us in prison.

Nikola Tesla is the real inventor of antigravity and ZPE. The germans in WW2 have done much for the further development. After that, what nazis didn't do, the alies and soviets have done it. I personaly believe that there is another spaceprogram, parallel to NASA, but with far bigger budget and greater history, with much more achievements, but hidden. If you look "UFO, never doubt again", you'll know of what I'm talking.

[Hansolo60]

You should read some of the books, written by Vladimir Terziski. He has proven everything.

One more thing - the 'Lifter' technology is only a small proof of what is realy going on ;)

[Hansolo60]

The project has no updates since December 2000. I see no progress in it.

[roidroid]

it really seems to rely on the progress of laser technology, which is making leaps and bounds lately.

- In this 2000 video it's using a 10 kW laser.

- Now in 2008 we have 100 kW lasers.

- The USA NAVY is now developing 1 MegaWatt lasers, which it expects to be ready by 2012.

Remember to get into ORBIT you have to do more than just fly up into space - you have to fly FAST, approx 6x the speed of sound. To get a 1 KG payload into orbital speeds will require a 1 MW laser.

[prhughes0]

neat! how long are the pulses? or how much power input to the laser and how much output to the flyer? does it really work without ablative material?

[roidroid]

This 10kW pulsed laser in the video has a sustained power output of 36 kilowatts (non pulsed).

in 2007 a 100 kilowatt laser was announced (expected to be 20.6% efficient).

USA NAVY is now funding development of MegaWatt solid state lasers - expected completion is in 2012.

a 1 MegaWatt laser can accelerate a 1 Kilogram payload into orbit (ie: 6x speed of sound)

Larger single payloads could be sent in small pieces one after another, or an array of lasers would do it all at once.

[roidroid]

Oops, actually I think that sustained 36 kilowatts figure is not for this particular laser - the actual figure for this laser would be lower than that - i'm gonna go out on a limb and suggest it's 10 kilowatts or lower (how can a 10 kilowatt pulsed laser produce MORE than 10 kilowatts sustained? haha).

[RAPTORSTARSHIP]

so sad to see them struggle when they already know where these cats will end up. If we were to tell them the truth that we already have the tech.

[fmman3]

LTI Is the company that will Bring us Future space shuttles. I can tell they will. Just look at the technology they've discovered, if they can place this into a new kind of shuttle or aircraft, Imagine what would be possible.

[andrew78m]

Ok this is 8 years old.. so why nothing new ? Their website has not been touched also since 2000.... This is hardly going anywhere it seems.. another dead and buried project.

[Dad103]

Richard Branson did it and its affordable to many at 200,000 a trip. At least people can fit on Sir Richard's craft.

[texNoz]

Just as an example.. The amount of energy used to set your records was probably in the fraction of a % efficient. You will increase your power exponentially to gain slightly more altitude. Tell us how much energy was used to launch your few ounces a couple hundred feet.

[roidroid]

tex, this is a proof of concept prototype for the technology. The first ever. I'm amazed it didn't burn/melt/explode, and you're whining about efficiency?

How efficient was the very first rudimentary turbine engine? some perspective please.

I believe plasma physics has a bright future in rocketry.

[texNoz]

I am only disputing the entropic loses of the laser propulsion system, even at 100% conversion efficiencies inside the resonator, it will never become as efficient as the status quo.

[texNoz]

physics just isn't your friend in this endeavor... You will NEVER gain the efficiencies with lasers that you will need to compete with turbine technology.

[roidroid]

Turbine technology is not in the "one engine to space" competition. Mainly because they have to carry their heavy combustible fuels onboard.

These lasers don't carry fuel - they don't even launch - they stay safely on the ground PUSHING the cheap & light launchcraft upwards, time after time after time using electricity from the grid.

[isadashhqdotcom]

Thanks! Check out the International Space Agency (ISA) site here on youtube by clicking on this user account! Also check out the International Space Plane (ISP) Program website! You can google "International Space Plane (ISP) Program", or you can go to this user account which has links to the International Space Agency (ISA) Organization.

[john759xtsd]

Keep working on this opportunity to get into space. We could learn so much and at a fraction of the cost.

[jensjacob]

I did see this on tv once. It looks very fancy and high tech. But if they use a 10 kw laser to launch a few 100 grams 60 m into the air, I sure would like to see the array of lasers needed to launch 50 kg of payload 60000 meters into the air. (?!)

Have they even begun to think how to upscale this setup ?

[roidroid]

i heave heard talk of an existing single 150kw laser, and single 1 MegaWatt lasers, the plan would be to use an array of such powerful lasers together for multi-megawatt capabilitys.

I havn't been able to find much more info.

[roidroid]

IIRC The most powerful laser/s in the world are at the NIF Fusion research facility - which is planned to have a total output of a mindboggling 1 Petawatt.

The NIF lasers are designed for one immense single pulse at a time, but maybe if they are pulsed one at a time they will be able to pulse and recharge fast enough to be useful for Propulsion?