The Orion Project

[AGITprop]

Orion Project was an atempt in the 50s to find a way for fast space travel and easy ways of launching ships into space. It was over all a success and I think an amazing breakthrough although never fel through because of bans on nuclear testing. This could have brought us so much further but it was killed at the root.

- Involved using sequential nuclear explosions to propel ships into space.
-There would have been no limit to load capacities.

Check it out on youtube, theres an old BBC video which explains it.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

The ORION project held a lot of promise. I would have much preferred if NASA had gone for that instead of the Apollo project.

The great thing about ORION-style drives is that they scale up well - unlike chemical the rockets we use today, fuel-payload ratios don't become insanely absurd the more mass a space vehicle has.

Of course, the original Helios (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helios_%28propulsion_system%29) idea was even more farfetched. The nuclear explosions were on the inside! (http://davidszondy.com/future/space/spaceship5.htm)

[AGITprop]

Originally posted by [email protected] 26, 2007 08:31 pm
The ORION project held a lot of promise. I would have much preferred if NASA had gone for that instead of the Apollo project.

The great thing about ORION-style drives is that they scale up well - unlike chemical the rockets we use today, fuel-payload ratios don't become insanely absurd the more mass a space vehicle has.

Of course, the original Helios (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helios_%28propulsion_system%29) idea was even more farfetched. The nuclear explosions were on the inside! (http://davidszondy.com/future/space/spaceship5.htm)
the whole shock-plate concept was cool though. What i dont seem to understand is how the radiation could be controlled after the bombs went off? i mean wouldnt they pollute our environment during takeoff.

"okay so we got into space but now all our children have 15 fingers and three eyeballs!"

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Originally posted by [email protected] 26, 2007 08:56 pm
the whole shock-plate concept was cool though. What i dont seem to understand is how the radiation could be controlled after the bombs went off? i mean wouldnt they pollute our environment during takeoff.

"okay so we got into space but now all our children have 15 fingers and three eyeballs!"
In space, the radiation doesn't really matter as the Earth's atmosphere would shield everyone. As for a ground, one idea they had for reducing fallout was to make the launch pad out of a graphite-coated block of steel. As for the problem of EMP, they had the idea of setting the launch site in the Antarctic, basically as far as possible from human civilisation.

Remember, the radiation from the actual bomb itself is fairly transient - it's neutron absorbtion by ejecta that makes ground detonations of nuclear weapons dangerous.

[AGITprop]

i see. well either way, im fairly certain we could have been years ahead in space exploratin if only they would have gone through with this program.