# What are the main challenges to boosting or driving smaller solar sails with a constellation of separate reflectors?

This is to continue expanding the idea of using smaller solar sails, but increasing the energy they receive from the Sun by having a constellation1 of satellites with mirrors + lenses.

For context, I have asked earlier for its possibility here.

I would like to know about the main challenges to make this real, and if there are any existing designs or analysis?

1Not necessarily an Earth orbiting constellation, they could be in various heliocentric orbits as well.

• fantastic, thanks for the edition! Jun 12 at 15:24

• +1 Another way to explain etendue conservation might be that In order to fry an ant with a magnifying glass, the glass has to look a lot bigger than the diameter of the Sun. I mentioned an f/10 imaging system in my answer to the question the OP linked to, which should give about 100x concentration. Keeping the sail from frying like the ant might be one of the technical challenges if this is happening at 1 AU. Your point about the single wavelength making it easier to make the mirrors extremely high reflectivity (and so low absorption) is spot-on!