Questions tagged [electric-propulsion]
Questions concerning the use, design, and operation of electrically powered thrusters, such as ion, Hall Effect, magnetoplasmadynamic, and VASIMR thrusters, which use electrical power and electric or magnetic fields to accelerate reaction mass, typically with low thrust and high specific impulse.
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Minimal vacuum system requirements to test a scale model ion thruster for a student project?"
I am planning to make a small-scale ionic thruster, however, I am not planning to invest in a vacuum chamber so I am thinking of only achieving vacuum in the plasma chamber itself, by sealing the ...
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When is the thrust produced in an ion thruster? [closed]
I have read many times that the thrust is produced when the ions leave the satellite, not while they are accelerating.
I have asked the same question twice in openAI ChatGPT and it gave me two ...
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What is the reason Starlink satellites took 4 days to re-enter during the accident on February 2022?
I am reviewing the incident that knocked out 39 Starlink satellites earlier this year.
As I explain in this thread, there was a modest magnetic storm on the 3rd of February, which increased ...
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Eutelsat 13G and Spacebus NEO's all-electric propulsion
Today, Eutelsat's Hotbird-13G was launched by a Falcon 9 to a "geosynchronous transfer orbit".
Deployment was at an altitude of roughly 1100 km. The satellite must reach a geosynchronous ...
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A hybrid micropropulsion system for CubeSats
I am curious about how much potential would a hybrid (electric & chemical) micropropulsion system have for CubeSats.
The chosen propellant is water due to its non toxic nature, cheap cost and high ...
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Solar powered spacecraft electrolyzing water as it goes; would ion drives or burning the H +O be more efficient?
I keep trying to think of ways that future asteroid mining might be facilitated, with cost effective in space transport a major challenge; I have been wondering about different ways that a spacecraft ...
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Is electric propulsion feasible for human spaceflight?
I have been reading a lot about electric propulsion and was wondering if it would be feasible for human spaceflight. It is really efficient but it takes a while to get to the desired speed. Would it ...
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What's this small source of glowing blue plasma next to Psyche's Hall effect thruster for? What does it do and why does the plasma curve and connect?
PV Magazine's NASA’s 1.5 billion-mile Psyche asteroid mission will be solar-powered includes the image below which is PIA24030 and the relevent part of the NASA caption is:
The photo on the left ...
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Why was SERT-1 put in a suborbital trajectory (4000 km apogee) while SERT-2 (1970-009A) was put in a 1000 km circular polar orbit?
Wikipedia's SERT-1 says
SERT-1 (Space Electric Rocket Test) was a NASA probe used to test electrostatic ion thruster design and was built by NASA's Lewis Research Center (now NASA Glenn). SERT-1 was ...
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Which spacecraft have entered lunar orbit through L1?
I'm examining entering lunar orbit through the Earth-Moon L1 point with low-thrust propulsion. As part of this, I'm interested in all examples of spacecraft (both actually flown and ones that didn't ...
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Are VASIMR + Arcjet engines feasible for orbital transfers on Mars?
The VASIMR engine is an electric propulsion system that has been lauded for its ability to cut down on interplanetary transfers. While it requires a high power source (in the range of 200kW), it is a ...
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"Hohmann-Like" and Chemical / Electric Thrust Comparison
Part of the work I have to do for my degree is to perform a "Hohmann-like" transfer between Earth and Mercury, of which I believe I have accomplished. I have attempted numerous times to ...
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Do operational Starlink satellites run their ion engines at night on batteries? And if so, do they have hi/low settings?
Discussion below What is the maximum thrust of the Starlink satellites? raise the question of the Starlink communications satellites' power budget and use of their ion thruster in daylight when the ...
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Has ion propulsion ever been used in a deep space trajectory correction maneuver proper?
Answer(s) to What types of propulsion are used to adjust an orbit? lead me to wonder if electric propulsion has ever been used for a proper TCM or "trajectory correction maneuver" in deep ...
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How exactly does a magnetoplasmadynamic (MPD) thruster generate thrust?
So, I have some trouble to intuitively imagine what exactly is going on in MPDs. As I understand it, you draw a current from a cathode in the radial direction to the anode (channel wall). You ignite a ...
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Where to send invention ideas?
I invented a new type of thruster for satellites. I would like to know where can I send the report I made.
The report was reviewed by several physicists and engineers in my environment, but I would ...
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Was the Isp = 11,000 seconds Neumann Drive tested on the ISS? Did it work? How well did it perform?
In 2018 answers were posted to
What is Australia's Bartolomeo platform? When does it arrive at the ISS; when and where will it be attached?
Will the Neumann drive start testing aboard the ISS ...
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What "unique control system" modulated GOCE's thrust to compensate for variable atmospheric drag? How did it know how to modulate it?
This answer to How much time did the longest maneuver last? says:
The GOCE satellite mission (Gravity Field and Steady-State Ocean Circulation Explorer) lasted 55 months (4.6 years) of largely ...
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Are the (relatively) new "all electric" satellite buses like the Boeing 702SP really all-electric? Are RCS and momentum unloading done with ions?
This answer to Can ion Thrusters be used for Reaction Control System? got me thinking about the new "all-electric" class of commercial satellite buses.
Question: Are the (relatively) new &...
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Can ion Thrusters be used for Reaction Control System?
As RCS (Reaction Control System) mainly required less thrust than regular rocket engine can ion Thrusters be used for attitude determination in spacecraft(Orion, Dragon), satellites or even during ...
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How much of the world's xenon has been used in spaceflight altogether? Is it a lot? Did it cost a lot?
This answer to Why will Starlink satellites use krypton instead of xenon for electric propulsion? says:
I expect they did the math, and found that overall cost was less, even with reduced thrust/watt ...
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Simple Ionic Drive Problem
I am having trouble with my calculated values for part B of the problem. In part A I used the formula F=qE, where F is the force, q is the charge = 1.6 * 10^-19 coulombs and E is the electric field = ...
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What are all the kinds of electric propulsion that don't qualify as ion propulsion in standard spaceflight lingo?
Comments on the meta question We have both electric-propulsion and ion-thruster tags, are they distinct? What would be good usage guidance for electric-propulsion? indicate that the term "...
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Has anyone suggested using an electrically powered sling or centrifuge mass thrower as a form of electrically powered spacecraft propulsion?
Has anyone suggested using an electrically powered sling as a form of electric propulsion for a space craft? It might be a centrifuge type arrangement with a way to release part of or all of the ...
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GMAT: LEO to GEO with Electrical Thruster simulation?
I would like to get a simulation from LEO to GEO with an electrical Kick-Stage.
GMAT seems to be able to do it.
Is there any Script/Scenario already written?
The aim is to perform a parametric study ...
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Powering pulsed Ion Thruster
The thrust of an Ion Thruster is directly proportional to the Input power. I've done some experimenting with DIY versions, and I was wondering: Since Power is simply Energy/Time, if I shot incredibly ...
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What technologies enable or at least help satellite operation in Very Low Earth Orbit (VLEO)?
This answer to How low is VLEO? (FCC's newest approval for SpaceX) suggests VLEO begins (or ends I guess) at 350 km.
The two bad things I know about in VLEO are an enhanced rate of altitude loss due ...
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How long can the dawn probe‘s ion thrusters burn?
The title pretty much summarizes the question.
Weirdly, googling „dawn spaceprobe burn time“ and similar things didn‘t turn up anything useful (at least for me), so I was wondering if maybe someone ...
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Are there now established classes of solar-electric powered spacecraft?
The NASA.gov press release NASA Awards Contract to Launch Initial Elements for Lunar Outpost says:
NASA has selected Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, California, to provide ...
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Technological challenges to sending a high altitude balloon to space and orbit from 50 km?
Below At what altitude would I have to go in a lighter than air balloon to be above all wind and just have the earth rotate underneath me? there is a comment:
If you want to be above all winds, you ...
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How much additional thrust could the electron gun produce for electric sail propulsion?
Suppose there is an electric sail in LEO, do the electrons coming out of the gun produce an additional thrust? to produce a net thrust the electrons should NOT return to the satellite (which is at a ...
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How much krypton do Starlink satellites carry when they are first deployed?
Starlink satellites use krypton as propellant.
This answer roughly estimates 2.3 kg of Krypton based on a total delta-V of 190 m/s and an exhaust velocity of 20,000 m/s.
But how close is that to ...
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Combination of fuel cells and electric motors - whether it has been used as part of an electric pump-fed engines?
In electric-pump-fed engines fuel pumps are electrically powered and batteries are used as source of electricity. Yet there is another source of electrical energy which could be used in theory - fuel ...
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Is the thrust provided by electrostatic engines low because thrust depends on particle mass of the exhaust in the case of electrostatic engines?
Based on the equations of mass flow rate and exit velocity provided here (https://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/rocket/rktthsum.html), we can see that thrust in the case of chemical engines does not ...
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Can I "tack" towards a laser beam from which I am powering my 100% efficient & massless ion engine?
As far as I know, for light and particles taking special relativity into account:
\begin{align}
E^2 &= (T + m_0c^2)^2\\
&= p^2 c^2 + m_0^2 c^4 &\text{ (particles)}\\[1.5em]
E &= p ...
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Is the propulsion for the Scorpion nuclear-thermal-electric ship concept viable and credible?
Recently I've come across the proposal for the "Scorpion" spacecraft -- I originally ran across it on Project Rho (ctrl-F for it) but it looks like the article was published in the journal ...
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Is an electric fuel tug from LEO to moon orbit economically feasible?
Does it make economical sense to use an electricaly powered fuel tug to supply a moon landing program with fuel?
I am imagining an architecture of launching a 25t payload of mostly fuel into LEO which ...
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Options for (high-thrust) RCS with Isp beyond that of chemical?
There are a number of potential options for high-performance engines in the future: nuclear pulse propulsion, NTR, gas-core NTR, nuclear electrothermal, and potentially even fusion rockets.
However, ...
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Fuel used for electric propulsion?
What kind of fuel do electric propulsion spacecraft and satellites use?
Did any of them get electricity from bateries?
An ion engine creates thrust by accelerating ions using electricity. How is that ...
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Where can I learn to calculate the physics of an ion thruster?
I am trying to build an ion thruster, but I don’t know where to start learning the actual numbers behind one. I know how they work on a basic level, but not much more.
Basically I want to be able to ...
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Why might krypton have a lower utilization fraction than xenon for ion propulsion, and what can be done to improve it?
A comment below Why will Starlink satellites use krypton instead of xenon for electric propulsion? links to the 2011 preprint A Performance Comparison of Xenon and KryptonPropellant on an SPT-100 Hall ...
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Could a carbon arc lamp help to propel a spacecraft through interstellar space?
I would like to know, on a theoretical basis, if the electron flow entering into the anode of a carbon arc lamp would impart enough kinetic energy to the anode, and thus to the spacecraft, to help ...
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Was DAWN's power-limited propulsion really limited by power used to accelerate the ions?
The discussion here uses the DAWN mission as a reference for the argument that the power used to accelerate the ions is what's important.
I'm curious how many watts were actually used to accelerate ...
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Have light gases like hydrogen or helium been explored for ion propulsion?
This answer and discussion in comments below this answer mention that for an ion of mass $m$ and charge $q$ accelerated by a voltage $V$ the momentum it receives (impulse) is
$$p = \sqrt{2mqV} = \...
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Using recent technology, how much electrical power could a nuclear reactor launchable by a low-level heavy-lift vehicle be developed to produce?
The main purpose behind asking this question is to ascertain the potential power-to-weight ratio of reactors built using modern-derivative technology (i.e. either Generation III derivatives or ...
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Going to Eros; what to consider choosing between ion and chemical propulsion?
When planning a mission to a close approach to the asteroid Eros and to remain nearby, what are the factors that one would need to consider when choosing between ion propulsion and chemical propulsion?...
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What's the final word; does the EmDrive drive work or not?
I'd like to know the final verdict on the EmDrive (or EM Drive); does it work or not?
Some say yes, others say no, some say the measured effect was not propulsion, but just the energy radiated by the ...
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Is the BBC's explanation of nuclear thermal electric propulsion wrong?
The new BBC News item New engine tech that could get us to Mars faster says:
Once Orion has been connected to the transfer vehicle, a nuclear electric rocket would be used to get the crew capsule and ...
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Do colloid thrusters generate thrust by using only droplets or pure ions as well? If they only use droplets, how are they the same as electrospray?
In all of the research literature I have read so far, I've seen colloid thrusters explained as devices that gain thrust by releasing only charged droplets from ionic liquids as the exhaust mass. ...
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Mass ratio of solar-electric versus radioisotope thermo-electric power for propulsion; beyond how many AU do RTGs win?
Solar-electric propulsion has been used several times now in deep space missions. This question explores the scalability in comparison to Radioisotope thermoelectric generation or other nuclear-based ...
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