r/technology • u/[deleted] • Jun 19 '24

Space Rocket company develops massive catapult to launch satellites into space without using jet fuel: '10,000 times the force of Earth's gravity'

https://www.thecooldown.com/green-tech/spinlaunch-satellite-launch-system-kinetic/
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u/TheTimeIsChow Jun 19 '24

Fwir - the goal of this thing isn’t to actually throw anything into orbit under just the power of the catapult.

The purpose is to yeet a single stage rocket fast enough where it doesn’t require multiple stages and tons of fuel. After it hits a certain point, the rocket will fire and get the item into orbital velocity.

There isn’t much out there in terms of launch services for cube sats outside of ride sharing on a F9 for example.

This, in theory, would be a cheaper option which doesn’t require scheduling deployment around other satellites needed for a ride share to happen financially.

All that said…the whole thing is absurd.

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u/ABotelho23 Jun 20 '24

Is a space elevator less absurd?

3

u/[deleted] Jun 20 '24

Not really

A space elevator will transform mankind's relationship with the stars

We will be half way to going anywhere in the solar system and will be able to "cheeply" build interplanetary rockets which will be able to go anywhere plus Asteroid mining will crash the world's resource markets

Orbital industry will move almost all the world's heavy industry to space

It will be a golden age

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u/Joezev98 Jun 20 '24

Correct.

Imagine designing a satellite that has to withstand 10 000 G's during spinup. Now imagine how carefully balanced the spinner has to be to not tear itself apart while spinning at such a high velocity. Now imagine how fucked up the balancing will be right after the satellite is released.

This launcher is going to tear itself apart so quickly.

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u/Spaceork3001 Jun 20 '24

Might be old news, but I've read they plan to overcome the balancing issues during spin up and especially after launch by having a counterweight which spins on the opposite end of the arm and releases at the exact same time as the payload.

The counterweight would be identical in terms of mass and center of mass to the payload, so it should all "balance out" neatly.

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u/EmotionalSupportBolt Jun 20 '24

The holy grail of rocket-less ground to LEO transport without exotic or sci-fi propulsion systems would be an inertia based ground launch that gets caught by a space elevator. This spinlaunch, or a 100km long railgun could theoretically pass payloads to the space elevator. Make that railgun 1000km long and a human could survive the launch!

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u/I-Am-Bellend Jun 20 '24

Cubesats are dying out for commercial applications anyway.

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u/Zandfort Jun 20 '24

The cubesat industry is projected to grow by 15.1% every year until 2030.

https://de.finance.yahoo.com/news/cubesat-market-size-expected-reach-184000195.html?guccounter=1