Serious science question...

The space tyrant

T
Regarding accelerating an object in space. Keep in mind I don't really know the lore behind the non-FTL propulsion in this game.


If we have a vessel which produces a fixed amount of thrust (1000LBS for example's sake), and our ship (100,000 LBS Gross weight) has some type of battery as a fuel source which does not lose mass as energy is consumed... assuming an *indefinite* amount of energy, will that 1000LBS-Thrust engine be able to accelerate us only to a specific speed, or will we continue accelerating until fuel depletion or 0.9999C?


Edit: Assume we're also smack dab between two distant galaxies, so gravity is nearly negligible.
 

Ian Skippy

Ian Skippy
Waagenator said:
Regarding accelerating an object in space. Keep in mind I don't really know the lore behind the non-FTL propulsion in this game.


If we have a vessel which produces a fixed amount of thrust (1000LBS for example's sake), and our ship (100,000 LBS Gross weight) has some type of battery as a fuel source which does not lose mass as energy is consumed... assuming an *indefinite* amount of energy, will that 1000LBS-Thrust engine be able to accelerate us only to a specific speed, or will we continue accelerating until fuel depletion or 0.9999C?


Edit: Assume we're also smack dab between two distant galaxies, so gravity is nearly negligible.
Click to expand...

ED's non-SC speed is capped for gameplay reason. ED's SC speed is vaguely based on the concept of an Alcubierre drive. That suggest you can 'go FTL', without 'really going FTL'.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive
 

gazra

gazra
Energy cannot be created or destroyed, only converted into other forms of energy. Albert Einstein's famous equation "E = mc squared" means that mass is equivalent to energy and that a small amount of mass can be converted into a tremendous amount of energy.

According to Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity, no mass can travel as fast as the speed of light. The more that an object accelerates closer to the speed of light, the more massive the object becomes. To increase the speed of an object that is already travelling close to the speed of light requires a tremendous amount of energy because the object becomes more and more massive.

Chemical combustion rockets are great at putting objects into orbit around the Earth or interplanetary trajectories within the Solar System but they are incapable of accelerating a spaceship close to the speed of light because they simply don't have enough fuel to be able to do it.

Ion engines (and possibly nuclear explosion pulse engines) (and possibly solar sails (but I personally think that solar sails are not viable)) are the most effective way to accelerate a spaceship or space probe from Earth to Alpha Centauri which is 4.3 lightyears away. These types of propulsion have very low thrust but they can apply that thrust for very long duration which might allow a spaceship or space probe to accelerate to ~80% the speed of light.

Elite: Dangerous is a computer game that uses science-fiction and different laws of physics than the laws of physics in the Universe. This computer game does not use Newtonian physics because it does not obey Newton's laws of motion (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton's_laws_of_motion). Don't try to look for realism in this computer game because you won't find it.
 
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kofeyh

kofeyh
We consume fuel, though. So I'm a bit confused about the confusion. Ships consume fuel in SC, and they consume it to hyper-space jump. Speeds in SC are capped for gameplay reasons; don't even begin to go "but science!" because we don't have enough theories to describe everything going on, let alone proven ones, and it's still a game that is ostensibly presenting a particular scenario.

Elite presents a blend of science, and science-fiction. It presents an example of what something could be like. A set of mechanics to provide a simulacra. Elite is a game that blends science, with fiction, to present a scenario you can interact with.

It doesn't have to get everything 100% right to achieve that. Just sufficient to present the scenario in a reasonable fashion; which it, imho, mostly does rather well.
 
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Stealthie

Stealthie
Waagenator said:
Regarding accelerating an object in space. Keep in mind I don't really know the lore behind the non-FTL propulsion in this game.


If we have a vessel which produces a fixed amount of thrust (1000LBS for example's sake), and our ship (100,000 LBS Gross weight) has some type of battery as a fuel source which does not lose mass as energy is consumed... assuming an *indefinite* amount of energy, will that 1000LBS-Thrust engine be able to accelerate us only to a specific speed, or will we continue accelerating until fuel depletion or 0.9999C?


Edit: Assume we're also smack dab between two distant galaxies, so gravity is nearly negligible.
Click to expand...

Firstly, it might be worth pointing out that the thrusters/FSD in ED don't produce a consistent level of thrust.
The thruster's/FSD's rather schizophrenic operation is what's responsible for a variety of speed-related shenanigans in the game, most of which can be "explained" by assuming that a computer somewhere on your ship automatically twiddles the level of thrust according the the game's requirements at any given moment.

Beyond that, basically yes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_travel_using_constant_acceleration
 
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