We could see nuclear aircraft engines deployed on Titan. They would work great there.
General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
51–60 of 71 posts
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
The piece was definitely written by an AI. And a bad one at that. It is a redundancy nightmare. To save your time: "In 1951, the United States military initiated a program aimed at developing a nuclear-powered aircraft capable of unlimited range (ANP program). The program’s goal was to create a nuclear reactor small enough to fit into an aircraft yet powerful enough to provide the necessary thrust while ensuring the…
We've come a long way in material construction in the last 50 years, I wonder if this could now be built.
Would be interesting in a drone, no need for the weight of shielding
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
We've come a long way in material construction in the last 50 years, I wonder if this could now be built.
Would be interesting in a drone, no need for the weight of shielding
You’d need a lead catcher’s mitt after it lands. Might make maintenance a bit tricky.
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#54I wonder if a RTG could produce enough to run an electric quad or optocopter? For certain applications if unmanned you wouldn’t really need to worry about shielding. I wonder how long those motors can run continuously?
The RTGs on the Voyager spacecraft weigh 38kg. They initially produced 160 Watts. That sounds like a no-go to me.
Not just Voyager but the mars robots as well.
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#55I wonder if a RTG could produce enough to run an electric quad or optocopter? For certain applications if unmanned you wouldn’t really need to worry about shielding. I wonder how long those motors can run continuously?
I got nerd sniped by this and asked GPT some questions. Given a 45kg RTG plus the weight of the drone itself, you’d need to be able to lift, say, 60kg. Energy required to hover 60kg using a 4-rotor drone at 70% efficiency is about 10kW - according to GPT. I don’t know enough to say if this is true or not. Assuming it’s correct, and that a 45kg RTG generates about 300 watts, give or take, the answer is: no.
There is no technical minimum; the only thing to keep in mind is that lift/drag ratio relates potential energy (moving mass up against gravity) to travel distance.
This applies independent of speed and vehicle type (even running counts!).
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#56Here's another fun one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersonic_Low_Altitude_Missil... An unmanned nuclear-powered ramjet designed to spew warheads, with a predicted range of 116,000 kilometers.
The problem with it was that they realized they didn't even need the warheads, they could just switch the plane to an open cycle reactor over enemy territory, spewing endless radioactivity and making the entire Soviet Union a nuclear death zone for thousands of years.
That's also why it was classified I believe. No one wanted the Soviets to get the same idea.
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
This was never serious. Technical writing e.g. in textbooks in the 1950s explain that a nuclear-power car is 'not within the bounds of reality'. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015003994194&vi...
Today, we have nuclear powered cars on Mars. And with their amazingly powerful (checks notes) 0.13hp engine, you'll have plenty of time to admire the view.
With no humans close to them.
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#58I guess the author gets paid by word count. The piece could have been written in one third of the length.
The piece was definitely written by an AI. And a bad one at that. It is a redundancy nightmare. To save your time: "In 1951, the United States military initiated a program aimed at developing a nuclear-powered aircraft capable of unlimited range (ANP program). The program’s goal was to create a nuclear reactor small enough to fit into an aircraft yet powerful enough to provide the necessary thrust while ensuring the…
Summarize using AI?
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#59This one didn't get cancelled
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/9M730_Burevestnik
Re: General Electric HTRE-3 Nuclear Jet Engine
#60Here's another fun one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersonic_Low_Altitude_Missil... An unmanned nuclear-powered ramjet designed to spew warheads, with a predicted range of 116,000 kilometers.
The problem with it was that they realized they didn't even need the warheads, they could just switch the plane to an open cycle reactor over enemy territory, spewing endless radioactivity and making the entire Soviet Union a nuclear death zone for thousands of years. That's also why it was classified I believe. No one wanted the Soviets to get the same idea.
As someone else already said - there wasn't really any risk of that, the reactor wasn't "shedding" enough radioactive material or even emitting enough radioactivity to be a danger to anyone standing on the ground. Maybe if you made it fly in a loop around one place it would start to add up, but it wouldn't be anywhere on the scale of "making the entire soviet union a nuclear death zone" - you'd need thousands and thousands of these flying across their entire landmass 24/7 for weeks if not months, which
1) is just a stupid idea
2) if you have the capability to do this, you also have the capability to detonate actual nukes which can be tuned to produce maximum amount of fallout if that's your goal.