Rockets cannot propel in the vacuum of space.
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They ASSUMED incorrectly (on purpose), that there is an equal and opposite force from gas movement due to pressure gradient force. Escaping gas needs something to push off of
Mathematical proof that the thrust equation is false Attachment 39978 |
Well it's not that the rockets push against something, it's that the equal reaction pushes the rocket forward as it throws stuff backward.
ETA: Or, in other words, the rocket pushes against the stuff that it shoots out its back. |
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ETA: If you combine two equations and get a result that contradicts one of them, then you've made a mistake in your math. This is just a fact about math and says nothing about physics. |
Why do you write the "NASA" rocket equation? You do realize that NASA didn't invent rocketry in a vacuum?
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Well of course they didn't! Everyone knows rockets can't work in a vacuum! |
Dang. I'm almost finished with a class on space mission planning over at edx.org. does this mean I'm wasting my time?
That's a trick question. I already know I'm wasting my time, in a practical sense, but it has been really cool learning about this stuff. Meanwhile, I applaud dasmiller for taking a look at the submission to point out a flaw. It took me a long time to understand how rockets moved. As a child, I, too, thought they pushed against the atmosphere, until someone pointed out that there was no atmosphere in space. Even after I could do the math related to conservation of momentum, I still knew that something had to push the spacecraft, and it took me a while to figure out what that was. |
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Wow, this guy is foaming all over the forum trying to discredit NASA. This should be entertaining.
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Science is hard, but you don't see me making stuff up to compensate, like some other people. :) |
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsiolk...ocket_equation |
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Which is true, but it's not a good description of how rockets work. |
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Jay differentiated in post 7. |
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Newton's law for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction then says that as the gases in the combustion vessel are moved in one direction the vessel is moved in the other. No atmosphere needed |
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Rocket thrust in a vacuum comes from two sources: the momentum of the exhaust and the static pressure of the exhaust. The first term in the equation looks at momentum, which has been written extensively about since Newton first discovered it. The momentum of the exhaust leaving in one direction matches the momentum of the rocket moving in the opposite direction, per Newton's third law of motion. The mass part of the momentum formula is the mass of the propellants, here described as the mass applied per unit time, because the exhaust leaves the system and must be replaced over time by new propellant. The key here is that the mass enters the thrust chamber as a liquid -- often a dense cryogenic liquid. But it leaves the engine as a gas of much greater volume and much less density than before. To be sure, the mass flow rate into the thrust chamber is the same as the mass flow rate out of the thrust chamber, but the exhaust mass is in a different form that must move much faster in order to sustain that flow rate. The propellant is first converted to gas in the top of the thrust chamber. It's sprayed together in such a way that it mixes thoroughly, and then the radiant heat from the reaction downstream vaporizes it. Those thoroughly mixed gases are then ignited, creating vast amounts of thermal energy in the working fluid. Every gas responds to an increase in thermal energy by trying to increase its volume and/or pressure. The urge to do so in a rocket engine is extremely powerful. A wonderful Victorian-era gadget called a de Laval nozzle -- a convergent-divergent nozzle -- lets the gas escape from the only remaining hole in the thrust chamber in a way that collimates the flow. All the gas molecules are going in the same direction, maximizing the momentum. Otherwise, pressurized gas escaping from a plain hole in a pressure vessel will expand in a cone-shaped pattern. The conversion of chemical energy thermodynamically to gas pressure, and from there to gas velocity, is what the poster's proof is missing. That's a more nuts-and-bolts explanation of where the momentum thrust comes from. Pressure thrust comes from the static pressure of the exhaust gas. The gas streaming in linear fashion out of the de Laval nozzle has momentum. But it's still a gas with measurable static pressure. It doesn't have zero density. As such, it pushes against the walls of the nozzle just like the contained air in a balloon pushes against the balloon walls, even though the balloon air isn't hot and isn't moving. It's ordinary gas pressure. The term for this effect is "adiabatic," and it's the same principle by which steam locomotives conserved water by opening the steam valve only a little bit at the beginning of the power stroke. If the static pressure of the exhaust is greater than the ambient into which it is exhausted, it will continue to expand in static fashion irrespective of its velocity. That urge to expand into a relatively unpressurized space is the ability to do what engineers call "pressure and volume work," in this case, to continue pushing in all directions. "All directions" in this case includes the direction of the rocket nozzle, which results in thrust. That's the second term of the equation -- the static pressure of the exhaust per unit area, minus the static pressure of the ambient (i.e., the pressure difference) times the area of the exit plane of the nozzle -- sort of like the area of the piston face in a steam cylinder. Ironically, the poster here thinks he has cleverly discarded momentum thrust. But he hasn't dealt with the notion that in a vacuum, the ambient pressure is zero so the pressure component of the rocket equation actually contributes more. The notion of "having something to push against" is actually the opposite of what makes rockets more efficient as they climb. Quote:
NASA didn't invent rocketry. NASA isn't the only state-funded space program. NASA isn't even the biggest consumer of rocketry. NASA relies on private industry to supply its rockets, the same private industry that sells access to space to other private industries. Spacefaring is a multibillion-dollar industry. It doesn't give a rat's patootie about some ideological spat. |
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It's just too bad that the OP will ignore you. |
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Especially when dealing with nut burgers who post nonsense like this. I do hope he lives for some more time, but I don't think never is in the cards. |
The rocket doesn’t push the gas out. The gas moves out due to pressure gradient force. That’s the false ASSUMPTION made. No one here can demonstrate that there is an equal and opposite force from gas movement due to pressure gradient force.
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Thank you for your clearly-written work. Jay has already addressed the errors in it, but the larger issue is that rockets are observed to work in a vacuum - we operate them all the time. That should have tipped you off that your work was incorrect. |
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The only rational response is attributed to Daniel Patrick Moynihan: "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." Dave |
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Another reason to question one's own work is the ease with which it comes about. If it were that easy to refute the principle by which rocket engines work, why would one think himself to be the first person to have done it? Or the only person who knows about it? |
"Further investigation and experimentation have confirmed the findings of Isaac Newton in the 17th Century and it is now definitely established that a rocket can function in a vacuum as well as in an atmosphere. The Times regrets the error."
- Editorial, The New York Times, July 17th 1969. Dave |
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Newton's third law has stood upon a solid foundation for some three hundred years. It tells us how rockets must work, but more importantly it tells us about how so much of the observable universe works. If it suddenly didn't work in this case, that would be very strange indeed. Quote:
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Well, the SpaceX launch I watched last week from just outside the Vehicle Assembly Building was a commercial endeavor - they had a customer who paid them to put their vehicle into orbit. So NASA provided launch infrastructure, but had nothing to do with the rocketry in space. That’s just the latest example of decades of commercial space flight. Not to mention Soviet/Russian, European, Chinese, Indian, Japanese, and other countries’ national and commercial space programs. The idea that the theory, let alone the practice, of rocketry somehow belongs to NASA is manifestly false.
On a more specific note, I’ve personally commanded a spacecraft to “fire” its thruster to move away from the Shuttle - a cold gas N2 rocket with a whopping few ounces of thrust. It worked just fine, as we observed the results directly - including tracking the vehicle with our own (not just NASA’s) S-band antenna. So, yes, I have direct personal experience that rockets work in a vacuum. |
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I may as well be the one to post this. It usually comes up sooner or later.
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What is it with conspiracists and their obsession with video?
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People need to realize that gas expands freely into a vacuum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AubIFUsq7Ss |
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You have presented a physics proof you say establishes that rockets cannot provide momentum thrust in a vacuum. You have failed to address the several people who have shown the simple error you've made. It is unclear what relevance cinematography has to that proof. You have lately asserted that no "unedited video of rockets in space" exists. You have failed to show how that is relevant to your proof. You have even failed to show that your assertion is true. It would help us understand your argument if you would, in addition to blurting out these claims, show how they tie into some overall conclusion. |
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If the air 'pushing off your face' came out of a rocket, you would feel it! :) |
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There is such a thing as fiction, so everything is obviously fiction ... |
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