
Inflatable Tower Promises Easy Access to Outer Space - MaysonL
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/07/02/space-tower.html
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GiraffeNecktie
It's too bad the article is so lean on details like how much it would cost and
how the design would deal with the enormous strains of torque and wind etc.
But one thing's for sure, put a revolving restaurant at the top and it would
pay for itself in three years.

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windsurfer
How is that sure, may I ask?

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mhb
Because of the view.

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windsurfer
What I mean is... Well, not everyone has $10,000 to pay for a dinner, even if
it is on the edge of space. How are you so sure people will take out a line of
credit to pay for such an extravagant couple of hours?

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evgen
Not everyone has $10K to spend on dinner, but enough do. A restaurant like
this will not cater to people who need to borrow to pay for the meal. $10K per
person is basically the equivalent of a week at a five-star luxury resort.
This is well within reach of anyone making $500K/year and there are enough
foodies, adventurers, and people who will use a meal at a place like this as a
way of "keeping score" in that group to keep the reservation number for this
restaurant perpetually busy.

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jws
_At 20 kilometers you still have gravity…_

I should hope so.

They talk about saving launch fuel by launching satellites from such a tower.
The dynamics elude me on that one. Sure, higher up the gravity well and all,
but gossamer cylinders of (probably) hydrogen in a rocket plume is going to be
worth the price of admission.

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stcredzero
You can put an electromagnetic accelerator on the thing, and substitute
acceleration from it for a first stage. It would be like the "pop-up"
trajectory envisioned for some TSTO concepts. Just by getting the craft above
the bulk of the atmosphere, you can optimize the engines to work in a narrower
range of atmospheric pressure.

At 20km, you still have some atmosphere to work with as well. Perhaps such a
craft could use fins to exchange some vertical velocity for horizontal.

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jws
I like that idea. I wonder if you even use the inherent springiness of the
pressurized cylinders for the first boost. Get the rockets up there then start
the tower top bouncing, eventually release the rocket when it can loft high
enough that a minor steering adjustment will avoid tower destruction.

