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Submitted via IRC for AndyTheAbsurd
Hyperloop One claims that its prototype ultra-fast train has completed a first full systems test in a vacuum, reaching a speed of 70 mph. The sled was able to magnetically levitate on the track for 5.3 seconds and “reached nearly 2Gs of acceleration,” according to the company.
The test was conducted privately but Hyperloop One offered some video that included footage from testing. Based on that footage plus a few seconds of additional b-roll shared with media, a lightweight skeleton sled uses a linear motor to accelerate, levitates briefly, and then comes to a halt as the brakes are applied.
Hyperloop One was created as an answer to a challenge from Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who wrote a white paper envisioning a mode of transportation that would send pods at speeds greater than 700mph using a low-friction environment and levitation using air bearings.
Source: Ars Technica
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Friday July 14 2017, @11:14AM (4 children)
I guess this would explain why I don't get it - I don't get the thing with celebrities either.
Just like with any other train that can run on elevated platforms and in tunnels? (i.e: any train but heavy freight)
Also - there is a huge hassle to get permissions for subway and underground railways (bigger issue than most expect)
As I mentioned - just a low-capacity vactrain.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday July 14 2017, @12:36PM (3 children)
Higher speed compensates. It also means lower loads per unit length which is important for elevated track.
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Friday July 14 2017, @01:39PM (2 children)
Not that much really - in general if you want a train to arrive faster you don't increase its speed but you reduce the number of stops (after a while it ends up with being in a constant deacceleration/acceleration cycle, and people dislike the g-forces of agressive (de-)acceleration). Also, high speed matters less than capacity unless you botch the passenger car design - a 1000 passenger train takes about as long to disembark-embark passengers as a 120 passenger train. So unless you start to bump the speed by 3-8 times it is often the less useful improvement (btw, lots of trains today are already approved for 250-300kph traffic, and shinkansen maglev aims for 500kph)
Regarding elevated track we know very well how to build elevated tracks - for instance the Shinkanshen runs on elevated platforms in bigger cities (dedicated track, keeps down on delays), and also the Shanghai Maglev runs quite a bit on elevated platforms. But yeah, if you skimp of maintainance or basic engineering lower load becomes important very quickly.
(Score: 1) by SomeRandomGeek on Friday July 14 2017, @02:51PM (1 child)
The trick is to have the vehicle stop fewer times. So, you make every train an express train. Consequently every passenger experiences an effective speed that is the same as the vehicle's maximum speed. Of course to run so many express trains, there is a smaller demand for each train. So you have to run more trains, each with fewer passengers. The smaller trains needed for the reduced number of passengers can be lighter, which dramatically reduces the cost of building the road bed needed to carry the trains. With many smaller trains, the system becomes dependent on fully automated vehicles, for both cost and safety reasons.
Whether the system will work has a lot more to do with logistics than technology. Of course there is a way to build it so that it will be slow, inconvenient, and expensive. There is also a way to make it fast and convenient, with costs TBD.
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Friday July 14 2017, @05:10PM
Which also increases the overhead per passenger (then again - a modern train is at about 500-750kg/seated passenger, so quite a bit to fiddle with).
But yeah, I agree that the issue is with routing - just like with normal trains (the reason why the Shinkansen is on time all the time - dedicated tracks) - and I kinda look forward to seeing just how they plan in integrating the recently-stopped capsule with the at max-speed-flow, I'm curious just how much redudancy you must build into it for that (for normal trains they use long stretches of rail, with the relative speed being higher in the hyperloop...). However, with the low capacity of the hyperloop the routing either will be nightmarish [quite a few capsules] or it will be mosly empty (trains solve the routing to a large degree by using higher capacity carriers - thereby needing less routing).
So yeah - still wondering what the hype is about with the Hyperloop. :)