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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 Arik on Saturday July 15 2017, @05:55AM (1 child)
There are only to be 2 - one running each way. Their plans are quite explicit on that.
I'm not saying this thing can't be built. I'm saying it would either be 1) tremendously and unacceptably prone to cause death if completed as presented and 2) if modified enough to avoid 1 it will no longer be competitive economically. The whole pitch here is the idea that not only can this be done, but it can be done safely and inexpensively, and that is simply bullshit. You can run add backup lanes and figure out SOME way to guide a mag sled hurtling along at 600miles an hour into it safely, you can wrap your steel tubes in concrete and more steel and install sensors and servos and...it's already going to cost orders of magnitude more to build and operate. And it no longer looks good next to the alternatives. And there are still LOTS of devils left to solve... no this is not a technology project. It may be, as another poster suggested, quite a successful scheme to get VC to develop components wanted for an entirely different project instead, but it certainly will never and could never work as advertised.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday July 15 2017, @12:32PM
I don't take their plans seriously at this point. A lot of what they would need to know about viable infrastructure, they'll learn later.
You're not presenting a serious argument either. A double shell would work here. The outer shell would shield from most external impacts and provide structural integrity, and the inner shell maintain the vacuum (including a safety margin for dents and such). You don't need massive infrastructure just to maintain a volume of vacuum. We already have companies that make large and often complex steel tubes for the oil industry and such. That infrastructure can be retooled to make Hyperloop sections, should that turn out to be a viable idea.