If EM Drive works, how long to get to nearest Star?

I am curious if this EM Drive really works what that means for Human space exploration and how long will it take to send a Probe to nearest star?
How fast can it go?

a reply to: Xeven

Probe nuthin' how long until we can start colonizing and getting away from each other?

Depending on how it scales up, But according to nasa - with the EM drive it would take approximately 10 weeks to get to mars. The nearest star is 4.37 light years away, So still not really in the realm of possibilities. But like i said, it depends how it scales up. 1 light year is 9.461e+12 KM, Or 63240 AU's. Earth to mars is 1.67 AU.
My math is probably wrong but it would take 1264800 weeks to get to the nearest star atm (if the EM drive is what it is)

originally posted by: Tjoran
Depending on how it scales up, But according to nasa - with the EM drive it would take approximately 10 weeks to get to mars. The nearest star is 4.37 light years away, So still not really in the realm of possibilities. But like i said, it depends how it scales up. 1 light year is 9.461e+12 KM, Or 63240 AU's. Earth to mars is 1.67 AU.
My math is probably wrong but it would take 1264800 weeks to get to the nearest star atm (if the EM drive is what it is)

I read something somewhere that it goes faster and faster so it would continue to speed up beyond Mars distance. Just wondering how much or how fast can it go, and what it all means to Space Exploration if this thing works.

a reply to: Xeven

Double checked my math and it was way off

Found it. 100 years I guess. Oh well still fast!



Is deep space travel a step closer to reality? Nasa reveals successful test of 'impossible' fuel-free engine that breaks the laws of physics

A trip to Alpha Centauri, which would take tens of thousands of years to reach under current methods, could be reached in just 100 years. And as the thrusters are solar powered, propulsion would be generated along the way.

Don't forget you need the same amount of power/thrust to slow it down, so multiply the time of arrival by 2.

a reply to: Xeven

Correct as long as the drive is powered there is a constant rate of acceleration, it all depends as if you want to simply reach the star then you will probably not be slowing down but if you want to visit the star then the craft would have to reverse thrust all at the half way point.

Proxima Centauri at approximately 4.35 ly by old text books but is now listed as 4.24 LY, it is a small red dwarf star so the more interesting alpha centauri would probably be there prime target for first star exploration though it is even more likely they would go in search of exoplanet systems as a first choice.
en.wikipedia.org...

I am rubbish at mathematic's and always have been having a dislike of the subject that gave me an almost allergic reaction but here is a page with some basic equations you can plug the figures into.
physics.bu.edu...

a reply to: ketsuko

Mmm.. think about nature with only a handful of humans, i would love that..

a reply to: muSSang

I'm just riffing here, but couldn't we use some sort of gravitational breaking at the destination end of the trip, slowing down faster than just reversing thrust vectors at the half-way point?

a reply to: Tripnman

Good point, loop around the star and have an onboard computer look for any planets to use in order to help slow the probe down.

It all depends how fast the probe is moving and if a gravitational capture is feasible as using the gravity to slow you down it need's to be slow enough for a gravitational capture to be possible and remember it has been accelerating pretty much all the way if that is the case.

There is one advantage to constant acceleration, simulated gravity, if an array of these drives can create a thrust that is equivelent to 1G (far above the test model but still) then the astronauts if it is manned will not suffer from bone weakening and circulatory conditions related to prolonged exposure to low gravity and so will be as fit at the other end of the trip as they were at the start of it (assuming the craft is large enough to accomodate active excercise etc).

Also there is closer to home applications, instead of blimp's imagine future EM drive based technology's (if they can ramp up the output/relative thrust enough) used to hold stationary platforms in the sky over sporting event's and also as a future alternative to dirty current engines, of course it has a long way to go and other forms of potential pollution such as EM pollution have to be looked at first.


This is too important for everyone to stay the province only of space applications as it can indeed offer an alternate to many other sources of kinetic motion that we use in our day to day lives and that will be essential to the future generations (if we live past the next hundred years).

Military application could see this put out of the public domein for decades as they use it to build silent and stealthy helicopter replacements without moving parts.
emdrive.com... emdrive.com...
hackaday.com... Well this article is dated as we now know it does work

www.wired.co.uk... pluto in 18 months.

[sarcasm] Stars are light that happened a billion years ago. A "figment" of our imagination. [/sarcasm] jajajajaj

I think the lifespan of the power supply comes into play here.
Plus even using nuclear power there is a fixed amount of energy in a fixed amount of fuel.
You can calculate the amount of energy needed to accelerate to 'x' speed at 100% efficiency.

So just because EM drive works doesn't mean we can get very far with it.

a reply to: JuJuBee

And if you could travel faster than light as reality itself may be a wave form then it would in one theory be possible to travel back to that star you are seeing, of course that would put you in the past but in a linear different dimension of time and space also and then if you could see the light from sol and travel back to that you would be here but all that time in the past, of course you can not travel (in a linear fashion) faster than the speed of light, at least theoretically and of course it is all conjecture based on theory based on observation and who is to say we are really the impartial observors we think.

Time travel may be impossible, faster than light in a linear expression may be impossible but are they impossible or are our theorys cockeyed.

a reply to: Tripnman

I'm afraid an object traveling fast enough to reach the nearest star from us in only 100 years will be going so fast that even going near another star will not slow it down enough to capture it.

As you head towards a gravitational body, you accelerate even more. It's not until you go past it does it's gravity begin to slow you down. If your velocity is great enough, it might slow you down some, but you'll still have enough velocity to keep going outside it's influence.

If you really want to slow something down (say enter into Jupiter's orbit) you'd do aerobreaking by skimming through the upper layers of it's atmosphere. The drag will slow you down a LOT more than the gravity will.

On the other hand, I'd shrudder to think what would happen to an object traveling that fast to get to the nearest star if it tried aerobraking.

According to the developers , the drive will require a radical new quantum physics development to even get off the ground. SO for now , is only in the realm of imagination....

To answer the original OP question : whatever time you feel like is possible.

I imagine a combination of gravity slingshot and solar sail could allow reverse thrusting to be held off until the 2/3 or 3/4 point of the journey.

originally posted by: Teikiatsu
I imagine a combination of gravity slingshot and solar sail could allow reverse thrusting to be held off until the 2/3 or 3/4 point of the journey.

You have quite an imagination then.

Just read through some of those links.

I do hope it's not another cold fusion.

Could be about to become very interesting times to live through tech wise.

I just don't know how that happens.