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Lockheed's High Altitude Airship
Posted by
timothy
on Wed Mar 17, 2004 02:00 PM
from the avert-your-eyes-citizen dept.
from the avert-your-eyes-citizen dept.
swordboy writes "Lockheed Martin has just awarded a contract to UniSolar Ovonic regarding development and delivery of flexible, lightweight solar cells for the U.S. government's High Altitude Airship security project. The proposed 500-foot-long dirigible is to fly at a stratospheric 70,000 foot altitude - above both jet stream and severe weather. The thin-film solar technology, although low in peak conversion efficiency, can potentially deliver a whopping 2500 watts/kilogram. This is the same technology as the previously discussed GE organic LED project - just with the physics in reverse. Broadband communication blimp, anyone?"
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Lockheed's High Altitude Airship
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Wow! (Score:2, Funny)
Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm in no way educated about such a topic, but is this some sort of less expensive approach to satellite-type communication?
Poor man's space telescope? (Score:5, Interesting)
Now, in addition to all the cool cosmic ray stuff that could be done up there, putting a near-space telescope up there would be a wonderful (and relatively cheap) idea... any thought of other scientific (rather than solely comm satellite) uses for this?
Launch platform (Score:5, Interesting)
Geosynchronisity without requiring a high orbit.
Of course, there are technical issues to work out regarding flame safetey, what to do if you lose pressure in your balloon, etc. But it's definately worth a look.
Re:Launch platform (Score:4, Interesting)
You avoid the most inefficient segment of a rocket's journey, pushing through the troposphere at sub-sonis speed.
You do have a problem to overcome, though. Despite the 70,000 foot head start you will be trying to obtain orbital velocity (17,000 mph) from a standstill. I'm too lazy to do the math at this point, but I'm not sure it would actually be that much of an advantage in the end.
Despite the innefficiencies of starting from the ground, the lion's share of the energy expended by a launch system is used to propel the craft to orbital speed. The magic equation is 1/2*m*v^2.
So lets say we max out the payload and have a launcher that has a mass of 1800Kg. (Metric is easier to work with.) We are trying to propel it to around 8750 meters/second. That's about 137e9 Joules of energy. 137,000 MegaJoules. Aviation fuel has an energy density of 47 MJ/Kg. You would need around 2910 kg of fuel (not including oxidizer.)
OTOH, gravity plays a lesser role at that altitude. I say lesser, gravity exists even in orbit, it's just that the orbiter is falling forward, which almost cancels the effect of gravity thanks to a loophole in physics with rotataional motion. Note the above calculation did not take into effect overcoming gravity.
Maybe you don't need to get the rocked all the way up to 17,000mph. Maybe you can find a fuel with a higher energy density. In either case, you are still at square one.
Re:Launch platform (Score:4, Informative)
If you were doing this in a sensible way you'd actually "fire" the space craft from the launch platform somehow (e.g. drop it).
The craft then lights its rocket and off it goes. It doesn't have to push _against_ anything.
Think about what happens in a vacuum...
20,000? Try 4000 lbs. (Score:4, Informative)
According to the linked articles the payload will be a mere 4000 lb, despite the dirigible's massive size. It makes sense, since an airship's bouyancy is created by the difference in density betwen the airship and the air around it. At sea level this large airship would have much greater lifting capability, but way up there the lifting gas won't be that much lighter than the thin atmosphere.
By the way, some back of the envelope calculations show that this thing would have about 70% of the volume of the LZ-129 , the famous Hindenburg. The Hindenburg was considerably sleaker too, at 804 feet long vs 500. The Hindeburg carried 50 passengers and 50 crew, which alone without luggage or cargo would amount to something like 15,000 lb; in addition, the ship could carry 11 tons of cargo.
So we're talkiing very neary 40,000 lb of payload capacity for the LZ-129 vs. 4000 for this beast. In part this is because of LZ-129's 40% greater volume (lifting gas only - overall it had 4x the volume), possibly the use of hydrogen gas (doesn't say whether the ship in question will use H or He). But mostly it is due to the fact the LZ-129's normal operating altitude was on the order of 200m.
An airship to lift 20,000 lb to the altitude this one will would, all other things being equal, have to have five times the volume. Conservatively, we are talking about something on the order of 850 feet long; possibly a bit less because of increased volume to surface ration. Undoubtedly it would be the largest flying machine every built.
Re:Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:5, Insightful)
Also Geo-syncronous satalites have to placed very high in orbit around the earth to stay in one spot with using a lot fuel. This causes a significant delay in transmission time to/from the satalites. The blimp would eliminate that.
Re:Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:easier to take out ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:5, Interesting)
In addition, with a derigible, you have the ability to loft a much larger amount of mass than you could with a rocket booster, at a fraction of the cost. This would allow you to put in a lot more power generation capability, more powerful transmitters, and greater computing power and communications equipment than you could ever fit on a satellite.
Re:Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:5, Interesting)
The velocity and mass simply isn't there in a lighter-than-air craft of this size. (Well, the mass is but it's spread over a huge area.) This is like shooting a
So long as the electronics were hidden, shielded, or replicated throughout the volume the craft would be difficult to take down or fatally damage.
Re:Taking the place of Satellites? (Score:5, Interesting)
The list is longer than you think. Most air-to-air missiles can reach that height, and the supersonic flight ceiling of modern jet planes (including MiGs) is classified information. A blimp like this would probably need some air cover to operate inside a war zone. (Not that air cover is a problem when you've got over a dozen carriers with the capability of delivering planes anywhere in the world.)
I remember a documentary on the Discovery channel where they were discussing how a pilot accidently shot down a LEO satellite with a missile. The realization that missiles could reach that height lead to the creation of the Pegasus launch solution.
Those "router crashes"... (Score:5, Funny)
Though the really great thing is that you could use the ol' tinfoil beany to actually reflect the "mind control waves" then.
Re:Those "router crashes"... (Score:5, Funny)
Oh, the humanity.
Zeppelin Overlord jokes... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Zeppelin Overlord jokes... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Zeppelin Overlord jokes... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Zeppelin Overlord jokes... (Score:4, Funny)
YET!
It's part of mind control.. (Score:5, Funny)
first they put up a blimp at 70K feet then they tell us its for national security and they LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE!!!!! This "blimp" will be beaming MIND CONTROL BEAMS into the brain of every citizen of Planet EARTH!!! We will become pawns of the ILLUMINATI and sheep in their WORLD domination MACHINE!!!
Already I feel the tin foil on my head being penetrated by THEIR MIND CONTROL RAYS!!!!!
@!(#U@)#U@U#()@!U#()@#)(@!U AAAAAHHHHAAH
AFDB (Score:5, Funny)
The above link has folding instructions and fashion advice. Just make sure your browser has cookies enabled. No real reason. Honest. Just, well, it'll enhace your AFDB experience.
Trust me on this.
wow. (Score:5, Funny)
Hah! (Score:5, Funny)
Colonel Sanders: Prepare to reverse physics!
Peon: Preparing to reverse physics!
Colonel Sanders: Reverse physics!
Peon: Reversing physics, sir!
President Skroob: Oh sh*t! Quick turn it off!
Colonel Sanders: We can't, it's irreversable.
Dark Helmet:
500 ft LED billboard? (Score:2, Funny)
Is it just me, or when I read this, I pictured giant Bladerunner-esque ad blimps advertising the off-world colonies!
At 70,000 ft, they might be advertising car sales or casinos on earth to passing Martians, I guess.
hmmm... sounds like SHIELD (Score:2, Funny)
Too Bad Commercial Airship Development Has Stalled (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe this military use will someday translate to some sort of commercial use.
Re:Too Bad Commercial Airship Development Has Stal (Score:4, Interesting)
There are many other commercial blimps, Lightship, Goodyear, etc. Not to mention several student groups working on similar topics (check out Univ. of Virginia Solar Airship, Surrey, and Univ of Japan)
The final closing of military use of airship, the Snowbird in the 60's I believe, was heavily influenced by more political factors that technical or monetary.
Re:Too Bad Commercial Airship Development Has Stal (Score:5, Interesting)
The company is alive, well, and making commercial passenger sightseeing flights. If you want to take a zeppelin ride all you have to do is go to Lake Constance with 190 euros to spare in your pocket.
We be rigid gasbags and shit [zeppelinflug.de]
KFG
Mmm, Zeppelin have been around for a while (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.zeppelinflug.de/pages/E/haupt.htm
Cargolifter were going to create a f*cking *huge* ship which with a cargo capacity of 160 tonnes but ran out of money. When I say "f*cking huge", imagine an ocean liner floating in the air in front of you.
http://www.cargolifter.com/
It seems that military spending is needed for these kinds of projects to succeed.
It's not an airship... (Score:3, Informative)
Sweet, but there are some stipulations (Score:3, Funny)
Otherwise I'll just stick to my Chocobo.
Broadband Blimps! (Score:4, Insightful)
Now if they could just stick some broadband transceivers on the thing....
Satellite service is my only option (until bb-over-power-lines succeeds), but the built-in latency of the roundtrip to geosynchronous orbit makes it useless for realtime, and the crippled upload speeds makes it useless for teleconferencing.
Shouldn't be too hard to add a motor and SNR tracker to have a dish follow that thing around the sky....
A more important application (Score:3, Insightful)
Making use of both the solar panel technology, and the OLED technology...
Autonomous, solar powered, high altitude....
Advertising billboards.
There are probably other equally attractive applications as well, such as tracking every citizen's personal tracking device within a given area.
Who needs this? (Score:2, Funny)
how does it keep from being shot down, exactly? (Score:1)
Why not just use Hydrogen? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:permiability issues (Score:4, Informative)
Given that the limiting factor for staying on station is gas leakage, hydrogen would seem to be a winner.
> If it gets shot or blown up...
I don't think gas type will be much of an issue. Either way the blimp will be a loss. The spectacular combustion of the hydrogen will happen well away from anything else that can burn.
The safety issues of hydrogen are probably only an issue on the ground. You probably would not want to put an inflated hydrogen blimp in the hangar for maintanence, so if the life cycle of the blimp involves hangar work like leak detection and repair helium looks better.
The final reason may be what Lockheed harps on a couple of times... Lockheed has the expertise in getting FAA certification for blimbs. The FAA is a variable that could effectivly kill the project, so project risk management probably dictates that they deviate as little as possible from the previous designs.
Frankly? Politics. (Score:4, Interesting)
There is no way on *earth* you're ever going to get another airship using hydrogen as the lifting gas. Even with a Halon mix to suppress the radicals required for burning. The movie of the Hindenberg burning is just too compelling, it's the first thing anybody mentions whenever the subject of airships are brought up. It set airship flight back 100+ years. Doesn't matter what actually caused the fire on the original ship, the fact that 2/3 of the passengers survived or the fact that you're actually using helium, they'll bring the Hindenberg up.
So, Hydrogen will *never* get approval.
Big Black Triangles? (Score:5, Interesting)
check this out (illustrations and sidebars at space.com):
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technolo gy
Investigation Casts Light on the Mysterious Flying Black Triangle
By Leonard David
posted: 07:00 am ET
05 August 2002
They are big, black, and triangular. In UFO folklore they are proof-positive that planet Earth is a rest stop for joyriding, but road-weary, extraterrestrials.
A just released study by the National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS), based in Las Vegas, Nevada, sheds new light on the dark and mysterious craft. They offer a more down-to-earth hypothesis.
NIDS researchers contend that these type vehicles are lighter-than-air, blimp-style craft of the U.S. military's making. Likely powered by "electrokinetic" drive, the lifting body-shaped airships have been skirting the skies from perhaps the early to mid 1980s.
Illinois sighting
NIDS has followed up on their study of last year that correlated sightings of large triangular or delta-shaped objects with Air Force Materiel Command and Air Mobility Command bases throughout the United States. Matches were made suggesting flight paths in and out of certain base locations.
The new assessment focuses on what four police officers, and more than a dozen others observed on January 5, 2000: A large, silent, low-flying black triangular shaped object. It flew on a southwesterly direction between Highland, Illinois and Dupo, located less than 30 miles (48 kilometers) from St. Louis, Missouri.
Part of the flight path took the enormous object near the perimeter of Scott Air Force Base.
NIDS does not come up with definite conclusion regarding the origin of the object sighted in Illinois.
However, the reports jibe with over 150 separate reports of sightings of large triangular or deltoid shaped objects. Those eyewitness accounts, accumulated by NIDS, have mainly come from the United States. A small number of the sightings they have on file come from Canada and Europe.
Ballooning expectations
To bolster their case about military airships being taken for UFOs, analysts at NIDS make a historical note.
Lighter-than-air vehicles held all records for payload, distance, duration, and altitude within the first four decades of the 20th century - even with the advent of the airplane. In fact, save for rocket-powered research aircraft, like the X-15 and the space shuttle, all absolute altitude records are still held by high-altitude scientific balloons.
NIDS makes the case that Big Black Deltas, or BBDs, are U.S. Defense Department airships. They are so large they can carry massive payloads at low altitudes, cruising at speeds three to five times as fast as surface ships.
Among a range of NIDS observations, the group believes the BBDs are powered by electrokinetic/field drives, or airborne nuclear power units. These craft also fly at extreme altitudes, high above conventional aircraft and the pulsing of ground-based traffic control radar.
Elecrokinetic propulsion means that no propellers or jets are used. A hybrid lighter-than-air craft would rely on aerostatic, lift gas, like a balloon. No helicopter-like downwash would be produced. Except for a slight humming from high-voltage control equipment -- and in older BBD versions an occasional coronal discharge -- a Big Black Delta makes no noise.
Given a slew of BBD capabilities -- from silent running, diminished drag, elimination of sonic shockwaves, to operation from ground level to full vacuum -- NIDS calls for pushing this black world technology out into daylight for commercial benefit.
Wheat from the chaff
"What we're trying to do is transform unidentified flying objects, UFOs, into IFOs, or identified flying objects," said Colm Kelleher, deputy administrator for NIDS.
"We want to limit the number of cases that are unidentified in our data bas
Not a balloon (Score:5, Funny)
(Cut to interior of a zeppelin. A party. Expensively dressed guests. Champagne. A palm court orchestra playing. Some guests looking out of the windows in wonderment.)
Von Bulow: (approaching Zeppelin) Herr Zeppelin - it's wonderful! It's put ballooning right back on the map.
(Zeppelin goes instantly berserk with anger.)
Zeppelin: It's not a balloon! D'you hear?... It's not a balloon... It's an airship... an airship... d'you hear?
(He hits him very hard on the top of the head with the underside of his fist.)
Von Bulow: Well, it's very nice anyway.
Tirpitz: (to Zeppelin) Tell me, what is the principle of these balloons?
Zeppelin: It's not a balloon! You stupid little thick-headed Saxon git! It's not a balloon! Balloons is for kiddy-winkies. If you want to play with balloons, get outside.
(Drags Tirpitz over to the door, opens it and flings him out into the clouds.)
Tirpitz: Aaaaaaaaaghhh!
It's unmanned, so why use Helium? (Score:2, Interesting)
It could also be 'canibalistic' is need be to power the fuel cells.
Hydrogen's only drawback is it explodes with fire, but this thing is unmanned, so
Just a thought
Not OLED based at all, actually. (Score:5, Informative)
The organic LED based technologies (polymeric / organic /nanostructured / Titania / Gratzel / Graetzel) cells are not yet ready for prime time, though they have huge promise. Check out Konarka [konarkatech.com] or Nanosolar [nanosolar.com]. GE and HItachi are also fooling around with this. The idea is that you can make solar cells out of TiO2, which is almost infinitely cheap in industrial quantities (see here toothpaste or white paint.)
Uni-Solar's product is in fact based on conventional silicon, just like 90%+ of the market today. The difference is that instead of slicing it out of crystals, they sputter it onto a backing, enabling them to make, e.g. peel-and-stick solar panels for commercial raised seam roofs, a conventional shingle for residential roofing, as well as, here, a flexible backing product for airships. Many are working in this area; it's sort of the next generation for solar cell cost decreases (which have come down by more than half in the last ten years; world production doubled between 2000 and 2003 - however, we're going to run out of tricks with conventional silicon within about 5 years at this pace.)
I find everyone's obsession with conversion efficiencies touching; what sense does it make when your fuel source is infinite and free? Area - related costs are subtle, so focus on this: with solar, efficiency matters not at all - the be all and end all is cost per watt.
Alternate uses: Cell towers and surveillance (Score:5, Insightful)
Another use for the tinfoil hat & central government crowd is surveillance. Put high resolution cameras in place and you could have low cost monitoring of everything from:
- Fires
- Traffic jams
- Speeders (digital VASCAR, anyone?)
- Traffic patterns
- Police tails of vehicles under investigation with no possible detection
Re:Alternate uses: Cell towers and surveillance (Score:5, Informative)
Not a chance, go read up how cellphone networks operate and you will see why this will not work.
cell towers need to be low, and lots of them in an area there are a very small number of frequencies and therefore you need to keep that number of calls in a cell area so that you can carry more calls in a geographical area...
cellular requires many small low towers to cover a metro area. you see taller towers in rural areas as the chance of saturating that cell site are much smaller in hickville compared to manhattan.
Why not a satellite? (Score:1)
Just doesn't have the same ring to it... (Score:2, Funny)
LOOK! It's the Lockheed Martin blimp!
Moving relay mirrors -- Yikes! (Score:3, Funny)
747 Captain: Commencing laser firing using floating relay mirror. Crap! Did anybody else hear a loud Pop?
Cool (Score:2)
[1] At sea level and assuming my US->metric conversion is ok.
floating geodesic domes (Score:3, Interesting)
Its two mints in one (Score:2)
Amateur Radio Payload (Score:4, Interesting)
2500 watts times surface area... (Score:2)
So much power did that 'anti ballistic missile' laser require? Or rather what would it take to put three or four of them onboard, and use them by remote-control against ground targets in realtime? No more depleted uranium- shells in tanks, just a laser range finder and a directinal antenna. In theory.
--Maskirovka
OT: rocket^W scientist can't use anti aliasing... (Score:1)
I hope their scientists are better than the hindenburg's (spelling most likelly to be incorrect)
Tasty (Score:2, Funny)
No thanks, I already ate.
S.H.I.E.L.D. (Score:1)
skycat ... (Score:2, Interesting)
http://www.worldskycat.com/
Defense Tech mas more... (Score:1)
An funny blend of technologies (Score:5, Funny)
It uses "the same technology as the previously discussed GE organic LED project"
in a new dirigible?
Making it...
A LED Zepplin?
High Altitude Recon (Score:2, Informative)
Help me with this (Score:2, Insightful)
Does "Peacekeeper" mean "Weapons Platform?"
Or am I just being paranoid?
I think Dubya wrote that globalsecurity.org piece! (Score:2, Funny)
Future: A stratospheric house? (Score:1)
Density? Area? (Score:2)
What's missing from this glowing pronouncement is the weight and size of the usable product. It's nice that you can pull 2.5kW/kg, but how much does a square meter of this stuff in usable form weigh? Does 1kg of TFS material need to be laid on a substrate weighing 4kg in order to provide support and electrical connections (4:1)? Or does it maybe take only 10 grams of TFS material to make a single square meter of panel (100:1)? And how about surface area? Is a 2.5kW panel 100 square meters in area? I haven't RTFA yet, but this odd 2500W/kg metric sticks out to me as, well, odd.
Ovonics - FINALLY (Score:2)
Over the years I have seen Ovshinsky's name pop up here an there. At last he seems to have made it work. As the article says, a whopping 2500 watts per kg! Gotta tip my hat to him for perseverence, even if unabombers don't have cheap, off-grid power in their survival cabins yet.
Partial Vacuum Blimp? (Score:3, Interesting)
Possible downsides: cost; no real advantages over conventional designs; more complex and probably heavier structure due to higher strength needed to resist air pressure; vulnerability to punctures and leaks. I'm just curious if this has ever been attempted.
Airship? (Score:1)
Alternate power source: microwave. (Score:2)
Jon Acheson
Akron Airdock (Score:2, Informative)
A book I have (Published by Goodyear in 1923) lists this place as 1175ft x 200ft x 325ft. It even has a picture of it super-imposed over the American side of Niagara Falls (it's 75 longer). It's also mentions that it is so big that it often form clouds on the inside.
More links are here [uakron.edu] and here [nlhs.com]
Onboard Helium production? (Score:1)
This has been in the works for a while now. (Score:1)
Got a truck that needs to go from LA to NY? Drive it up to the balloon, park it inside along with the 200 other trucks, and it arrives in NY in a couple days.
The practically proved too far fetched to continue in the end, but at least the concept has been around for a great while.
Re:Can I shoot at it? (Score:5, Funny)
If your shotgun can hit something at 70,000 feet I think you may be in for a visit by Mr. Ashcroft & Co.
Re:Can I shoot at it? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Can I shoot at it? (Score:5, Interesting)
Gerald Bull [std.com], a Canadian big gun engineer, made large guns and was killed by Israel's Mossad for daring to talk to Iraq about building a "super gun"
Re:This is a pipe dream (Score:2)
Alternatively, you could join the tinfoil hat crowd and...
you will see it when you believe it.
-