No One Wins NASA Space Elevator Contest

volts writes "According to New Scientist no one was able to grab the two $50,000 top prizes in the recent NASA 'Beam Power Challenge'. The biggest limiting factor seemed to be that no team was able to meet the speed requirement, although a group from the University of Saskatchewan in Canada set the height record at 12 meters. Not quite geosynchronous..."

Re:OMFG ROFLMAO!!!

[jferris]

I think it has more of a chance of working than you. How's the view from the family basement, junior? The thing that people fail to realize is that even if a project never reaches its goal, it has the potential to spawn innovation that can be applied to other problems. There is a quite a list of things that are NASA castoffs that are used in everyday life.

I can hear it now...

[Surazal]

"Quick guys, we gotta find a way to spin the Earth up really fast so we can call our elevator geosyncronous. There's $50,000 at stake, people!"

Not quite geosynchronous...

[aengblom]

Not quite geosynchronous...

We didn't have enough money to put a man in a track suit up a ladder! I mean, I would've been there,

"Go man, go!" "

I'm going, I'm going! 'Ang on!"

"Just hang on to the ladder!"

"Hello, Swindon, I am here. Swindon, can you hear me?"

"Swindon here, we are monitoring you on our instruments at the moment, we've got you on a tuba." "There should be a bigger laugh for that joke, I think."

"Yeah, I can't quite understand it; I thought it was really funny. Swindon, a knackered, kind of Fresno town."

"They don't seem to be going for it."

"They're obviously bastards."

"Anyway, Swindon, I'm nearly at the Moon... actually, that's a bit of an understatement, that one.

Have you got another big ladder, another bit of ladder? I don't think we're quite at the Moon yet, but I can see right over the top of the houses! Fantastic!"

Here's an idea

[eyal]

...although a group from the University of Saskatchewan in Canada set the height record at 12 meters

Maybe if we stacked them...

Re:New idea.

[eln]

Wonderful idea! Now all we have to do is build a skyscraper that's 22,240 miles tall, and we can use these babies to get into orbit.

Junkyard Wars

[KilobyteKnight]

Didn't they do this on Junkyard Wars with a jet ski engine, duct tape, and a couple pieces of PCV?

"Space elevators stuck on the first floor"

[Monkeyman334]

It seems the solution to this problem is to add a basement.

Well my team..

[modi123]

... was disqualified for "inappropriate" elevator music... Under testing situations, all of our patients (read: monkeys, elderly, humans, and fish) were driven insane, then promptly driven sane, then insane, then sane, and so forth during the 62.5 mile elevator ride finished. After the tenth go around we decided the cost to hosing out the compartment filled with bile, blood, and bits of hair were not worth the cash prize. So it goes. Additionally, the PSP battery life wasn't sufficient to stave off elevator-maddness either. http://trs.nis.nasa.gov/archive/00000377/01/tm1085 37.pdf [nasa.gov]

Re:Junkyard Wars

[KilobyteKnight]

Oh... no wonder it didn't work.

Geosyncronicity

[Deanasc]

12 meters. That would be easy to launch a satellite into geosyncronous orbit. Just make it's orbital velocity 20,000 miles per hour.

a totally wrong direction ;-)

[Anonymous Coward]

why oh why did everyone try to build an ascending elevator? They could easily meet the speed requirements with descending types ;)

Beam me up!

[Urusai]

Kind of puts a different meaning to the phrase...