Spacecraft data has confirmed successful deployment of the futuristic technology.
  • @[email protected]English
    2•3 months ago

    Sail absorbs power while also acting as a sail, and you can use the lasers to steer?

    It would also be like steering a boat more or less no?

    • @[email protected]English
      1•3 months ago

      The solar sail reflects light instead of absorbing it so you get to double dip on photon momentum.

      And sure, you can steer with the laser I suppose, but with that kind of super weak deltaV, you’re not going to be exactly doing donuts in the solar system.

      Even the massive solar sail only imparts a super small amount of force. It’s only useful because it does so for free over a long period of time with no air resistance.

      You’d be better off using a conventional thruster to do whatever steering you needed to do before letting the sail take over. It’s not like you need to steer around any obstacles.