Talk:Dyson sphere/Archive 1

message: A dyson bubble is made of beans?  Could this be clarified?
:As you might guess, a Dyson Bubble is not composed of beans, but of statites - apararently some very old vandalizm that no one caught until you did. Good job - Beowulf314159 04:16, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dyson Bubble: Made of beans? 

message: It is claimed in the Dyson bubble part of the article that there are no practical uses for the idea of a "cloud" of statites around the sun - but is this accurate?
Photonic pressure, close to the sun, can pack a heck of wallop.
The only treatment I've seen of statites is in fiction - by Robert L. Forward who also invented and patented the statite concept - was in the novel Flight of the Dragonfly. Forward was a rigourous hard science fiction author and a professor of physics, so I'd guess his treatment of the statite was backed by figures. In the novel - an entire space habitat is suspended by a ring solar sail slipped over the shadow cone of mercury (with the habitat inside the shadow cone).
I find the idea of a statite based Dyson swarm very interesting - as it eliminates the orbital dynamic problems of "swarms" of worldlettes trying to avoid collision in the classical model. Statites can just "hover" at rest over the sun.
Beowulf314159 02:34, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dyson Bubble and Statites 

message: For each one of those purposed methods of constructing a Dyson Sphere, where would we get the resources to make it? I'm not a scientist but reading through the article, it looks to me that you would need a lot of material to construct this sphere. Can anyone explain where we would get all the material to make a Dyson Sphere. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.115.89.90 (talk • contribs) .
:: Dyson spheres usually require the "disassembly" of the rest of the planetary system - both to remove collision hazards, and - as you point out - getting material to build the structure. Construction scenerios sometimes differ on whether it's possible to "transmute" hydrogen (through fusion?) to more useful construction materials. If so, then there is a lot more material that in the system that can be used. In the later case, even the star might be "mined" for material. Beowulf314159 17:56, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Resources Available 

message: I'm sure someone will question the Dyson bubble figures, so here's my calculations.
* The O'neill colony is decscribed as 3x106 tons 
* This is ~2,721,554,220,000 grams.
* The areal density of the sail is 0.3g/m2
* The density of a statite around Sol has to be no more than 0.78g/m2
* Thus, the sail has an extra "carrying weight" of 0.4g/m2 (pessimistic rounding)
* Dividing the mass of the colony by the excess carrying capacity = 2,721,554,220,000 grams / 0.4g/m2 = 6.80388555 x 1012 m2.
* A circle of 6.80388555 x 1012 m2 has a diameter of 2,943,293 m = 2,943Km. Rounded up in 3000Km.
* a sail/paylog combination with a density of 0.8g/m2 (pessimistic rounding) and a sail area of 6.80388555 x 1012 m2 masses  5,443,108,440kg, or about a 50/50 split between the mass of the sail and the colony.
Beowulf314159 02:57, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I just noticed that this section here on talk: is provided as a reference for Dyson sphere#Dyson bubble. This is not a good thing, it looks like a violation of the Wikipedia:No original research policy (as well as the Wikipedia:Avoid self-references guideline). Can you provide an external reference for this stuff? Bryan 07:56, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Yeah, it is a bit of a blurry area. One factor that isn't blurry, though, is that all else aside we shouldn't be putting "publishing details" on a talk: page. When Wikipedia is mirrored the talk pages are usually left out, so in this case part of the article would be missing. Moving it into the article might work, though I tend to favor your other idea that we should just say "but Dyson sphere's based on statites may be possible with advanced nanomesh sail material" or something similar. Bryan 17:04, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You could reference Dyson Bubbles at ToothyWiki which goes into further detail on Statites and the materials needed. --Douglas 13:16, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  A defense of Staties. 

message: Wouldn't it be possible to put a series of satellites in orbit that somehow act similiarly to a solar sail to actually move a star? I don't know how the mechanics would work. Perhaps a magnetic field? Or the sattelites extend out the solar sails and somehow hook to the gravitational field of the sun, and turn off/ dissemble when it started to come loose. Or, you could maye set it up like a big rocket, with the solar wind being fired out the back. Or, if you could invent a material which could hook directly to the sun... but I don't think that's too likely anytime soon. Could someone please help me refine this idea? Scourgeofsmallishinsects 15:40, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You've got a great huge fusion reactor harnessed! Use it as a rocket, or a photonic drive :) The idea is called a Shkadov thruster or a Stellar engine, depending on whether or not you want to used a Dyson shell as part of the thruster design or not - Beowulf314159 16:34, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dyson Drive