Uncle Bob
I think we can agree that an ion drive involves the electrostatic acceleration of nuclei. Limited to an Isp of about 3-5K. Higher Isps can be acheived by MPD or MHD device.
Agree with that and would class a "true" ion drive as those that accelrate ions of only one charge type, i.e., either positive or negative ions.
Conservation of energy, yes. Also conservation of momentum. ... HEPLAR is described too precisely to get away with that.
I'm a strict conservative when it comes to conservation of energy and momentum, not to mention a few laws of thermodynamics.
I agree on the HEPLAR view, not alot of wiggle room,i.e., room for yet to be invented technology or theory, there. The whole KKM discusssion got me rethinking my assumptions about what reaction drives could do, then calculating a few numbers made me realize they can't do what the version of FFS2 rules I found would lead you to believe they can.
Now with the (IMHO) most likely model for the CT maneuver drive you need 4 GW/ton to move at 1G, but there is a lot of grey area....Thrust plates should require more power to maintain a constant accel as the ship picks`up speed relative to local gravity.
I'd be interested in the model.
[excessive reply]My personal model follows, trying to use as much now-known physics as possible with the full realization that such technology requires physics yet to be discovered. That is, Einstein didn't have all the pieces of the puzzle. This is all clearly IMTU and started as an exercise to provide some guidlines to limit, at least IMHO "abuses" by players (or myself) of CT drives. Also, I just like to think about this stuff. I'm veiwing thrust plates as follows.
(1) They create a "field" that warps space-time around a specific volume. The degree of curvature of this field determines acceleration. The field is a weaker and more stable version of the field that allows a ship to enter jump space. It was far easier to reach a "singualrity" in the field equations and hence "jump" than to maitain the smaller curvature for a practical drive, hence the TL delay between FTL and thruster plates.
(2) The effective mass of this volume is greater than that of a solid chunk of lead, e.g., so the mass of the ship is inconsequential in determining the mass accelerated. Thus, preserving the drive based on ship volume and keeping off the design sequence yet another number to track.
(3) Conservation of energy is preserved as follows. The KE energy put into the field comes from a near direct channelling of energy by the conversion of fuel mass to energy (e=mc^2)power plant energy is used to funnel this energy to the field but power plant output alone is not the only energy input. It is more of a direct dumping, made possible by these thrust plate/jump field physics, of energy liberated by conversion of mass into energy into the field. IMTU this is how the energy needed for jump gets consumed (i.e. all that fuel). This is my workaround for where the energy comes from without requiring large power plants. You still need energy in the form of mass though. The energy liberation comes "through" the power plant process so LHyd still is the fuel of choice.
(4) Conservation of momentum is preserved as the warped space time volume "pushes" against the local space-time. That is, when you thrust foward the solar system (or a portion at least) thrusts back, but like jumping up in the air on earth, it's a very, very small distance as the mass of the earth is far larger than the jumper. The difference here is the "mass" is not that of the local interstelalr gas, but an effective mass of placing a dimple or warp in the local space time.
(5) Maintaining the curvature of the field becomes harder as the energy dumped into it increases. The effect places a limit on maximum velocity (i.e, delta v) as there is a limit on maximum energy that can be dumped in. Also the field may collapse if the velocity is too high, not good if you can't restart your drive before you need to stop or turn. You can play around with this limit and whether it is volume dependent or not. The reason, IMTU, to even have such a limit is to preclude "high delta v for free scenarios", so the limit is pretty low. I also run it so smaller volumes (i.e., fighters missiles) can attain higher max. v. An added benefit is controlling max v. makes vector based combat easier to run.[/excessive reply]
