Rubber and Laughing Gas shoots SpaceShipOne to 64mi altitude

Post by **ccb056** » October 4th, 2004, 2:26 pm

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/10/0 ... index.html

A fuel tank about six feet in diameter at the center of the craft holds liquid nitrous oxide, also known as laughing gas. A hollow tube leading from the tank to the engine nozzle is filled with solid rubber. The combustive combination produces thousands of pounds of thrust, although exact amount remains secret.

Tebow2000 · Post by **Tebow2000** » October 4th, 2004, 10:16 pm

lol, I wouldnt want to be at that launch site..lol

Smartweb · Post by **Smartweb** » October 4th, 2004, 10:57 pm

Tebow2000 wrote:lol, I wouldnt want to be at that launch site..lol

They don't start the rubber and all until they get to 45,000 feet.

Tebow2000 · Post by **Tebow2000** » October 4th, 2004, 11:03 pm

ah gotcha

MovingStill · Post by **MovingStill** » October 6th, 2004, 12:28 am

So simple, hell if your Mom/Dad was a dentist you'd have access to laughing gas, and then... rubber, like that's some precious commodity, right? Great, now every kid with a few bucks will blow themselves up, hopefully the stupid one's won't read that, or at least go through with the idea.

Smartweb · Post by **Smartweb** » October 6th, 2004, 12:29 am

Does that kind of reaction harm the environment in any serious way?

MovingStill · Post by **MovingStill** » October 6th, 2004, 12:56 am

*Remembers Physical Science, Life Science, and Biology*

Hmm, ozone is O3, and the bond cannot be broken by heat, as seen with solar flares, etc. So the 'heat' itself is harmless, rubber, if used from the rubber tree (the actual rubber sappy stuff) is natural and when burned would turn into carbon... oh wait, C + O3 = CO2 + O So, depelpetion of the ozone layer at some level, but probably not serious enough to be worried about, consider everytime lightning strikes, ozone (A single O2 molecule is split, the two seperate O molecules join with two O2 and create two O3, this happens on a massive scale into the billions per every single lightning strike) ... so, ozone is no worry there really. As for the nitrous oxide... can't be too bad for the enviornment when I think about it, don't quote me... I'm not sure of what it's true effects are on anything, but my best theory would say there is little here that is a negative on the enviornment, that in the long run, would be replaced by nature anyway.