‘Impossible’ EM drive engine produces thrust from nothing

Also thus far the thrust produced is so small it could boil down to a hall effect. It is difficult to tell. Like one of my electronics profs said.

"When you are messing around with sub milivolt... you can convince yourself of anything the fuzz is so bad"

Like said above, it is very very important to test, but it is important to have a sense of reality also and to be able to figure out if something really works or doesn't.

Also, people need to understand some physics, Photons have momentum, it is how a solar sail works, its how radiation pressure works. An LED probably produces thrust when it flashes... useful? no, probably in the peco-neuton range.

Should we invest in making huge light bulb/laser propulsion? No because it would worse than a solar sail

NASA scientists have purportedly been trying to make the EmDrive a reality, but China now claims to have beaten NASA and pulled off successful testing of the EmDrive on Earth. Furthermore, China’s space agency is also saying it is currently testing the EmDrive out in space aboard its Tiangong-2 space station.

Inverse.com, Dec. 21, 2016 - China Claims it Has Done the "impossible" with EmDrive.

That is not the only thing China is claiming. The claim they have YUGE breakthrough in nuclear fusion but have not released any details. So, they succeeded in testing this out on earth and already are using it in low earth orbit. Hum? Again, they are just stating things with nothing really to back it up.

On this Chinese news... this one I will believe it when I see it.

Interesting thread OP, thanks. I thought I'd write a general reply as there seemed to be a lot of people confused about the fuel usage of this engine. It is being called a reactionless drive as roguetechie states, but I think calling it a propellantless engine is more illuminating for the context of this discussion. The engine would need a power source, but does not eject any propellant during its operation. No propellant needs to be carried with the craft to produce thrust using this engine.

That is a really big deal for the challenge of space travel if this engine works as predicted. Spacecraft can be designed for longer trips that do not need to consist mostly of propellant storage space.

Also, here's a link to Shawyer's(the inventor) page:
emdrive.com...

He gives his own theories for how his engine works if you look through his material. There are a couple papers in there. I've heard them called crude or possibly inaccurate, but they make sense to me. I like to think of it as pushing off from the fabric of the universe, though I suppose that's not exactly right. That's just how I imagine it.

It's interesting to me that Shawyer's designs have shown so much promise without the low temperatures and superconducting materials that his design calls for. It should be interesting to see what adding these elements will do for the test results.

a reply to: TheBadCabbie

Reactionless drive really is the correct term both from the technology and terminology standpoint.

I say that because an engine is a very good example of a reaction drive system...

Whether you connect a propeller or a transmission and axles you are TRANSMITTING the rotary motion of the engine into something that gives propulsion by the interaction between what is being driven and some physical medium. Ie air water dirt or asphalt.

Engine has very specific connotations and implied meanings that definitely do not fit the EM drive.

a reply to: roguetechie

The EM Drive is an engine, but I don't see the point in arguing terminology with you and I agree that reactionless drive is the more apt term. I suppose the word engine conjures images of moving parts, and the EM Drive doesn't really have any, unless you count vibration. I was merely expanding on your statement that the device doesn't use any propellant, in case any other readers hadn't quite digested it.

a reply to: TheBadCabbie

Yes the entire concept of something which requires power input in the form of electricity yet does not use propellant or something interacting with a physical medium to move really messes with people's heads!!

I guess for odd dudes like me who have spent their whole life reading thinking experimenting and investigating the idea it's super clear and completely awesome to boot...

Even though I'm every bit the garage mad scientist and even being open to "fringe" ideas ... I totally truthfully never fully believed I'd see a device like this come out of the black into the white world in my life!

As good a place as any:

Paper highlighting the Navy's upcoming test - specifically not "to discover new physics"- but instead to test only for anomalous thrust.

Get "Bad request"
from that link...

a reply to: Miccey

Dunno why:

info.aiaa.org...

or "Thrust Measurement and Error Analysis of the IMPULSE Resonant Microwave Cavity Drive" in Google for the first PDF result.

The error analysis bit makes this of particular interest.

a reply to: Miccey

Yeah theres extra characters on the end of the url, delete everything after .pdf and it loads

Was worth a read as not seen many other updates on this recently. Interesting to see other governments pursuing this suppose its not worth the risk not to in case it does pay off.

If a starship has it's own strong magnetic field...it might be possible for it to generate low powered propulsion, by using vector and torque forces; whereby it would use magnetic ebbing and flowing forces against another magnetic field such as a planet or a star.

Anti-grav properties for the starship, will also be generated by these same magnetic forces. But high-powered propulsion... would require a photon propulsion unit, such as a micro-mini black hole, housed onboard the starship --- which would generate it's own variable magnetic field, by the taking in of starlight photons or plasma around it's accretion disc and ejecting said photons from it's two magnetic poles, funneled to and ejected from thrusters, thereby causing thrust, exponentially squared, easily up to the speed of light barrier for the starship and beyond into the superluminal realm.

a reply to: Erno86

First paragraph... hall effect thruster

Second paragraph.... Anti-Grav has not been proven, let alone it be absolutely related to magnetic fields.

Micro-mini black hole, redundant use of the terms for small, black-hole containment, also an impossible feat at this point. The whole paragraph runs away with itself and is highly subjective. You start out by suggesting the starlight generates the magnetic field and producing astrophysical jets making thrust... so which is it? And besides, the jets come from both sides, momentum is conserved, so exactly how do you produce thrust from it?

Easily... in the realms of science fiction... sure...

originally posted by: ErosA433
a reply to: Erno86

First paragraph... hall effect thruster

Second paragraph.... Anti-Grav has not been proven, let alone it be absolutely related to magnetic fields.

Micro-mini black hole, redundant use of the terms for small, black-hole containment, also an impossible feat at this point. The whole paragraph runs away with itself and is highly subjective. You start out by suggesting the starlight generates the magnetic field and producing astrophysical jets making thrust... so which is it? And besides, the jets come from both sides, momentum is conserved, so exactly how do you produce thrust from it?

Easily... in the realms of science fiction... sure...

I'm speculating how current interstellar capable starships [owned and operated by high-tech ET alien races] tic.

The starlight or generated fusion plasma is fed to the accretion disk of the micro-mini black hole propulsion unit onboard the starship. This rapidly spinning accretion disk is comprised of photons, which can have some powerful magnetic effects, because...when plasma moves, it is an electrical current that creates magnetic fields around it. The ejected photons are released at the two magnetic poles, an funneled to the thruster outlets of the starship at near the speed of light.

www.astronomy.com...

originally posted by: Erno86
I'm speculating how current interstellar capable starships [owned and operated by high-tech ET alien races] tic.

Thats fine, though speculation on the basis of a lack of solid evidence one could ask, we know of no high-tech ET alien races, so to propose it as matter of fact is not so useful.

The starlight or generated fusion plasma is fed to the accretion disk of the micro-mini black hole propulsion unit onboard the starship. This rapidly spinning accretion disk is comprised of photons, which can have some powerful magnetic effects, because...when plasma moves, it is an electrical current that creates magnetic fields around it. The ejected photons are released at the two magnetic poles, an funneled to the thruster outlets of the starship at near the speed of light.

www.astronomy.com...

The accretion disk is not comprised of photons, and accretion disk is comprised of plasma, photons are not maintained in a closed orbit in an accretion disk, they are maintained in a closed orbit around the event horizon. You cannot switch the terms around and expect to be correct. It is quite well known that massive compact objects have very very strong magnetic fields, how these exactly produce polar jets is less well known though there are plenty of ideas.

My point is really this, you are not obtaining anything with photons other than re-directing the light, the same can be achieved with a very powerful light source, you don't need a blackhole to do that. You need to be able to hold the blackhole in space fixed relative to your ship, requires lots of power and probably magnetic containment. You now have a ship that has the same mass as the blackhole. If its a tiny one, ok fine, but that tiny one isn't going to help you in the manner you think. The accretion disk is going to produce loads and loads of radiation emanated in all directions, which is fine if you want to collect it, but it wont give you a projected thrust in a manner that you think.

a reply to: ms898

you are not pushing anything I.e there is no air in space like a jet on earth could push

A rocket doesn't work by pushing against air. Rockets work in space.

originally posted by: ErosA433

originally posted by: Erno86
I'm speculating how current interstellar capable starships [owned and operated by high-tech ET alien races] tic.

Thats fine, though speculation on the basis of a lack of solid evidence one could ask, we know of no high-tech ET alien races, so to propose it as matter of fact is not so useful.

The starlight or generated fusion plasma is fed to the accretion disk of the micro-mini black hole propulsion unit onboard the starship. This rapidly spinning accretion disk is comprised of photons, which can have some powerful magnetic effects, because...when plasma moves, it is an electrical current that creates magnetic fields around it. The ejected photons are released at the two magnetic poles, an funneled to the thruster outlets of the starship at near the speed of light.

www.astronomy.com...

The accretion disk is not comprised of photons, and accretion disk is comprised of plasma, photons are not maintained in a closed orbit in an accretion disk, they are maintained in a closed orbit around the event horizon. You cannot switch the terms around and expect to be correct. It is quite well known that massive compact objects have very very strong magnetic fields, how these exactly produce polar jets is less well known though there are plenty of ideas.

My point is really this, you are not obtaining anything with photons other than re-directing the light, the same can be achieved with a very powerful light source, you don't need a blackhole to do that. You need to be able to hold the blackhole in space fixed relative to your ship, requires lots of power and probably magnetic containment. You now have a ship that has the same mass as the blackhole. If its a tiny one, ok fine, but that tiny one isn't going to help you in the manner you think. The accretion disk is going to produce loads and loads of radiation emanated in all directions, which is fine if you want to collect it, but it wont give you a projected thrust in a manner that you think.

I base my alien interstellar starship propulsion theory from eyewitness accounts of foo fighters, including my own double nighttime sighting; one night in November 1976.

Any kind of plasma carries photons that emanate from it...including fusion plasma.

I'm speculating that the accretion disk is capable of storing photons, till one or both of the magnetic poles attracts the photons for polar jet expulsion at near the speed of light.

I know my theory sounds so simple --- though I think I stumbled upon the idea --- But what we really need is a micro-mini black hole, preferably based on some distant asteroid; where we can study it and possibly refine it into a starship for photon propulsion.

"Black Hole Starships"

www.youtube.com...

"Black Hole Spaceship Propulsion"

www.youtube.com...

originally posted by: Erno86
I base my alien interstellar starship propulsion theory from eyewitness accounts of foo fighters, including my own double nighttime sighting; one night in November 1976.

Any kind of plasma carries photons that emanate from it...including fusion plasma.

I'm speculating that the accretion disk is capable of storing photons, till one or both of the magnetic poles attracts the photons for polar jet expulsion at near the speed of light.

I know my theory sounds so simple ---

It sounds like you don't know basic physics. Magnetic poles do not attract photons.

"Black Hole Starships"

www.youtube.com...

"Black Hole Spaceship Propulsion"

www.youtube.com...

What you are saying is completely different than what these links are saying. They at least make some sense but your ideas violate basic known physics.

arxiv.org...
That's from the link in your first video and they are talking about harnessing Hawking radiation, not jets. We aren't quite sure exactly what powers the jets however we think we have ruled out the accretion disc as the source of the power for the jets. The most likely candidate seems to be that power for the jets is coming from a reduction of angular momentum of the black hole, with a small contribution from the accretion disk. This is fine for a supermassive black hole which has plenty of angular momentum, but with such a tiny black hole as you are describing there's not as much angular momentum to lose so it seems unlikely it could provide much power to jets for very long.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Are you trying to say the origin of the BH's jets are not magnetic poles?

I favor the study that says the black hole's two jets that fly out along the black hole's spin axis, are composed of "high energy positron - electron jet plasma."


If the black hole's poles are not magnetic --- The spinning accretion disk or the matter or plasma contained in it, will possibly have a "pumped-up magnetic field" that twists and turns along the magnetic lines, till it launches material or plasma outward in the form of jets.

originally posted by: Erno86
a reply to: Arbitrageur

Are you trying to say the origin of the BH's jets are not magnetic poles?

I never said that. Magnetic fields play a role, but they don't play any role in attracting photons like you said here:

I'm speculating that the accretion disk is capable of storing photons, till one or both of the magnetic poles attracts the photons

I favor the study that says the black hole's two jets that fly out along the black hole's spin axis, are composed of "high energy positron - electron jet plasma."

Then why are you saying they are photons?

The ejected photons are released at the two magnetic poles, an funneled to the thruster outlets of the starship at near the speed of light.

If you had said the jets were expelling "high energy positron - electron jet plasma" instead of saying they were ejecting photons earlier you might have sounded like you had some idea of the science.

However you still have the problem of how to power the jets and the problem Eros mentioned of the net thrust being zero since the two jets are ejected in opposite directions. As I said we are pretty sure the accretion disk can't be the main source of power for the jets we observe in nature, and if the source of that power is lost angular momentum of the black hole, It seems to me like you can't store much of that in your "micro-mini" black hole.

The authors who claim Hawking radiation might be extracted from such a black hole may have a more plausible argument, however I'm not convinced of their claim that black holes would be easier to handle than anti-matter which is dangerous because it can explode on contact with matter. They are right about anti-matter being dangerous, but at least we've demonstrated the ability to handle small amounts of anti-matter, and to my knowledge nobody has ever demonstrated an ability to handle black holes. Black holes may sort of "explode" when they run out of fuel (mass) but I guess you'd just have to make sure to dump them before that happens (if you let the mass of the black hole get as low as one metric ton, the black hole will have about the same luminosity in watts as our sun at that point, and luminosity increases as the mass gets lower). Even before their mass gets that low, a black hole still seem pretty dangerous to me, because if anything falls into it, you're not getting it back.