Quote:
Originally Posted by Nauset
Here are some numbers I pulled up with a google search on a real space craft.
Space shuttle fuel consumed in a launch: 3.5 million pounds.
If water, instead of fuel, were pumped by the three Space Shuttle Main Engines, an average family-sized swimming pool could be drained in 25 seconds.
The three space shuttle main engines generate the maximum equivalent of about 37 million horsepower. The fuel pump alone delivers as much as 71,000 horsepower, the oxygen pump delivers about 23,000. Just as a basis of comparison, the fuel pump alone is probably the equivalent horsepower of 28 locomotives. And with the horsepower of the oxygen pump, that's probably the equivalent of 11 more locomotives.
You could also compare the Shuttle engines to a Corvette. The three main engines plus the two solid rocket motors deliver the horsepower of about 120,000 Corvettes.
Each of the Space Shuttle's solid rocket boosters burns 5 tons of propellant per second.
It only takes the Space Shuttle about 8 minutes to accelerate to its orbital speed of more than 17,000 miles per hour.
14 astronauts have died in the two shuttle accidents.
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I'm not taking the space shuttle. You are comparing apples and elephants.
Spaceship One used 594 pounds of fuel (solid rubber). That is the same weight as 99 gallons of gasoline. I don't think they have released all the specs on Spaceship Two yet, but the weight is about 3 times as much so figure 297 gallons of gasoline. The Nor-Tech's have 300, 360 or 400 gallon tanks.
I will ride just once, my share of the fuel is about the same weight as 37 gallons of gas.
Now go figure the fuel for a family of 4 to fly to Disney World.