Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 (Tek) 9/28/84 based on 9/17/84; site dadla.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!teklds!dadla!jamesp
From: jamesp@dadla.UUCP (Jim Perkins)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re: Antisatellite weapon effectiveness
Message-ID: <378@dadla.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 27-Aug-85 12:17:54 EDT
Article-I.D.: dadla.378
Posted: Tue Aug 27 12:17:54 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 30-Aug-85 09:57:15 EDT
References: <1273@poseidon.UUCP>
Reply-To: jamesp@dadla.UUCP (Jim Perkins)
Organization: Joe Zit's House of Creative Acne Treatment
Lines: 40
Summary: 

In article <1273@poseidon.UUCP> brent@poseidon.UUCP (Brent P. Callaghan) writes:
>Its effectiveness against a "distributed" satellite
>would be another matter.  A 12" diameter hole in
>a large solar array would reduce the available
>power somewhat, but nothing more.
>Enemy satellites could even have an infra-red
>emitter of some sort hanging out on a boom to
>misguide such expensive cannonballs.
>				
>Made in New Zealand -->		Brent Callaghan

An object moving at 500 mi/min. = 50 mi/sec. = 80 km/sec, weighing, say, 20
kg has a kinetic energy of .5mv*v = (.5)(20 kg)(80k m/s)(80k m/s) = 1.6e+10 J.
This is no small crackers, and is going to send any craft spinning fast enough
to be hopelessly disoriented, or at least tear off or cripple the entire arm
holding a distributed solar array.  The boom with the I/R source will provide a
nice lever arm to get the craft REALLY spinning.

How about having a net of wires cast out from the Kinetic Anti-Satellite
Weapon (KASW) that could rip and tear hundreds of square feet of cells and
tear up anything with a boom less than 5 m long?  If a low-earth satellite has
too long an arm with an I/R source, there will be stability problems due to
gravity gradients anyway, so they probably wouldn't be designed that way.

-- 

James T. Perkins -- dadla!jamesp, orstcs!jamesp



		  ````	``````	``````	``````	`    `
		 `	     `	`    `	`   `	``  ``
		``````	     `	`    `	`  `	` `` `
		    `	     `	`    `	` ` `	`    `
		````	     `	``````	``   `	`    `

			E n t e r p r i s e s

 
It is better to kiss an avocado than to get in a fight with an aardvark