Megastructures

Discuss megastructures such as dyson spheres, ringworlds, planetary mirrors and such.

Quote :

Actually IRL dyson spheres might not even be viable. They can collapse due to their own weight.

Now that you mention global warming, what about other megaengineering projects such as orbital reflectors to cool down planets, orbital habitats and non-godly terraforming? (eg, grab some ice meteors, stick some rockets on them and dump on mars)

A big enough mirror could be pointed at a planet to provide it with extra sunlight and warmith. I recall the capital world of rheinland in freelancer had something like that because it was so fucking icy.

I personally think dyson spheres as uniform shells would not be practical, instead making them from statites (like satellites, but static) might be an easier task. It would make certain things impossible though, such as living on them.

Commander Keen wrote:

I personally think dyson spheres as uniform shells would not be practical, instead making them from statites (like satellites, but static) might be an easier task. It would make certain things impossible though, such as living on them.

Certain areas could be 'webbed' together, forming a surface that a colony could live on. Expansion of that colony could cause problems, though.

Or the colony could just be an interstellar petrol station. With a little shop. The little shop goes without saying.

Well, for the sake of sci-finess I beleive we should implement both dyson spheres and dyson webs. Just because it wouldn't work IRL doesn't mean we shouldn't implement it. Sci-fi without a good bit of imagination and unscientificness (how ironic) would be quite boring...

Some funky smaller-scale megaengineering ideas from shimizu corporation (they even have some awesome pictures)

Djohaal says click me!

The Uteen wrote:

Certain areas could be 'webbed' together, forming a surface that a colony could live on. Expansion of that colony could cause problems, though.

Or the colony could just be an interstellar petrol station. With a little shop. The little shop goes without saying.

You would have to sacrifice solar panels for more solar sails, though. I guess it would still give enough energy, though.

Simple enough. Eventually we'll likely have a research that unlocks such vast size in the TO. You'd be able to build them that way. I agree that solid dyson spheres is a little ridiculous. A bit like rocky giants.

Solid dyson spheres could be unlocked as part of some advanced tech when you already have gravitational manipulation and such to keep the structure intact. I'd use the main star at the core as a source of warmith and energy through massive solar panels that orbited it on the inside causing day-night cycles. I'd be a inside out planet actually....

Djohaal wrote:

Solid dyson spheres could be unlocked as part of some advanced tech when you already have gravitational manipulation and such to keep the structure intact. I'd use the main star at the core as a source of warmith and energy through massive solar panels that orbited it on the inside causing day-night cycles. I'd be a inside out planet actually....

Simple grav tech will likely be the key to interstellar travel. If solid Dyson Spheres are to pop up, I'd say very late game, maybe only a couple milennia before Ascension.

Tenebrarum wrote:

Djohaal wrote:

Solid dyson spheres could be unlocked as part of some advanced tech when you already have gravitational manipulation and such to keep the structure intact. I'd use the main star at the core as a source of warmith and energy through massive solar panels that orbited it on the inside causing day-night cycles. I'd be a inside out planet actually....

Simple grav tech will likely be the key to interstellar travel. If solid Dyson Spheres are to pop up, I'd say very late game, maybe only a couple milennia before Ascension.

Pretty much that is the point. To keep a dyson habitat (solid sphere where you have a planet surface on the inside facing the star) together you'd perhaps need the energy of another dysonsphere...
This feels like a "yo man" moment....

Djohaal wrote:

Tenebrarum wrote:

Djohaal wrote:

Solid dyson spheres could be unlocked as part of some advanced tech when you already have gravitational manipulation and such to keep the structure intact. I'd use the main star at the core as a source of warmith and energy through massive solar panels that orbited it on the inside causing day-night cycles. I'd be a inside out planet actually....

Simple grav tech will likely be the key to interstellar travel. If solid Dyson Spheres are to pop up, I'd say very late game, maybe only a couple milennia before Ascension.

Pretty much that is the point. To keep a dyson habitat (solid sphere where you have a planet surface on the inside facing the star) together you'd perhaps need the energy of another dysonsphere...
This feels like a "yo man" moment....

Actually, dyson spheres would be like soap bubbles- the gravity of their own parts would create surface tension. However, like soap bubbles, if they get too big, they stop being spheres and begin to stretch more and more according to the gravitational pull of othe objects.

Ok, so I guess we should start with a list of megastructures, from small to big.

Planet-based megastructures:

Arcologies
Space elevators
Sea-sized dams (atlantropa for instance)
Skyhook spacestations
Lofstrom loops
Globus Cassus

Space-based megastructures:

Asteroid habitats.
Orbital habitats 1 2 3[url][/url]
Inhabited dyson shells
Unhabited (energy extrtacting) dyson shells
Dyson nets
Ringworlds

More ideas?

The various other dyson structures like the dyson ring, swarm and the bubble.

Would a large planet sized space craft also be classed as a mega structure?

caekdaemon wrote:

The various other dyson structures like the dyson ring, swarm and the bubble.

Would a large planet sized space craft also be classed as a mega structure?

Yes.

i just got an idea that is similar to an orbital elevator, it is an orbit catapult!

You basically have a cable as long as an orbital elevator, but it is not attached to anything. it simply lays limp on the ground (for now).

You attach rockets all along the cable at intervals pointing in the same direction. as in if they all turned on, the cable would fly in one direction without bending much. that's not what we're going to do though,

attach the ship/ w/e to the end of the cable

keeping the cable bent about 90 degrees throughout itself (think inverse kinematics)

activate all rockets at once so it begins to rotate as a whole

reverse the rockets at the bottom and slowly work its way up the cable until it whips forward

at the exact moment it cracks forward, release the ship/ w/e

watch it fly faster than an angry mule with bits of glass up his back end

toxiciron wrote:

orbit catapult!

Would a mass driver actually be a better piece of technology for this things name? After all, it flings you into orbit.

toxiciron wrote:

i just got an idea that is similar to an orbital elevator, it is an orbit catapult!

You basically have a cable as long as an orbital elevator, but it is not attached to anything. it simply lays limp on the ground (for now).

You attach rockets all along the cable at intervals pointing in the same direction. as in if they all turned on, the cable would fly in one direction without bending much. that's not what we're going to do though,

attach the ship/ w/e to the end of the cable

keeping the cable bent about 90 degrees throughout itself (think inverse kinematics)

activate all rockets at once so it begins to rotate as a whole

reverse the rockets at the bottom and slowly work its way up the cable until it whips forward

at the exact moment it cracks forward, release the ship/ w/e

watch it fly faster than an angry mule with bits of glass up his back end

That sounds extremely overly complex.

~sciocont wrote:

toxiciron wrote:

i just got an idea that is similar to an orbital elevator, it is an orbit catapult!

You basically have a cable as long as an orbital elevator, but it is not attached to anything. it simply lays limp on the ground (for now).

You attach rockets all along the cable at intervals pointing in the same direction. as in if they all turned on, the cable would fly in one direction without bending much. that's not what we're going to do though,

attach the ship/ w/e to the end of the cable

keeping the cable bent about 90 degrees throughout itself (think inverse kinematics)

activate all rockets at once so it begins to rotate as a whole

reverse the rockets at the bottom and slowly work its way up the cable until it whips forward

at the exact moment it cracks forward, release the ship/ w/e

watch it fly faster than an angry mule with bits of glass up his back end

That sounds extremely overly complex.

I'm not sure it would save that much fuel, either, with all those rockets... And cable. I'm not sure how well this would work in-game, either...

Not to be Simon Cowell, but it's a no from me. Alright, maybe using his catchphrase makes me him then.

That last sentence can be interpreted in several ways. They are all wrong.

I think a mass driver or a space elevator would both class as mega structures.

The space elevator, simply due to its shear size, and the mass driver for the complexities of its design, as well as the large size.