A way to imitate gravity in space

[JoeRoccoCassara]

I have an idea for a light weight, super flexible magnetic suit that molds to your body, and is magnetically attracted to the floor of the spaceship.

 

Is it possible to strengthen this magnetic attraction and allow the an astronaut wearing the suit to experience equal gravity to that on Earth, or greater, yet allow them to be as agile as if the weren't wearing it at all?

[freeztar]

I have an idea for a light weight, super flexible magnetic suit that molds to your body, and is magnetically attracted to the floor of the spaceship.

 

Why would the suit need to mold to your body if its sole purpose is to be attracted to the floor. Why not magnetic boots?

Is it possible to strengthen this magnetic attraction and allow the an astronaut wearing the suit to experience equal gravity to that on Earth, or greater, yet allow them to be as agile as if the weren't wearing it at all?

 

You could, in theory, use an electro-magnet placed in a boot that has some type of automatic variable resistance to allow for different strengths. If it is too strong, you can't move. If it is too weak, you float away.

 

How do you envision this working exactly?

[JoeRoccoCassara]

Why would the suit need to mold to your body if its sole purpose is to be attracted to the floor. Why not magnetic boots?

 

 

You could, in theory, use an electro-magnet placed in a boot that has some type of automatic variable resistance to allow for different strengths. If it is too strong, you can't move. If it is too weak, you float away.

 

How do you envision this working exactly?

 

I don't want boots because I want the gravity (Force) to be felt all over the body, so that everything we do takes effort. Training in this suit could allow us to easily navigate planets with higher gravity than ours, right?

 

The suit won't stop you from eating because you can take it off. Your can breathe through a hole in front of your mouth and nostrils.

 

This would require an advanced fabric, thats like a flexible magnetic plate, that can bend and curve like cloth.

[freeztar]

I don't want boots because I want the gravity (Force) to be felt all over the body, so that everything we do takes effort. Training in this suit could allow us to easily navigate planets with higher gravity than ours, right?

 

Ok, I had assumed that you meant to use the suit in low/zero gravity environments. In tis case, why not just use weighted suits for training?

 

This would require an advanced fabric, thats like a flexible magnetic plate, that can bend and curve like cloth.

 

Though a suit could be made of flexible magnetic sheets, it would be very weak, magnetically speaking. For instance, consider the difference in attraction between a person's head and feet while standing.

[JoeRoccoCassara]

Ok, I had assumed that you meant to use the suit in low/zero gravity environments. In tis case, why not just use weighted suits for training?

 

I do mean in space.

 

Though a suit could be made of flexible magnetic sheets, it would be very weak, magnetically speaking. For instance, consider the difference in attraction between a person's head and feet while standing.

 

With enough energy you can do anything.

[freeztar]

With enough energy you can do anything.

 

Except break the laws of physics.

[Janus]

I have an idea for a light weight, super flexible magnetic suit that molds to your body, and is magnetically attracted to the floor of the spaceship.

 

Is it possible to strengthen this magnetic attraction and allow the an astronaut wearing the suit to experience equal gravity to that on Earth, or greater, yet allow them to be as agile as if the weren't wearing it at all?

 

Won't work. There is no way to work it so that you would have equal attraction to the floor for all parts of the suit.

[Jay-qu]

Like Freeztar pointed out there would be trouble trying to make to field constant over your whole body.

 

The best way to imitate gravity is to incorperate a spinning cylinder into your ships design. To imitate higher gravity you can either have the room taper at one end, decreasing to radius of the cylinder. This would make you rotate faster and hence 'feel' more gravity.

[Boerseun]

Won't work. Even if you could get the magnetic attraction even for the entire suit, it won't "feel" like gravity.

 

Imagine, your entire body would be pulled down to the floor at what would feel like 1g to your skin, being the only part of your body physically connected to the suit. But your intestines would still be weightless. Your stomach and its contents would be in free fall, but your body would be at 1g. Also, your skeleton won't really experience it, so it won't do anything for bone density loss. I think this particular setup will make me extremely nauseous. I will paint the spacecraft with my stomach lining in no time flat.

 

I think normal weightlessness experienced by astronauts would be more comfortable, or simply rotate the entire space vehicle so that centrifugal forces would simulate 1g.

[JoeRoccoCassara]

Won't work. Even if you could get the magnetic attraction even for the entire suit, it won't "feel" like gravity.

 

Imagine, your entire body would be pulled down to the floor at what would feel like 1g to your skin, being the only part of your body physically connected to the suit. But your intestines would still be weightless. Your stomach and its contents would be in free fall, but your body would be at 1g. Also, your skeleton won't really experience it, so it won't do anything for bone density loss. I think this particular setup will make me extremely nauseous. I will paint the spacecraft with my stomach lining in no time flat.

 

I think normal weightlessness experienced by astronauts would be more comfortable, or simply rotate the entire space vehicle so that centrifugal forces would simulate 1g.

 

I see.

 

I already knew about the rotating centrifuge, it seems a little expensive though. I know about more expensive ways to imitate gravity, but none that are less expensive.

[prometheuspan]

a more realistic idea along the same lines would be to use a celled pressurization suit and have the suit

push down on you as a computer tells the suit what directions to push in. This wouldn't hold you down,

but at least it would approximate the sensation of gravity.

 

You could then use magnetic boots in combination, i think, to achieve the effect you seem to be looking

for.

 

All in all, I think i personally will opt for the million dollar rotational colony instead of the million dollar suit, but anyways...theres the workaround your probably looking for.

[GAHD]

Won't work. There is no way to work it so that you would have equal attraction to the floor for all parts of the suit.

well there *is* a way if you turn it into an engineering problem: you have the head of the suit contain more magnetic material as an exponential function in relation to the feet of the suit. This would when standing allow the powerful gradient of magnetic field to be more normalized and result in a relatively consistent pull within the right field.

 

Still it would only be a stop-gap measure in that if you ever face-planted you'd have difficulty standing back up.

Like Freeztar pointed out there would be trouble trying to make to field constant over your whole body.

 

The best way to imitate gravity is to incorporate a spinning cylinder into your ships design. To imitate higher gravity you can either have the room taper at one end, decreasing to radius of the cylinder. This would make you rotate faster and hence 'feel' more gravity.

 

Coriolis force. Precession. Nutation. The banes of spinning spaceship/colony pseudo-gravity. I guess you'd adapt to to it, if the wheel was big enough.

[erKa]

well there *is* a way if you turn it into an engineering problem: you have the head of the suit contain more magnetic material as an exponential function in relation to the feet of the suit. This would when standing allow the powerful gradient of magnetic field to be more normalized and result in a relatively consistent pull within the right field.

 

Still it would only be a stop-gap measure in that if you ever face-planted you'd have difficulty standing back up.

 

 

Coriolis force. Precession. Nutation. The banes of spinning spaceship/colony pseudo-gravity. I guess you'd adapt to to it, if the wheel was big enough.

Thre is no reason to build a wheel: you need only to tether your standard ship having mass M to an external mass m by a simple chain or wire having fixed length l. This mass could be greater or less than the mass of the manned vehicle anyway the coupling M+m could rotate around the center of mass on the wire far at fixed distance d = l* 1/ (m+M) The inventor of this funny tethered coupling was Ingegner "Bepi" Giuseppe Colombo and it was really tested in a Space Shuttle STS-46 TTS-1

[Tekime]

In addition to the problems already mentioned, I imagine even the most sophisticated suit couldn't overcome the problem of having HUGE magnetic fields present on a ship with heaps of sensitive electronics. A fun idea though. I've always been totally fascinated by magnetism... there are almost certainly secrets buried in there we have yet to unravel. :)

[Cyberia]

As pointed out, magnets and electronics don't always mix. Even humans and magnetic fields do not always mix, particularly on a long voyage (permanent magnets would be better than powered magnets which would cost energy, but you cannot turn them off).

 

I thought of perhaps a water filled chamber where each astronaut (separately) could spend maybe two hours a day. The ship's water supply could be used.

 

Or even a fairly tight elastic suit which would need a little exertion to move about and so help stop muscle wastage on long journeys.

 

Or even a little red wine, for medicinal purposes:

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2015989/Red-wine-good-astronauts-prevents-negative-effects-weightlessness.html

 

.

[Universal Student]

Since mass requires energy to accelerate, spacecraft are and will be built as light as possible. Therefore, very little steel or other ferromagnetic material will be used in construction. Most construction would be titanium, beryllium, magnesium or aluminum alloys. Therefore, magnetic suits or boots would be impractical.

 

A tethered counterbalance would be difficult to accelerate and decelerate. It would be a huge waste of energy for it to be a non-usable mass, and if usable, would be difficult and dangerous to access.

 

A centrifuge section would require bearings and seals, require energy to spin, and would require energy to prevent the rest of the spacecraft from rotating due to friction.

 

The most practical artificial gravity concept is spinning the entire spacecraft. Without significant particles in space to create drag, a spacecraft does not need to be long, narrow, or streamlined. A short, fat spacecraft could be spun to provide 1G on the outermost level, and varying degrees of artificial gravity on successive levels towards the center, with zero G at the center. The varying levels of gravity would actually be useful for a variety of purposes.