so why doesnt it work?

:idea:
Ok, I've got it! A hybrid river raft! It can work!

 

These radiation direct to electricity isotope reactor have been around for decades. The fuel is in pellet form which does not allow it to go supercritical but still generate enough radioactive particle to then develop electricity. Think of them as nuclear batteries. They can be built relatively cheaply and will last year without moving parts. Except some nut can get one and dump it in a city water supply canal and kill millions with it.

Technology was used in pacemakers in the 60's that how old it is. Back then they could develop 5 watts in a garbage can size unit. With something called Beta isotopes they produce that in something the size of regular car battery.

The new thing is micro batteries the including controller in a chip. Many chips in a board could be future.

 

Planet solar turanor

This is a picture of planet solar's prop. It looks a lot like the fan we use on the terrace on hot summer days.
As you can see, most of the prop is shielded by the hull, which seems very ineffective to me. Yet the crew member who writes the blog reports speeds of 25+ knots.
Some more data: the power plant can generate approx. 100 kW in bright sunlight, the ship's weight is 90 tons, so with the sun at it's zenith there is a fraction more than 1 kW per ton....

Is this all bogus or have we all been doing things the wrong way for at least a century?

 

Must be one of those surface piercing supercavitating miracles..
I think

 

What I see is just another way of making a surface prop. A very neat one, however.

 

Wonder if a surface piercing paddlewheel would work too :idea:

 

Those may be props made by Contur http://www.compositecarbonfiberprop.com/technology.htm
Bring more money.

 

CDK, I concur, it is strange. Might have just cut out a wet well in the hull and protruded the bottom 35% of the prop for heavens sake.

-Tom

 

What am I missing? It just looks like a super-cavitating prop. There are spray sheilds or something there that look like afterthought but it doesn't look out-of-the-ordinary to me other than that. I blew up the picture as best as I cud and it appears to be CP.

 

Sure looks like a Contur prop Mark.
But do you think two of these, powered with a less than 50 kW electric motor can propel a 90 ton catamaran at 25 knots?

 

Here you see them working (attachments)

The props are Carbon CPP´s, low revving. The act as rudders also!

 

its a Voith Vector Propeller, produced by the Voith Turbo Group like the Contur

 

I had to laugh ..the captain broke a tooth ....and is flying to Switzerland for a repair .....dont they have dentists in Spain ....more money than sense ....

 

Couldn't find the dentist story, but rereading the blog I found something interesting.

This was the original text (September 28):

18.00 hrs and the wind today was stronger than we expected; our speed has been between 25 and 30 knots and the oceans have been quite rough.

And this is the text now:

18.00 hrs. and with 25 up to 30 knots, the wind today was stronger than we expected, and the oceans have been quite rough.

What other subtle changes in their texts may we expect? Maybe we'll learn later that they have a big generator in case the sun abandons them.

 

dentist bit is under "read more" if you want to ...ha ha ...me toof akes with laughter