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A reactionless drive is a hypothetical device producing motion without the exhaust of a propellant.A propellantless drive is not necessarily reactionless when it constitutes an open system interacting with external fields; but a reactionless drive is a particular case of a propellantless drive that is a closed system, presumably in contradiction with the law of conservation of momentum.
Field propulsion is the concept of spacecraft propulsion where no propellant is necessary but instead momentum of the spacecraft is changed by an interaction of the spacecraft with external force fields, such as gravitational and magnetic fields from stars and planets.
All designs for electromagnetic propulsion operate on the principle of reaction mass. A hypothetical drive which did not expel propellant in order to produce a reaction force, providing thrust while being a closed system with no external interaction, would be a reactionless drive, violating the conservation of momentum and Newton's third law. [17]
Magnetic sail animation. A magnetic sail is a proposed method of spacecraft propulsion where an onboard magnetic field source interacts with a plasma wind (e.g., the solar wind) to form an artificial magnetosphere (similar to Earth's magnetosphere) that acts as a sail, transferring force from the wind to the spacecraft requiring little to no propellant as detailed for each proposed magnetic ...
Atmosphere-breathing electric propulsion, or air-breathing electric propulsion, shortly ABEP, [1] is a propulsion technology for spacecraft, which could allow thrust generation in low orbits without the need of on-board propellant, by using residual gases in the atmosphere as propellant.
In this mixed state, ullage gases may be sucked into the engines, which is undesirable, as it displaces useful propellant, reduces efficiency, and may damage the engines. Small rocket engines, called "ullage motors", are sometimes used to settle the propellant before main engine ignition to allow the formation of a temporary free surface (with ...
''bobbin/spool'', and so named for its shape) [nb 1] [1] is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using any surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed. [2] Rocket engines work entirely from propellant carried within the vehicle; therefore a rocket can fly in the vacuum of ...
With the development of rocket propulsion in the first half of the twentieth century, space travel became a technical possibility. Early ideas of a single-stage reusable spaceplane proved unrealistic and although even the first practical rocket vehicles ( V-2 ) could reach the fringes of space, reusable technology was too heavy.