Re: Orbit B

[Kevin C Houston <hous0042@maroon.tc.umn.edu>]

> To Kevin,
> Great, now we only need a way to accelerate that asteroid you are talking about.
> Tim

Okay, I'm going to try to do some ascii art that i hope will make things 
clearer.  Itried once already, but then lost the connection, and the 
stupid university computer didn't save my file.   AAARRRGGGHHH!



anyway, here goes:
Sol is on the left, TC is on the right.  R is the retro-reflector, A is 
the Asimov

Stage one:  acceleration of Retro-rflector.   (these photons are ~)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~R

the mass of the retro reflector is about 2 E9 Kg (sound familer?)
the beam is 1 E18 watts the reflector gets to .75 C and coasts.

Stage two:

decellerating energy is sent (ahead of the asimov)(these photons are =)

one LY long                      tail end of accel energy
================>                         ~~~~R (.75C)

Stage three:
Asimov is accelerated to near light speed (these photons are ~)


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~A                  <================R ( approx C)

Stage four: Sol-based Accel beam cuts out at halfwaypoint.
Just as Retro reflected beam catches up to Asimov

Note, the decell beam (==) will be red-shifted, but that's okay, beacuse 
when Asimov plows into it, it will blue-shift it  :)


                          ~A  <======================                R

Stage five: Asimov uses the decell beam to slow down to Target star.


Kevin