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Pyramid Skyscraper To Orbit?

What about rainwater collection and filtering too? a building of that size could collect a ton of rainwater each day or so all the way up feeding it all through a filter and into the tanks.
Rain doesn't form at an altitude of more than half a dozen miles or so, so your building would receive rain only near the base.
 
FWIW - I don't think Tachy really intends for things to leave the top of this pyramid to be "in orbit" but he just used "orbit" as a term for "in space" or "outside the atmosphere."
 
Well, if the very tip were at geosync altitude, then you could theoetically give something a tiny shove off the top and it would just float there.
 
Why make it soild? Why not a Tinker-Toy frame like the Tokyo proposal?

And why even make it go ALL the way up?

Just make it go really high - and use it as a */foundation/base* for a nanotube-cable space elevator?

(^Something like this might even be more practical on, say, the Moon....)
 
No no no no no, you all misunderstand. The corner of the Pyramid would be like a maglev rail track that propels the craft or satellite at high velocity 75 miles up, once it reaches 75 miles up on board rocket boosters will kick in to finish the trip.
 
That's not what you said. It's difficult for us to act as consultants / sounding boards / victims of a cruel joke if:

A. You have no concept of basic principles of how things work, or choose to ignore those principles which you may understand.

B. You can't clearly define what it is you're trying to accomplish.

C. If you keep on doing so ad nauseum.

D. You keep adding stuff "Oh, it's mag-lev!" after you've been told why things you outline won't work.

Please. Do us all a favor. Further your education in the real world, not by using a bbs forum. You'll be the richer for it, because you'll stop getting yes/no answers, and you yourself will be able fo figure out *WHY*.

Cheers,

AG
 
I said a corner of the pyramid would be used to help get satellites into orbit, clearly this would require something like a maglev system. I didn't exactly mean a backwards water slide.

Oh yeh and calm down. This is meant to be a fun discussion.
 
Clearly...a "maglev". Naturally.

So, not only are you going to built a pyramid that will consume pretty much the planet's entire supply of everything, but you're going to stick a maglev on a corner of it that has the ability to accelerate objects to orbital velocity and then continue to accelerate another 75 miles to get into orbit.
 
Clearly...a "maglev". Naturally.

So, not only are you going to built a pyramid that will consume pretty much the planet's entire supply of everything, but you're going to stick a maglev on a corner of it that has the ability to accelerate objects to orbital velocity and then continue to accelerate another 75 miles to get into orbit.

When the boosters kick in it will add extra speed on top of the speed acquired from the maglev track so it will gain more speed for once it's left the top of the pyramid.

None of this really matters, like I said earlier in the thread the getting satellites into space idea was something I threw in at the end. I'm more interested in the base size of a pyramid that large and how we can get around other problems. The space part is not as relevant.
 
I am calm. I'm also trying arm you with knowledge so you will either know or be able to determine the answers to the questions you pose here.

Go. Learn. Libraries rock. You'll even find out what sound (and ultrasonic sound) is made of and why it won't withstand plasma.
 
I think a large conical building would be a good idea, I actually had thought of such an idea before. The idea I had conceived was basically like a hershey's kiss in shape with a large base but increasing progressively in taper all the way up to the top.

The idea I called for was about 21,120 feet (4 miles high). The idea was for it to be big, a naturally sturdy structure, made as sturdy as possible using innovative construction techniques, and high strength metals, composites, and such with enormous structural redundancy. The idea was that this thing would be as close as you could get to a man-made mountain and would damn near require a nuke to take it out (In the aftermath of 9/11 you want a big building to be pretty goddamn sturdy -- multiple fully loaded A-380 hits at full speed).

Since there was a risk of power loss the building would be equipped with large batteries, and solar panels that could generate electricity off the grid for the building, multiple electrical systems for redundancy, and it would have multiple water tanks with pumps and heating/cooling systems located within the building.

Pressurization systems for the air would also be required above about 10,000 feet and probably be used down to around 8,000 feet (which is about on par with a commercial airliner -- most people can take that) and would need to be self-sufficient. To allow for the ability to get up and down quickly, the idea called for elevators that could use maglev technology and go both vertically and laterally.

There were also other provisions for stairs in areas as well as a series of slides that would allow a person to get down in a reasonably quick amount of time yet avoid excessive speed build-up.

The idea was that this building would house government and corporate offices, apartments of varying quality, a few pools and gyms, a mall, and a fancy series of gardens. Subways would connect to it's subterranean levels. It would be a city inside a city (though it's not a captive environment, people are free to go whenever they want)

Since this idea was kind of a bit of mental-masturbation as well as a bit of a gag-idea, the bit also jokingly called for phased-array radars, radar and IR guided missile batteries and CIWS mounted in the building to shoot down airplanes in the event that they got too close. Even ejection capsules which a few people could get in, it would shoot out of the building up and out at an angle and with drogue and main-chutes (for areas high up in case of a 9/11 like situations, people could literally bail out. At the very least a bunch of parachutes were to be available.

No there was no mental orgasm following this mental masturbation, but it was still pretty interesting and a bit funny.


CuttingEdge100
 
We're all neglecting the most important question: What will the pyramid be called?

I vote for "Babel".
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimizu_Mega-City_Pyramid

This basic idea has been floating around for a while, it is not new by any stretch of the imagination. Even a building like this one just a mile or two tall would be the largest and most complicated engineering project mankind has ever undertaken and would require advanced construction materials like carbon nanotubes we don't even have the capability to mass produce yet.

Of course Tacky wants to build one 100,000 meters tall that we could launch space ships into orbit with.
 
In all seriousness, an electromagnetic "railgun-style" orbital slingshot isn't a new idea. One shows up (on the moon) in Clarke's Time Odyssey trilogy.
 
A potential problem is isostacy -- such a huge weight would tend to cause the underlying crust to sink into the mantle, and potentially lead to earthquakes and volcanic activity. You might build it 100km high only for it to end up 50km high in the middle of a huge active volcanic caldera.
 
Psstch, I say we just fix Lunar into a geosynchronous orbit with Terra, and make a giant cable from one to the other, and build stations, elevators and the whole whazoo on the joining cable. Let's be ambitous about this people ;) 'Aim for the moon, if you miss you'll still be among the stars' and all that jazz...though not literally with this hair-brained idea, you'll just have a cable leading to nowhere :p

Brilliant! All we need is a grappling hook with a really, really, really long rope attached!
 
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