why don't we make space ships that go faster?

Question

our modern space probes take about 9 months or so to get to mars from earth. that's long. I know it's far but why don't they use more propultion up there. there's no cops, no speed limit (except light speed), no friction. so as long as the gas peddle is pushed, the ship accelerates. why not give it some gas, slingshot around the moon like in armageddon, and do capt kirk a solid and hit warp 1.1 already. at the current rate, it takes too much of an astronaught's lifetime to make it worth going anywhere significant like the moons of jupiter, saturn, uranus, and neptune. these moons are not just dead rocks like our moon. they have volcanism, no not like Spock, but volcanoes, geisers, glaciers etc. but it takes a decade to get there. we need to move faster in space in order to do anything outside of our solar system. there are billions of other suns in our galaxy alone. some of them probably have big chunks orbiting them as well like our planets. we might find suitable planets

Answer 1

What you're seeing now from NASA is the most practical forms of propulsion, meaning the least costly and most efficient, and also the most tested. Fairly recently, there was a physicist working at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, CA that has developed an Ion propulsion drive that, amazingly, could power a spacecraft traveling from Earth to Mars within only 40 days. But there are already problems with this if you have any background in astronomy. You can travel as fast as you want, and we have the capability to travel much faster than we ever have using modified Saturn V rockets, but once you reach your destination, you have to slow down. Moving at 10 km/sec does nothing for you if you're going to overshoot your target. The other considerations made in the above comments also factor into why you haven't seen anything new.

Answer 2

You already answered your own question....

" I know it's far but why don't they use more propulsion"

Weight is the answer. It takes 10 lbs of fuel to lift 1 pound. Remember we don't have any gas stations up there.

If we could have a "gas station" in moon orbit, then it would be possible to get to places a bit faster. Although then we still have a bit of a problem because just our solar system is over 100 AU, from the sun to the edge of the solar system. Our nearest neighborhood star is about 4 light years away which at current technology will take a loooong while to get there.

Faster than light (FTL) speeds are still only a dream.

Answer 3

Its not the question of "Why", its a question of "How". We need a totally different propulsion concept to go faster. Its not as simple as hitting the accelarator in the car to go faster. Think of an analogy of a cycle. There is theoritically no limit to how fast you can go in a Bicycle. Faster you peddle, faster you go. But there sure is limit to our energy and stamina because you can't peddle the bicycle faster than you can or continue to do it for month non-stop. Technology is in the same phase too.
As far now, we use rockets to escape the atmosphere and solar energy in the orbit. But we were to go into deep space, we cant rely on our sun light or any star light..do we? So we need Renewable energy. Like the concepts we have in star trek and so on. We dont have that technology yet but are in the process of research. Once we have that technology, I am sure things will be different and space probes will have a whole new realm to go after.

Answer 4

Lets think about this in a different way. Number one astronauts who travel in space understand that a human can only exhibit a certain amt of pressure on his or her body. Supposedly, if scientist were to develop a method of making a more efficient way to fuel, and increase the speed NASA rockets. Astronauts would experience more gravitational pressure that could theoretically crush someone. This could be a potential answer of why rockets are not created to be faster

Answer 5

Our ships construction is feuled only by politics who's eyes open every now and again. As long as oil is lining their campaign's pockets, the war will continue. Our planet is far too dependant on fossil feuls for us to even consider these possibilties for another 50 years. Just think about this, humans have invented a few things, better ways to heat water, faster ways to transport stuff to heat water and better ways to kill the next guy who has more water heater feul than we do!

Answer 6

weight/propulsion problem. That much fuel would weigh so much and need so much space, that it would not be economical to construct. It could cost 10 times as much. Good luck convincing your boss of that.

And why does a person need to go? Just b/c it's cool? No dice. Probes can do jsut fine.

Answer 7

We choose not to give it some more gas for a couple reasons. The first is that extra gas is very expensive to move. Not only do you have to have the gas (more gas), but you have to carry that gas up into space (more gas). Second, when you get there you have to slow down again with retro rockets (more gas). Also, you have to get that extra gas into space (more gas) and accelerate that extra mas of gas (more gas). Turns out to be a lot of gas.

Answer 8

Because we don't have the technology.