Re: [FT] The Sa'Vasku

I did some quick  crude radiation heat transfer calculations and found a
1 mm
sphere would freeze in about 10 sec, 1cm sphere in 100 sec., 10 cm
sphere
in 1000 sec and so on.	This ignores the heat loss due to vaporization
of water.  At standard conditions the heat of vaporization is about 7
times
that of freezing and it is conceivable that some of the water could 
vaporize which would draw off enough heat to freeze the rest of the
water.
One should also note that the author Brian mentioned (David Brin) is
a physics professor.

> 
> Brian spake thusly upon matters weighty: 
> 
> Is this possible? I'm not sure it would work. I think that falls into 
> a popular fallacy about space: That space is cold (ducks and prepares 
> for salvo fire from the physics guys out there). 
> 
> I was under the impression space was not cold, rather it had a lack 
> of temperature - because as I understood it temperature is a property 
> of matter relating to how excited or how expanded the particles were 
> and what phase they were in or some such. As a result, space being 
> largely empty, doesn't really have much of a temperature. 
> 
> And you can't effectively lose heat in space (by ejecting water) 
> because (I could be wrong) the water has no nearby particle which it 
> can transfer its energy (heat) to, therefore it is unlikely to 
> freeze. I believe you require a transfer of energy between molecules 
> or some such to change temperature. 
> 
> This is illustrated by one of the main space shuttle problems: 
> Overheating. The humans and equipment inside radiates heat. It 
> doesn't (because it can't) radiate into space. So things get warm. 
> The only way to radiate heat is to do something like heat a gas and 
> then vent that gas (particles with energy attached) into space, thus 
> venting the energy. Normally, because you can't radiate the energy, 
> it just stays with you. Or so I understood. 
> 
> Now perhaps I'm totally FUBAR. (Wouldn't be the first time). 
> 
> > How about "Mister" for your organic sandcaster? Instead of spraying
sand,
> > it sprays water/some other liquid - which in space instantly freezes
into
> > ice crystals anyway, giving roughly the same effect. fits the
organic-ship
> > feel as well.
> > 
> > (One of David Brin's books had a scene where a (non-bio) ship dumped
a
> > massive load of water to screen it's escape - and to lose the
> > wieght)(Can't remember the name...not 'Uplift War', not "sundiver',
one of
> > the other uplift series books...with dolphins in it...mental
blank...)
> > 
> > Brian (burger00@camosun.bc.ca)
> > - http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Nebula/9774/games.html
-DS2/SG2/games-
> > 
> > 
> > 
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