Re: Active vs Passive

Popeyesays@aol.com wrote:
> 
> In a message dated 4/13/00 2:32:48 PM Central Daylight Time,
baqrt@mta.ca
> writes:
> 
> <<  Yes, that would work (somewhat), although how are you going to be
sure
>  which side is safe to radiate on? If you're wrong, you've just become
>  VERY visible. Also, doing this requires extra power (heat sinks are
NOT
>  super-efficient), which therefore means you have to radiate more
heat,
>  which means....
> 
>     I'm just not sure it would be worth the effort.
>   >>
> 
> The point is do you radiate any heat at all into space - space hasno
air to
> heat byradiation. At best to a sensor youwould be a pinprick - a hot
one
> determined only if you can read the surface temprature of the hull -
the
> waste heat would be read perhaps in em emiissions but would be a lot
less
> noticeable than neutrino or particle emission, sensor or communicator
> emission - running under EMCON you would just be a lump of metallic
> composition indistinguishable from a planetoid - until you add thrust
and
> start to maneuver THEN you stand out like a sore thumb from delta-vee
> analysis and perhaps a drive plume.

	I'm going to respectfully disagree with a lot of this. Neutrinos
are
INCREDIBLY hard to detect. We can only detect a few, and that's with a
STAR providing the output. Detecting neutrinos from a REACTOR would be
almost impossible. As to temperature difference, current sensors can
detect a difference of a few Kelvins from ambient (given what ambient
is, that means that, with current technology, we could detect a
ship-sized object out at least as far as Jupiter if it were any hotter
than about -200 centigrade). As for indistinguishable from a planetoid,
again, ignoring the 200-or-so-degree difference, yes. I'm not all that
sure that that difference can be ignored.

-Brian Quirt