The first guineapig will be inanimate. Indeed the first couple thousand will be. There are two classic ways you get a load-bearing cable across a large expanse (such as when building a suspension bridge). Both start with a very thin cable. The old way then uses the thin cable to pull a bigger cable, then a bigger one, so on and so forth. The way used for modern cabling (post Brooklyn Bridge and Golden Gate Bridge) is to build the thick cable in place. That's what these guys are doing, except with carbon composite ribbons instead of stainless steel strands.
By the time this thing can carry the weight of a human being plus a life support system, hundreds of trips will have been made up the cable just to build it.
Hundreds more will have been made to carry up scientific equipment (satellites, space craft). Hundreds more still will carry up the makings of -another- space elevator.
The first humans on this thing will probably be carried up in a spacecraft, and perhaps thousands of trips will have preceded their trip.
By the time someone builds/repurposes one of these things for civillian human use (and then runs hundreds of trips up that cable to carry a 'somewhere' for people to go once they get to the top), this will be very well-tested tech.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jason Marshall @ Dec 19th 2005 2:37AM
The first guineapig will be inanimate. Indeed the first couple thousand will be. There are two classic ways you get a load-bearing cable across a large expanse (such as when building a suspension bridge). Both start with a very thin cable. The old way then uses the thin cable to pull a bigger cable, then a bigger one, so on and so forth. The way used for modern cabling (post Brooklyn Bridge and Golden Gate Bridge) is to build the thick cable in place. That's what these guys are doing, except with carbon composite ribbons instead of stainless steel strands.
By the time this thing can carry the weight of a human being plus a life support system, hundreds of trips will have been made up the cable just to build it.
Hundreds more will have been made to carry up scientific equipment (satellites, space craft). Hundreds more still will carry up the makings of -another- space elevator.
The first humans on this thing will probably be carried up in a spacecraft, and perhaps thousands of trips will have preceded their trip.
By the time someone builds/repurposes one of these things for civillian human use (and then runs hundreds of trips up that cable to carry a 'somewhere' for people to go once they get to the top), this will be very well-tested tech.