Are they using some interesting propulsion system or just old fashioned rockets? Space tug was supposed to be part of STS in the 1970s but it got cancelled iirc. Leaving just the now defunct space shuttle.

[–] artifex@lemmy.zip 5 points 2 days ago (5 children)

Nah nothing fun, just tanks of propellant.

[–] Bravo@eviltoast.org 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

"We had been operating relatively conservatively, in how many people we were allowing ourselves to hire and capital expenditures," Romo said. "This will allow us to release a little bit of that conservatism and lean into some stuff like electric propulsion and potentially other vehicles that are going to allow us to grow long-term."

(Emphasis mine)

He said this but then never really elaborated. This was the only part of the article I wanted to read more about. It sounded like he was talking about something akin to the EmDrive, but my understanding was that the EmDrive had been debunked as a measurement calibration error, so I'm curious WTF he's talking about.

[–] Bimfred@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Ion and plasma drives. They're electric and work very well. All the thrust of a hefty fart, but high specific impulse allows them to burn for a long time, so they're great for maneuvering in the vacuum.

[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

And far more efficient than chemical propulsion.

[–] Bimfred@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

But exactly because of that, they don't have yeet. Long periods of low thrust are great for long duration missions, like satellites, stations and interplanetary probes, awful for a TLI burn.

[–] i_love_FFT@jlai.lu 3 points 1 day ago

Also, is a bit more complicated to use in kerbal, because the manoeuvring node expects strong instantaneous impulse.

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