It's interesting that the biggest line item in the costing is not the tube, nor the capsules, nor the vacuum pumps, nor the solar panels, nor the land, but the concrete pylons that support the tube - about two-fifths of the total. The pylons are planned to be 30m apart, making for about 25000 of them.
The focus from people on bathrooms is puzzling to me. I've been on buses, without facilities, that go for hours without stopping. This is a 35 minute ride with restricted movement, if you greatly fear being able to hold it for that long, there are other, less efficient methods of transport to accommodate you.
If the U.S. doesn't take this on, I hope another country with a big appetite for enormous public transit projects takes this on. Japan, Korea, and China, I'm looking at you...
IMHO Musk (or anyone who follows up) should drop the "passenger" version and go with the "passenger plus vehicle" version only.
Because right now what people and the press are going to focus on is how small the cabins are, why there are no toilets, etc. On the other hand if you can imagine putting a car in there the claustrophobia argument disappears and you can think straight again...
Interesting quote:
The intent of this document has been to create a new open source form of
transportation that could revolutionize travel. The authors welcome feedback
and will incorporate it into future revisions of the Hyperloop project,
following other open source models such as Linux.Strange PDF title -- "Falcon 9v1.1 - Reentry Nozzle Study" -- is there some design reuse or just document reuse?
I worry that the necessary straightness of the tube will be difficult to achieve. The pads float 0.5 to 1.3 mm from the inside of the tube, so deviations from straightness on that scale will cause the pads to crash. Any contact at 760 mph would probably damage the pad, plugging the air holes.
He doesn't properly address thermal expansion of the entire system. A long straight steel tube from SF to LA will expand a total of 300 meters over a 40C temperature change. Where does it go?
Why is everyone so negative?
Musk just posted a innovative, open-source, thorough, alpha design study which addresses a real problem.
Personally I think it's great, and I hope it gets taken seriously by the right people.
It's interesting that the Shinkansen has raised sections built on pylons, especially the new bits they built in the last few years in the built-up areas in the north of Japan.
When I was a kid I had a similar idea, a low pressure elevated concrete tube transport system. In my idea cars would get rails underneath them and freely enter/exit the tube at some key points. The cars would get a compressor to help keep the not-so-large pressure differential at bay; all inspired by evacuated tube documentaries.
In other words, this has been proposed several times before. However, there are some key innovations here - namely the compressor/nozzle pair and the air suspension system - which may indeed change the game and make this viable.
This could be considered a "next generation train". Elon Musk as we know likes to consider things from "first principles". It looks like here, he has taken the first principles of high-speed "rail" travel on land, and come up with this.
I think our children might enjoy using it ;-)
Looks like a good idea, but the major glaring technical point that seems to be missing is the issue of horizontal stability within the tube.
When you get very low friction, high speed and no tracks, you're going to start having attitude problems without the right control surfaces available. Don't want to be spinning passengers around the roof of that tunnel!
Nice font. But looks good so far.
EDIT: There's a bit of minimally technical details, but this is neither highly polished (public-perception-focused) nor highly technical (engineer-focused). Is it a good balance or would one of the extremes have been better?
Cool concept, but a 500 mile bridge? Elevated transportation routes are expensive [1,2,3]. The utopian dreams tend to give way to an ugly reality [4,5].
The $1 billion budget for land and rights of way also seems wildly optimistic for razing a path through multiple heavily populated metropolitan areas with astronomical real estate prices. And let's not underestimate the tenacity and ingenuity of a determined opposition [6,7].
[1] The 3.2 mile, mostly elevated [1a] BART/OAK connector with dinky little cable cars will cost $361mm for the capital construction alone[1b].
[1a] http://bart.gov/docs/oac/OAC%20Project%20Alignment%20Map%20S...
[1b] (slide 36) http://bart.gov/docs/oac/Microsoft%20PowerPoint%20-%20OAC%20...
[2] http://www.nationalaffairs.com/doclib/20080528_197905505cost...
[3] http://www-pam.usc.edu/volume2/v2i1a3s2.html
[4] http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=DkZ...
[5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embarcadero_Freeway
[6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highway_revolts#California
[7] http://dc.streetsblog.org/2012/06/25/indianas-big-dig-raises... (this one is hilarious)
It's too bad the tubes and trains can't be made transparent. Imagine the view!
This is supposed to be for commuters? I worry not many would commute daily from LA to SF.
Also, travel time to the station has to be taken into account, even more so if we compare it to driving.
I wonder what they have in mind for how stations will offload/onload capsules onto the loop. That will be heck of an engineering problem to solve - ultra high safety, pressurized environment, fast turnaround times...
My initial thought was they would have switches on the track like a normal train and capsules would veer off. But I bet they would come to a stop on there own and then get lifted vertically off the train and into a decompression area where they'd cue up.
Claustrophobes will not be eager to travel in this fashion.
Cool stuff here, but I'd rather see them focus their efforts on moving cargo rather than people.
Find a way to remove the cargo (trucks) from the commuter transportation system (roads & highways) and you'll improve the lives of many more people.
Moving cargo is a lot easier than moving people because it doesn't complain or need to go to the bathroom. It also won't be missed by most people if it's destroyed.
Could someone buy land in the potential path of this hyperloop then block access or sell the rights or land to make a profit?
I was trying to figure out where I'd seen this before.
http://www.thecomicking.net/2012/06/25/the-core/
The (terrible) movie "The Core" has a vehicle -- the Virgil.
Anyone has the resources from this pdf and willing to commit to github? Lets start forking!
If this system will evolve, how switches will work between different routes? Will it be only from station to station?
Eeeh, that looks awfully cramped. Especially for anyone a little overweight.
So what happened to section 5? Is that redacted by the NSA?
How would you rescue when pod breaks down mid tube?
Isn't the pod going to be extremely loud?
Honestly, this paper should be made as a mandatory reading in schools. Honoring modern science and economics.
What's the ideal format for an open source whitepaper? Certainly not PDF. Straight up HTML on Github?
How does one maintain oxygen ratios?
So where is the 'loop'. Seems like this should be called 'hypertube'.
Location is a primary reason why Musk can claim Hyperloop will be cheaper than high speed rail. As the paper correctly points out, right-of-way acquisition is very expensive. Bypassing major population centers is an easy way out of using eminent domain or expensive tunneling to build the system. The HSR project is required by Proposition 1A to pass through several population centers in the state and have a couple dozen stops. Notably, Hyperloop proposes to bypass all of the SF peninsula, San Jose, and Central Valley cities like Fresno and Bakersfield. HSR was politically viable because these regions were included in the project. Furthermore, the route and station map appears to hint that Hyperloop's stations are positioned away from city centers. For example, the "San Francisco" station appears to be located in the East Bay and the "Los Angeles" station is closer to Burbank. This is quite significant from an urban planning perspective as it means that short haul transit or car trips have to be accommodated for a majority of those people who want to use the system. It also adds to the total travel time needed to get from door to door for a greater number of people than does HSR.
I'm not saying that Hyperloop is an inherently flawed project or that HSR is the perfect solution to the state's long-haul transportation needs. I just think that Musk is oversimplifying the situation.