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by ForkMeOnTinder 905 days ago
fwiw electric cars date back to the late 1800s. There's no reason old ideas can't work well with new tech.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car#Early_development...

1 comments

If there's been innovation on the fundamental problem, sure. We haven't really improved vacuum pumps that much, nor can we really fix the whole "one high-caliber bullet could implode the entire tunnel" problem yet.
These aren't powered by explosives. The tech was not the problem.
I hear the "catastrophic implosion" argument a lot but it doesn't sound right to me. I never shot at a vacuum chamber but my guess is that it will just create a leak, which is bad, will probably stop traffic for a while before it is repaired and the vacuum reestablished, but nothing catastrophic.

A bomb would be a serious threat, the shockwave from both the explosion and rapid decompression, but I believe it can be mitagated. Bombs are bad for pretty much everything anyways.

The other problem is if the walls don't break but the pipe crumples. But this is more likely to have a self-sealing effect, and with enough overbuilding, it shouldn't cause a chain reaction.

I don't believe in hyperloop, but I think catastrophic implosions are rather low in the list of reasons why it won't happen. It doesn't even make it at the top of safety related reasons.

I am fine with the downvotes but if that because I am wrong, please tell me how.

I have yet to see a convincing simulation of how a would be hyperloop would behave of one were to poke a hole in it. And by convincing situations, I mean one with an appropriate model, that is a very long tube engineered to hold a vacuum.

An then you can downvote this post too, a good explanation is well worth a few karma points :)

We get the same about airplanes despite demonstration that it doesn't happen. Material science is far enough along to avoid anything with problems.

of course cost is something we can also make good estimates of.