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Forums > Social Discussion > a gravitational question
Login/Join to Participatewater based
5,125 posts
Location: melbourne, Australia
aight. I asked this to my science teacher, but he failed to answer it, so ive decided to post it here.
if you were in space, so there was no gravity, but also in a space shuttle, where there is oxygen, and you were to light a match, in which direction would the fire go?
cheers, pete
"you know there are no trophys for doing silly things in real life yeah pete?" said ant "you wont get a 'listened to ride of the valkyries all the way to vietnam' trophy"
*proud owner of the very cute fire_spinning_angel, birgit and neon shaolin*
10,530 posts
Location: They seek him here, they seek him there...
I read about this somewhere.....
the flame does something weird...
https://www.physlink.com/Education/AskExperts/ae673.cfm
The existance of flamethrowers says that someone, somewhere, at sometime said "I need to set that thing on fire, but it's too far away."
water based
5,125 posts
Location: melbourne, Australia
thankyou
"you know there are no trophys for doing silly things in real life yeah pete?" said ant "you wont get a 'listened to ride of the valkyries all the way to vietnam' trophy"
*proud owner of the very cute fire_spinning_angel, birgit and neon shaolin*
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom
links to some pictures if you want to have a look
cole. x
"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood
water based
5,125 posts
Location: melbourne, Australia
cheers
"you know there are no trophys for doing silly things in real life yeah pete?" said ant "you wont get a 'listened to ride of the valkyries all the way to vietnam' trophy"
*proud owner of the very cute fire_spinning_angel, birgit and neon shaolin*
Carpal \'Tunnel
3,899 posts
Location: Austin, Texas, USA
there is garvity in space by the way. it is just that when you are in orbit, you are in a continuous free-fall state - you just happen to also be going forward fast enought to never hit the ground! If you were stopped dead at the same height as the space shuttle but somehow had something supporting you, you'd feel almost as much gravity pulling you down as you would at the surface of the earth.
the above answers are fully endoresed by me though
note that there is little danger of an onboard fire destroying the space station because of this.
-v-
Wiederstand ist Zwecklos!
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom
Non-Https Image Link
the risk of fire is however the reason they have never bothered to actually carry out experiments with flames in space - all the tests seen above were carried out in microgravity (on board free-falling aeroplanes).
cole. x
"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood
Carpal \'Tunnel
3,899 posts
Location: Austin, Texas, USA
why isn't that guy suffocating?!?
-v-
Wiederstand ist Zwecklos!
big and good and broken
7,330 posts
Location: lunn dunn, yoo kay, United Kingdom
and why isn't he worried that the space shuttle is only about 200 feet away but is moving fast enough to instantly turn his face into hot jam should they ever meet...
he does have nice boxer shorts though...
cole. x
"i see you at 'dis cafe.
i come to 'dis cafe quite a lot myself.
they do porridge."
- tim westwood
HOP Mad Doctor
13,925 posts
Location: San Francisco, CA, USA
The answer is that the flame will point away from whatever air current predominates (and in practicality there is always air circulating in a spacecraft). In the absence of an air current, it forms a sphere, and then because there isn't gravity-driven air circulation pushing the cool air down around the warm flame, it snuffs out.
-Mike
Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella
A buckuht n a hooze! -Valura
643 posts
Location: Check behind you.
Is the ari currents bit only part of the explanation of how flames work under gravity?
Chucks nuns
Property of mynci and blu_valley, and proud of it.
member
186 posts
Location: San Francisco, USA
Written by: vanize
there is garvity in space by the way. it is just that when you are in orbit, you are in a continuous free-fall state - you just happen to also be going forward fast enought to never hit the ground! If you were stopped dead at the same height as the space shuttle but somehow had something supporting you, you'd feel almost as much gravity pulling you down as you would at the surface of the earth.
The space shuttle orbit may be low enough that if the shuttle wasn't falling, they'd feel a fair amount of gravity, but farther out there'd be basically nothing.
"Ours is not to question The Head; it is enough to revel in the ubiquitous inanity of The Head, the unwanted proximity of The Head, the unrelenting HellPresence of The Head, indeed the very UNYIELDING IRRELEVANCE of The Head!" --Revelation X
Carpal \'Tunnel
3,899 posts
Location: Austin, Texas, USA
a LOT further out. And once you are that far out, you are feeling the gravity of something else.
And even if there was nothing else to exhert gravity - the gravitational attraction of the earth will extend out at least 4 or 5 billion light years or so (that being how long the earth has existed and how far its gravitons would have reached by now).
So that is MUCH further out than the space shuttle. If you stopped all realtive motion WRT the earth and you were 1 million miles away, you'd eventually find out that "basically nothing" really hurts when you slammed into the ground at hyper velocities.
there is gravity to be felt everywhere in large amounts. zero-G and free fall are not an absence of gravity, mearly the lack of anything to stand on or to impact on.
-v-
Wiederstand ist Zwecklos!
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