Could ships traveling to the poles use lasers to cut through the ice?

http://phys.org/news/2012-04-inventor-preps-robot-ice-europa.html

We may know soon

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could ships traveling to the poles use lasers to cut through the ice?

To the North Pole, yes, but it would be extremely energy hungry. To the South Pole, no.

Stealth said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could ships traveling to the poles use lasers to cut through the ice?

To the North Pole, yes, but it would be extremely energy hungry. To the South Pole, no.

The American icebreaker can break ice over 6 metres in thickness, but it is a large ship. However if you could use lasers on smaller ships, you still need to push the ice away. The alternative to cut a channel where all the ice is melted sounds rather fanciful to me.

I am reading of Hillary’s 1958 expedition to the South Pole ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_Trans-Antarctic_Expedition ) where the author (a participant of the expedition) describes the trials of working their way though the sea ice.

They essentially drive the boat up onto the ice, where the weight of the boat cracks and pushes the ice under and to the side. Particularly heavy ice required the assistance of gelignite to separate it, and shipboard cranes to move it out of the way. (There is an anecdote where something went wrong with the process, resulting in the 6” wire rope of the crane fouling the propellor, resulting in several hours of “THUMPTHUMPTHUMP” on the ship’s hull before it finally dislodged itself)

If the wind came from the wrong direction, all the ice would end up closing up before they had a chance to get into the resulting gap fully. This went on for days.

In fact, in the Arctic has claimed many wooden ships, where they would become icebound and the pressure of the ice would force them out of the water and onto their sides on the ice. The wind would change, the ice would open up again, and the boat would end up back in the water, but not always the right way up.

All of these early explorers were completely and utterly mad.

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could ships traveling to the poles use lasers to cut through the ice?

Well they could. But perhaps the energy required to melt the ice is a lot more than that required to break the ice?

Soso said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could ships traveling to the poles use lasers to cut through the ice?

Well they could. But perhaps the energy required to melt the ice is a lot more than that required to break the ice?

How does one use a laser to get a ship to the South Pole?

Stealth said:

Soso said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could ships traveling to the poles use lasers to cut through the ice?

Well they could. But perhaps the energy required to melt the ice is a lot more than that required to break the ice?

How does one use a laser to get a ship to the South Pole?

Build a canal by vaporising the rock and allow the water to flow in, allowing the ship to advance.

Soso said:

Build a canal by vaporising the rock and allow the water to flow in, allowing the ship to advance.

Far Canal.

use a hovercraft

Stealth said:

Soso said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could ships traveling to the poles use lasers to cut through the ice?

Well they could. But perhaps the energy required to melt the ice is a lot more than that required to break the ice?

How does one use a laser to get a ship to the South Pole?

Have you read that article that Thomo posted?

From: Thomo
ID: 466545
Subject: re: Ships stuck in ice
Inventor preps robot to cut through ice on Europa

We may know soon

Well I was thinking two lasers mounted on the sides of the ship near bow with another two underwater lasers again located near the bow

the 2 underwater lasers cut horizontally in 45 degree angle sweeps towards the center, the two lasers mounted each side of the ship near the bow cut vertically in downward 45 degree angle sweeps

the bow of the ship is designed to push up the cut up ice and out of the way

so just out of curiosity what capacity high powered laser would you need to cut ice?

Carmen_Sandiego said:

Soso said:

Build a canal by vaporising the rock and allow the water to flow in, allowing the ship to advance.

Far Canal.

Sure is a far canal.

CrazyNeutrino said:

Stealth said:

Soso said:

Well they could. But perhaps the energy required to melt the ice is a lot more than that required to break the ice?

How does one use a laser to get a ship to the South Pole?

Have you read that article that Thomo posted?

From: Thomo
ID: 466545
Subject: re: Ships stuck in ice
Inventor preps robot to cut through ice on Europa

We may know soon

Well I was thinking two lasers mounted on the sides of the ship near bow with another two underwater lasers again located near the bow

the 2 underwater lasers cut horizontally in 45 degree angle sweeps towards the center, the two lasers mounted each side of the ship near the bow cut vertically in downward 45 degree angle sweeps

the bow of the ship is designed to push up the cut up ice and out of the way

so just out of curiosity what capacity high powered laser would you need to cut ice?

Perhaps more than you might imagine. I have an 80watt laser that will cut through 10mm acrylic, very slowly (a few mm per second) Beyond that depth, the beam loses focus and it simply will not cut. I looked at upgrading to a much more powerful 5kW laser that would cut 25mm acrylic. It needed an 80amp 3 phase supply. Not feasible in my situation.. That laser would also cut 10mm steel, to give it some perspective.

In normal cutting applications, beam focus is absolutely critical. I think that the same would apply in the ice cutting situation. It might be possible to continuously vary the focus perhaps. But I think that it would need to be something much more powerful that your average high powered steel cutting laser to cut through thick ice sheets.

Anyway, the ice would refreeze as it was cut.

roughbarked said:

Anyway, the ice would refreeze as it was cut.

Yes

morrie said:

roughbarked said:

Anyway, the ice would refreeze as it was cut.

Yes

Ice breakers work by moving the ice faster than it can refreeze.

Lasers would be no good. Seconds after the laser has passed the ice would freeze again.

Consensus

tauto said:

Lasers would be no good. Seconds after the laser has passed the ice would freeze again.

correct.

>the Arctic has claimed many wooden ships, where they would become icebound and the pressure of the ice would force them out of the water and onto their sides on the ice. <

Wooden ships would be crushed rather than forced up out of the ice.

thermite

Some people have seriously considered using lasers to assist ice breakers. If only the paper had an abstract or was available on a rental site. $35 is a lot to ask for a paper that may conclude that the idea has no potential. Which would be a reasonable assumption, since the paper was written in 1973 and there don’t seem to be any icebreakers around equipped with lasers.

Ability of a CO2 Laser to Assist Ice Breakers

morrie said:

Some people have seriously considered using lasers to assist ice breakers. If only the paper had an abstract or was available on a rental site. $35 is a lot to ask for a paper that may conclude that the idea has no potential. Which would be a reasonable assumption, since the paper was written in 1973 and there don’t seem to be any icebreakers around equipped with lasers.

Ability of a CO2 Laser to Assist Ice Breakers

Ah wake up and smell the coffee, Big Icebreaking has been suppressing the laserboat for years.

I doubt that it’d be efficient to use lasers to melt the ice. But a CO₂ IR laser may be able to crack the ice by inducing thermal shock. I know that pulsed IR lasers can certainly shatter glass that way, so it’s not unreasonable to suspect that a sufficiently powerful IR laser could do the same to ice.

Here we go. High powered marine laser system for use on a nuclear ice breaker

They propose a 30kW laser. That’s a bloody big laser.

morrie said:

Here we go. High powered marine laser system for use on a nuclear ice breaker

They propose a 30kW laser. That’s a bloody big laser.

I suspect they might be better off using a high-pressure (~30,000 psi or more) water jet to cut through the ice. Reckon it’d be faster and easier to do.
That is if you had to do it that way.

Spiny Norman said:

morrie said:

Here we go. High powered marine laser system for use on a nuclear ice breaker

They propose a 30kW laser. That’s a bloody big laser.

I suspect they might be better off using a high-pressure (~30,000 psi or more) water jet to cut through the ice. Reckon it’d be faster and easier to do.
That is if you had to do it that way.

yep.. Ice breakers rely upon water to be moving to stop the ice refreezing.