this post was submitted on 26 Mar 2024
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While railguns are known for rapidly accelerating projectiles to hypersonic speeds over the short length of a gun barrel, there's no limit on how slowly they can accelerate something or how long the "rail" part of the railgun can be. Accelerating "slowly" over a long distance is totally possible!
Sure, but it’s gonna require one hell of a long rail…
Make it a circular rail with an off-ramp; like a particle accelerator. Still very ambitious.
They can call it the vomit comet.
That would put the g-forces back in play: the faster you go around the rail the stronger the centripetal force that keeps you going in a circle. If the rail is straight the force only depends on acceleration not speed.