oh man this is a heavy door okay so what if i told you that there
was a mode of transportation that not only promised to leave planes trains and
automobiles all in the dust but to do so
with extraordinary efficiency and that te connectivity brought us down to los
angeles to take a close look at a sponsored prototype built by a ragtag
team of reddit engineers
rangineers calling themselves our loop
from all over the world it weighs 400
kilograms contains hundreds of sensors
and it can freaking hover
so our loop started out in much the same way that any online
community does as a group of passionate people on reddit that saw that spacex
was hosting a hyperloop competition and figured that they could do it better
but unlike most online communities with
some help from spacex and sponsors like tecon activity who provided engineering
resources sensors wiring and manufacturing space they managed to
overcome the geographical and communication barriers that inevitably
arise when you've got a team of over a thousand people scattered across dozens
of countries and they actually did
something and considering that all of these folks
are volunteers one of which even quit his job and moved
to the u.s from india for a year
what they've done is nothing short of amazing so let's take a closer look at
the pod now if you're not already familiar with the hyperloop concept the
first thing you'll probably notice is that there's no obvious external
propulsion mechanism like a jet engine or a propeller
that's because hyperloop pods aren't expected to be able to propel themselves
see this big plate on the back of the pod it's called a pusher plate
now in the future pods could be launched down the tube at near hypersonic speeds
then boosted by linear induction motors essentially making the tube a big rail
gun or they could use an on-board system but for the purposes of the competition
that we're attending today this pusher plate is used to give the pod a colossal
kick in the ass with a stripped-down tesla and send it whipping down the
track but anyone who's ever tried to mimic their
dog sticking their head out of a car window can probably guess that uh the
fiberglass nose cone over there isn't going to solve the pods air resistance
challenges at over a thousand kilometers
per hour where air feels less like a
gentle breeze and more like the boston molasses tsunami of 1919
which is a real thing by the way look it up so the proposed solution for now is
to run these pods inside a closed tube
that's being held at a near vacuum now the clever among you have probably
also noticed that these wheels are totally unsuitable for speed of
sound travel that's because they are only for manual maneuvering of the pod
and emergencies these babies right here are what
actually keep the pods butt from getting as raw as mine did on a dried up water
slide that one time there are eight of
what the team affectionately refers to as hover engines
each of them is made up of three king strong magnets
it's a scientific term right there arranged in what's called a hall back
array to augment the strength of the magnetic field of the individual magnets
so when they start spinning over an electrically conductive surface they
actually create enough lift to keep this
400 kilogram pod levitating above the
track then there are also passive magnets on
the bottom for additional lift once the pod gets up to full speed and while
we're on the topic of magnets they power the brakes too the pod uses two 28-inch
hallback arrays that are configured such
that they create drag as they approach a
conductive surface without making contact so that means no biannual brake
pad replacements sorry nappa and this is really cool too
while any pod that would hope to be used
in a working hyperloop would need to levitate to achieve the required
efficiency our loop's design is unique in that its
active hover engines allow it to levitate over any conductive surface
not just inside of a specialized tube
and furthermore their gimbal mounting system lets them be used for thrust in
addition to just lift however this crazy levitation is super power
hungry so much so that the team had to
design and custom manufacture two of
these 2 000 amp lithium polymer battery packs
these things are so powerful that a wrench accidentally dropped inside would
essentially weld itself to the copper bus bars then they crammed both of them
into the pod for redundancy which is where te connectivity comes in through
the transmission of power and data signals now let's talk cooling the heat
generated by the various mechanical and electrical systems in the pod many of
which you can actually see when we pop the hood is monitored by over 600
thermal sensors but monitoring is not enough you got to
get rid of it and because there will be virtually no air in the tube the
solution is not as simple as just slapping a radiator to the front of the
pod our loops answer this liquid carbon dioxide cooling
system so at the end of each of these little brass fittings is a super small
hole only 13 and a half thousandths of an inch that when activated dispenses
four grams of liquid co2 per second
when that goes from the high pressure holding tank to the low pressure near
vacuum environment the liquid co2 vaporizes removing heaps of heat in the
process how much exactly well let's just say
that if you opened it up over a glowing hot toaster you'd be left with a block
of dry ice to say that there are still a lot of
engineering manufacturing security cost
and logistical problems for hyperloop believers to solve
would be an understatement but the work being done here and the
reason for sponsors like te connectivity to get involved
is not necessarily about building a working hyperloop and pod
tomorrow it's about developing technologies that
may end up being deployed in completely different ways that we haven't even
imagined yet and if we succeed in building a system
that lets commuters travel from san francisco to la in as little as 35
minutes with no strip search from your friendly local tsa officer
well then that's just icing so thanks for watching guys if you
disliked this video you can hit that button but if you liked it hit the like
button get subscribed maybe consider checking out te.com
our loop where you can watch a five-part webisode documentary about the r-loop
team and learn about their awesome virtual collaboration model