[Spaceships] Query: Activating Mag-Sails

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by PTTG

I'd say it takes about an hour, maybe more if it's large or crude, less if it's small or advanced.

It's not a physical object -- it's a charged plasma field.

I'm afraid you've confused "plasma sails" with "mag sails". As Dalton points out the mag sail is a big loop of superconducting cable.

The solar wind bouncing off the superconducting magnetic field of that cable transfers momentum to the cable and whatever is attached to it. This is similar to what happens at the periphery of the plasma sail but the two things are different ways of skinning the same cat.