The Death Star's OTHER Fatal Flaw

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Everyone knows that the Death Star had a critical weakness which allowed the Rebels to win, but was there ANOTHER one that would have finished it off well before that? Kyle stays on target on this week's Because Science!
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[@becausescience]

Thanks for watching! I'm so pleased with the animations in this one. I know this one may have felt a bit different, but I like taking chances. See you in Footnotes! -- KH

[@sky0kast0]

Because Science inertial dampers exist in the movie but idk ... I do believe that it would need to be as big as the ship or half the core in order to help at the very least just like our tower dampers that exist in our towers

[@vorpalspartan1463]

The empire never think anything through Like the very strong armour storm troopers where’s ^ ^

[@yodu45]

just put a giant mirror in front of it, lasers reflects on mirrors....

[@humansword4152]

Good video kile Hill you day best

[@michaelaengelbrecht5074]

The one and only YES PLEASE A THOUSAND TIMES YES

[@DrShaym]

There's also the fact that the Empire doesn't even need a Death Star at all. If you have the ability to accelerate something with mass to light speed (such as a spaceship), you automatically have the power to destroy a planet through sheer kinetic energy. Just strap a hyperdrive to a missile and there you go, you've got a planet-killer.

[@uni4rm]

Wow, it's like you went and saw The Last Jedi or something, or watched the video from this channel about it....

[@nicholasrose8173]

The reason stated for that ship destroying everything in its path is the fact it has extremely powerful prototype shield which force everything away from it instead of yhe ship just pancaking

[@DrShaym]

@@uni4rm Funny story, I thought about that long before I watched The Last Jedi, and always assumed the reason they never did it in Star Wars was that when a ship goes into hyperspace, it's actually entering an alternate dimension where it can't interact with anything in normal space, kind of like going through a worm hole. But then they did it in that movie and established that they can, in fact, accelerate to light speed in real space, and ended up breaking the lore by raising the question of why nobody ever did that before.

[@bluemilk66]

@@DrShaym Well, I believe that the MC85 or the Raddus, was close enough to Supremacy the point it is only accelerating and hasn't actually gotten into "hyperspace". We can actually see this in the films and shows that they speed up before entering hyperspace.

[@lgmmrm]

Except, in the legends lore there actually was a ship that (accidentally) rammed a planet. It didn't destroy the planet, or even continent-crack it, but instead it released toxic fumes and a lot of energy across the environment, making it uninhabitable.

[@GeorgeLukass]

Oops. Didn't think of that in 1977

[@jwhiteheadcc]

LOL

[@mackenzieclements7593]

G. Lucas lol

[@marcinkapinski9537]

To your defense, Star Wars is more a fantasy story than hard sci-fi space opera like 2001 Space Odyssey.

[@hindsight2022]

I did ...

[@ares_bluesteel]

What? You mean everything isn’t going to be 100% scientifically accurate in movies about laser sword wielding dudes fighting a galactic empire armed with giant lasers and robots?

[@worldstateproductions8787]

Star Destroyers regularly pull 2300gs of acceleration. They have magical devices that keep the people inside from feeling it.

[@worldstateproductions8787]

@@kevinkarlwurzelgaruti458 The New Essential Guide to Vehicles. The New Essential Guides aren't always reliable (the weapons ranges are all wrong for example, the RoTJ novelization and WEG RPGs are better for those), but those acceleration figures are generally consistent with the films. Like in the first film where the X-wings travel around a 200,000km wide gas giant in less than two minutes.

[@sirmount2636]

You are REALLY overthinking it

[@worldstateproductions8787]

@@sirmount2636 I'm a Star Wars fan.

[@BierBart12]

The magical repulsorlift

[@jbodden6977]

either that or hey have a slippery red wet coating over all the bulkheads...

[@heathermillsphantomlimb9314]

One aspect of the Death Star I found interesting in Return of the Jedi was that, considering its distance from Endor when it exploded, it would’ve crashed into the planet and basically destroyed it, raining fire and molten metal as it fell.

[@herpderp9108]

I think this was actually touched on in a comic a long time ago. Endor was basically destroyed.

[@andreabindolini7452]

From the infamous sequel trilogy we have canonical proof that the DSII actually crashed on another Endor moon

[@sirmount2636]

@@herpderp9108 It wasn’t destroyed, it was just one panel of Ewoks panicking.

[@spvillano]

Well, that wouldn't matter all that much, as the plasma shockwave would've stripped the atmosphere off of the moon first.

[@TheRealScooterGuy]

One of the New Jedi Order books touched on this. A character was complaining about propaganda the Empire had put out which accused the Rebellion of genocide (of the Ewoks). I don't recall now which character or which of those books it was.

[@danieltsmoke]

Who ever's job it was to CGI the symbol on his shirt for over a minute...bravo sir, bravo

[@yourregularintroverts5059]

Dan Smoke i was thinking the same thing

[@sidders_3275]

Dan Smoke probs had a tracking dot on the shirt, image just attached to it surely?

[@KingLouisII]

Seemed like a bigger hassle than getting a $10 insignia badge on Amazon. 🤔😂

[@EclecticFruit]

Interns.

[@jackvos8047]

@@sidders_3275 would be several tracking dots to get it track smoothly if that was the case

[@MrSirKirby]

I love those imperial guys standing right next to the laser firing and just covering their eyes. Guys, you are toast.

[@cyberpixel15]

And you thought holding a lightsaber was bad

[@arnoldfossman1701]

Anywhere on the Death-star would have a major radiation problem when the weapon was fired.

[@builderdude9488]

@@arnoldfossman1701 Darth vader would be fine because he has a literal hazmat suit at all times

[@arnoldfossman1701]

@@builderdude9488 That suit would be helpful depending on the level of the radiation dose and the duration. even a 10 foot thick wall of lead will not block all the radiation from getting through and how long you have to stand behind that wall also comes into play. If the source is powerful enough and lasts long enough enough would get through to kill you. This is why people wear those dose badges when working in areas that would be safe for people to pass through quickly.

[@davidtatro7457]

Yeah, right!? They literally are right there in a shaft sharing airspace with the beam and they just duck and cover their eyes. Too funny.

[@pisscvre69]

“Do not be so proud of this technological terror commander it’s flawed beyond reason or use”

[@reppich1]

like the stellar converter in "battle beyond the stars"

[@IamCoalfoot]

The thing is, the Death Star's Superlaser is based on the same Hyperlaser technologies they'd been using for many thousands of years. So they would already _know_ how to compensate for it, and just how much they _can_ compensate for.

[@World_Theory]

Blowing a planet to pieces, such that it won't reform, is overkill anyway. They should just use a lower setting to blow the planet's atmosphere away into space and scorch the surface. Although, honestly… That's wasteful overkill, too. A habitable planet is valuable, you know.

[@LordZontar]

Considering that this is a galactic civilisation with literally tens of thousands of habitable worlds comprising its main political unit, and obviously the engineering capability to build artificial habitats out to the size of a small moon, any one planet would be akin to a city in our world. However, yes the idea of a weapon that could literally blow a planet apart was decidedly over the top. Flash-boiling off the atmosphere would have been as effective, more plausible, and actually a bit more terrifying. Imagine if the Millenium Falcon had emerged out of hyperspace to find an Alderaan that had been turned into a still-glowing cinder. What a sight that would have made on the silver screen.

[@TheoryofKhaose]

Shock and awe tactics. In our own history there were invasions where they would salt the ground effectively ruining it for generations. Destroying a whole planet would be absolutely devastating to there moral and resolve.

[@LordZontar]

No, destroying Alderaan only inspired more systems to join the Rebellion. When people see that loyalty to the regime will give them no protection whatsoever, they figure they've got nothing to lose through revolt. And in our own history, Nazi brutality failed to quell resistance in any of the countries they occupied, especially Yugoslavia.

[@mandickthetittysmithy5117]

LordZontar like the Desolator super weapon from swtor.

[@Rez090]

1, 2, 3, 4; that's the combination to my luggage; remind me to change that; suck, suck, suck, suck, suck, suck

[@LillyTensei]

I can't wait till this guy sees the Final Order fleet in RoS and just starts laughing in the theatre.

[@gamertagboakan7417]

Those Lasers actually make more sense as they cut into a planet and ionise and basically 'detonate' the core. Again, it makes more sense. Not alot of sense

[@klausstock8020]

About 1,000 ships, each with a crew of 29,585. Guess they must have farms aboard to produce food for these people. Guess they could force a smaller planet simply to surrender, simply by threatening to empty their sewage tanks. Yep, 30M people...that's some serious shit. Literally.

[@liwojenkins]

@@klausstock8020 That wouldn't include fleet support either, those are all combat ships, there would be thousands of support ships, docking facilities and fabrication centers. Once you start understanding logistics, plot holes get pretty big sometimes.

[@Arexack999]

Oh yes the remotely guided megazord lazors

[@greenpeasuit]

I like the idea of Inertial Drives put forth in Asimov's "Empire and Earth". A spacecraft capable of generating an inertial field to move. Everything in the field accelerates uniformly.

[@magister.mortran]

That is obviously how the death star's engine works, since it has no visible engine exhaust. So compensating the impulse of its main laser wouldn't be much of a problem.

[@BadKruser]

Love the Wilhelm Scream at 7:07 ❤

[@JustinY.]

"It just works" ~ Designers

[@Vanishing_]

Justin Y. I Saw you on discord

[@aaaaaaaa6685]

Justin Y. I love you daddy no homo

[@ravoniesravenshir3926]

Ron Howard Didn't design it.

[@joaoburigo1447]

crimson death star

[@igorgrubor5867]

YOU'RE LITERALLY EVERYWHERE ITS ANNOYING

[@theCodyReeder]

I always figured that the death star beam was some kind of mater destabilizer (causing some matter to spontaneously decompose into energy) not a laser. But hey, its all fiction.

[@stevenpowell1991]

Antimatter would work nicely

[@marcinkapinski9537]

Nope. You'd need an absurd amount of antimatter to begin with (two cubes 10 km wide) and far more energy to create it than Sun size star can output. You're much better off scouring other planets for deuterium and tritium to make a powerful nuclear weapon that would do the job.

[@TheDude42069]

What if it was some kind of anti gravity beam that flipped the planets gravity so it expanded out

[@marcinkapinski9537]

Now you are talking about a device that could literally change laws of physics. Space magic. So you couldn't use known science to make people understand how it works because it can't.

[@benbraceletspurple9108]

Marcin Kąpiński I don't think you're accurate about that. Antimatter has enough energy to kill an earth sized planet adequately.

[@NathanOkun]

Two ways that when combined get around this problem: (1) You do not have a central dish --it would vaporize when fired. Instead you cover the entire surface of the DEATHSTAR with many, many small phased-array transmitters that can form concentric rings of energy sources about a selected central transmitter that is aligned to be directly between the center of the DEATHSTAR and the target (may require a small rotation of the battle-station to do this, depending on the configuration of transmitters used). You then charge up the entire side of the DEATHSTAR transmitter capacitors (each has its own) and, when firing, light off the outermost, widest ring on the side toward the enemy, rapidly dropping the power out for each ring until the central transmitter is finally reached. By setting the rings off timed properly, each ring of energy will cause constructive interference with the rings energy already fired until ALL of the energy is focused like a magnifying glass being used to burn a piece of paper using the Sun. The rate of stepping from the outermost ring (DEATHSTAR diameter) to the central aimed transmitter would be faster than light. Note that modern phased-array radars use this kind of system, but here with the power turned WAY, WAY up and, by being a sphere, you can switch targets rapidly (as fast as you can charge up[ the many transmitters) in any direction or even fire at many targets at once with reduced power on each (good enough, I would think). This is WAY better than the dish used in the current DEATHSTAR. (2) You assume that the DEATHSTAR weapon is the source of all of the power used to destroy the target planet. NO. Planets are FULL of material, hydrogen and uranium and so forth, that a moderate power signal could cause to fission or fuse when hit by the proper form of trigger energy (I assume that the laws of physics in the STAR WARS Universe can be made to create such energy types; what information says different?). Thus, like in an H-bomb, the beam need only punch deep into the target and it will blow itself up in a huge thermo-nuclear detonation using a powerful, to be sure, but much more limited source of trigger energy. This deletes your entire problem, does it not?

[@autolykos9822]

The phased array is pretty much the only sensible way to build a laser of that size. We can just chalk those three tiny beams up to artistic license. And while we're at it, we don't have to explode the whole planet to make it utterly uninhabitable. Just melting a sizeable hole through the crust would probably do the job just fine. (Using the whole planet as fuel for the galaxy's biggest inertial confinement fusion reactor doesn't make sense, though. Earth-like planets are mostly iron, which is already the nucleus with the lowest possible energy. Neither fission nor fusion would free any energy, except for a tiny shell on the surface, where all the interesting stuff is.)

[@tomkelly00]

Also, space magic

[@benjaminbrown3939]

Antimatter for the win

[@peterbonucci9661]

I figured the rays from the Deathstar was artistic licence. Whatever energy was transmitted would be invisible. I think they generated antimatter and sent it via hyperdrive to the center of the planet. Hyperspace breaks the equation Kyle used, so momentum isn't a problem. It also means we can't assume momentum is transferred to the planet. Antimatter works because we only have to send half of the energy needed to destroy the planet. We don't know what happens when something materializes inside a planet, so we may be able to reduce the amount of antimatter.

[@cosmicspooky]

the outer hall was made of Quadanium steel, the inside was probably durasteel and, duraplast, with several large artificial atmosphere and gravity units, i don't remember what they said about the thrust, but i kinda remember something about the laser being used in tandem with the sub-light engines to stay stationary.

[@SciFiChatterMike]

But, Kyle you are forgetting the "magical" inertia damping technology that their universe employs to cancel out the waveform both the force of and forward or reverse the movement. And i am sure the station is also utilizing some type of stabilizing thrustes.

[@nathanjohnson6543]

Thank you! Now I don't have to write this. And he's using theoretical science to explain this.

[@nobleradical2158]

Also false gravity, they have some magic stuff to counteract things like this

[@banzeyegaming2234]

That’s actually how they move!

[@scottguffie7759]

I was going to comment on the Inertial Dampening technology that Star Wars has but I was also going to say that since we don't see any visible engines on the Death Star it must use some form of Non-Reactionary or Inertialess drive which would also presumably allow it to cancel out the recoil of the Superlaser being fired.

[@snatchertheunfriendlyghost558]

It’s been established in books the Death Star is both a station and ship not to mention gravity well projectors exist in this universe and we see on the interdictor cruisers and they are capable of ripping a ship out of hyperspace so what’s stopping the empire from using this technology to stay stationary and 4 gravity well projectors can rip any size of ship out of hyperspace I would imagine it would have many more of those the empire clearly knows what they are doing I’m sure they thoughts of this

[@MatterBeamTSF]

The Death Star propels itself with ion engines. The exhaust it produces could be travelling at just 0.01% of the speed of light. This means that to counter the push of a laser of X force, it only needs to expend 0.001^2: 0.000001 or 0.0001% of the laser energy to power the ion engines for 5 seconds or so. Of course, any realistic material would get crushed like an eggshell between the laser push and the equal and opposite ion engines...

[@ultraspeed_exe]

Man, you stole my comment. Great comment though.

[@MatterBeamTSF]

@philosoraptor Indeed, I am a super need.

[@sailboi7108]

Matter Beam sorry about that, try to forget that this happened

[@stevenle9960]

Matter Beam shhhhhhhhh space magic

[@MatterBeamTSF]

@UltraSpeed Post that comment anyway, and Kyle is likely to put all of them together on the screen and say 'this bunch of nerds all had the same bright idea'

[@JimmyMFP]

I like the breakdown, but I think the team forgot about interdictor technology (portable blackhole generators - I know, space magic), so it could be that they use them to increase or decrease gravity strength at certain parts of the station(s).

[@Larroseba]

I think the theory of using the thrust of the Death Star engines make sense considering that in this universe travels near light speed several times no matter their size.

[@keithgraber]

Yeah, but the whole thing works with Kyber Crystals. And who knows what impact that has on the science... because magic.

[@nyyotam4057]

Sorry but.. Conservation of momentum beats any magic.

[@JakeAikens]

Inertial dampers, etc etc...

[@nyyotam4057]

@@JakeAikens Inertial dampers will not help. The only thing that would work is firing a jet to the other direction.. but Kyle already related to that.

[@JakeAikens]

@@nyyotam4057 there are no such things as inertial dampers IRL so you couldn't know if they would work or not. So there... leave my planet killing space stations alone. :)

[@nyyotam4057]

​@@JakeAikens lol

[@kirkbolas4985]

The term “Superlaser” is misleading if one considers that the term turbo laser also is in the Star Wars universe. The turbo laser is essentially a blaster on hyper steroids. It’s a plasma based weapon. Both use laser energy to create plasma out of something known as Tirbana gas. The only thing that I am aware of that might render a a rocky earth sized planet to ruble on contact in the time that it takes me to type one average sized word is if the beam projected by the primary weapon on the Death Star is a coherent beam of anti-protons and anti-electrons. Again, as in the blaster and the turbo laser, the laser component would serve to create a plasma out of anti-hydrogen. The beam would require some mechanism to couple a magnetic field around the beam in order to protect it from contacting any ordinary matter between the emitter assembly and the solid portion of the target. The protective field would also confer a quality of confinement in order to prevent any spread during its travel. I imagine the recoil from this kind of directed energy discharge would be significantly less and much more manageable.

[@aleksandarrudic3694]

That would depend of course on the velocity of the antimatter plasma jet and the amount of antimatter required for the job. If we assume a non-relativistic jet, which is optimal from the recoil perspective, 2.4x10^32 J is mass-energy equivalent of roughly 2.5 10^15 kg, so the amount of antimatter needed is about a half of it. If we assume the storage density of antimatter plasma to be similar to liquid water on 300 K (which would be super-efficient), this amount of antimatter would fit tightly inside the size of the Death Star, and it would probably outweight the entire Death Star by a single-digit factor, say 5 times. So, if the Death Star would fire at a planet at a certain non-relativistic velocity, it would gain about 5 times that much speed in the opposite direction. This is of course not a very good thing because, if you want the Death Star to remain relatively stationary the jet would have to be very very slow compared to orbital speeds (that is not more than few hundred meters per second). And assuming the other side has the similar level of technology which is almost always the case in warfare, you cannot fire a plasma jet that slow otherwise your target will have enough time to move away or block the beam (given interstellar distances, even if it was a stone-age Earth, it would have many millennia to develop a civilization that would develop a technology and industrial capability to accelerate or decelerate the home planet slightly). One way or another, the energy required for blowing up a planet completely is just so ridiculously enormous that only the theoretical weapons that use the energy output of a massive star, supernova, quasar, or similar, would have a chance. On the other hand, the whole idea of blowing up a planet is ridiculous at best, when warming the surface of it just slightly (by no more than 100 degrees) would transform it into an uninhabitable hell-world, and that can be done by a well distributed kinetic energy of a few large asteroids, that is only a few tons of mass-energy (half that much if you are projecting a pure antimatter). Speaking of antimatter, it's probably not that perfect of a weapon as portrayed in the media anyway because, unlike nuclear fission, its products are extremely high-energy gamma rays and neutrinos, which don't interact much with the surrounding matter (gamma rays interact very weakly - the more energy they have the weaker they interact, neutrinos don't interact at all), so a theoretical pure antimatter bomb or cannon would radiate almost all of the released energy out into space, and comparably very small part of it would heat the immediately surrounding matter, causing explosion. Of course, the total energy is enormous, so even a small part of it would produce a powerful explosion, but one should not expect something that is orders of magnitude more powerful than a thermonuclear bomb, for instance. So, why even bother with the antimatter when the good-old nuke can be made cheaply (ask Kim Jong-Un) and arbitrarily large (ask Nikita Khrushchev).

[@selvahechicera4292]

Megalaser. The planet killing weapon used by the death star was called a "Megalaser." Not "Superlaser."

[@exceptionvideo]

So a turbo laser is neither turbo nor a laser?

[@joda7697]

@@exceptionvideo correct It's more of an incandescant lightbulb that's done with everyone's shit, souped up on steroids and getting fired at a target, except it's not contained in glass, but magnetic fields or some shit.

[@peterpeterson4800]

The death star is in space, so there isn't that much matter in the way before it hits the planet?

[@Daxqueries]

Could the death star enter hyperspace exactly towards its target and let the recoil of the firing push it out of hyperspace letting the inertial dampeners do their magic?

[@DeltaFoxtrotWhiskey3]

No. The energy needed to fire the weapon at full power AND go into hyperspace would be too much for the reactor to produce. But firing the laser into hyperspace, where most of the acceleration would happen outside the station, is certainly plausible.

[@joshhardin666]

Because the death star is already equipped with a Faster Than Light engine, it MUST already have some kind of inertial dampening systems (at least inside) or the second they jump to ftl, the crew would end up as paste on the back wall.

[@livingskeleton11]

There are things in Star Wars called inertial compensators. They drastically reduce the force of inertia of objects, such as when a ship is dropping out of hyperspace. I don't doubt that they were used in the Death Star for this purpose, too.

[@zimriel]

Don't even need that. The fact that everyone on this station was enjoying, let's say, 9 ms-2 gravity (Earth=9.8) without spin to the OUTSIDE, hints at a gravity-source at the station's core. Harnessed neutron-star, is my guess. The Death Stars didn't explode; they imploded. Oh and Yavin and Endor's moon are both toast

[@demetrisloukas8586]

Kyle Hill - Destroying childhoods since forever

[@jjthorx3245]

Δημήτρης Λουκάς with shiny hair and a smile on his face

[@demetrisloukas8586]

jj thorx Like a true gentleman

[@sayheyguy]

Not any worse than what George Lucas has already done

[@akizeta]

_Time_ destroys childhoods.

[@gandalftheantlion]

Scotty D. I’d have to argue Disney is a much worse offender.... looking at you “solo” *glares*

[@messengerguardiansparanorm8606]

I'm too busy laughing, especially around 8:34. This is just so much fun to listen to. I've shared it, already. Kyle, don't you have another channel? Love you!!!!

[@overcomingobstaclescreates1695]

The "Comparison Ford" joke at 10:16 got me 😀

[@Zminator1986]

Imperial Reporter, "What do you feel when you shot Alderaan?" Death Star Gunner, "Recoil."

[@techguypaul]

But we DO see the Death Star move in the movies! We just can't see the thrusters because the station is so enormous and they are scattered across and hidden beneath the surface of the DS. We know that it has numerous hyperdrives in order to facilitate the jump to light speed. What if the process of firing the superlaser also activates a sync with the hyperdrive so that it fires an engine burst at the same time that the laser would "kick back", thus canceling out the kick back? That could even explain why it's not a simple button press to fire and all these different crew members have levers and stuff to do (yes I know that firing sequence is more for cinematic effect, I'm trying here).

[@silverrenard]

Paul, only issue I see with this, is that the force that would be needed to cancel out the kickback on the scale he is calculating, would still require hyperdense construction materials and/or some kind of internal reinforcement design, or the station would crush itself under the combination of both the engines and laser firing.

[@seanpeacock4290]

The death pancake. Now at Dennys

[@SS2LP]

silverrenard wouldn’t be as bad as it sounds actually the only recoil the death star it self would experience would be from the multiple smaller lasers around the dish. There would absolutely still be recoil but it would be much less so, we also don’t see the actual firing mechanism which could have a sort of recoil dampener system to reduce the impact upon the station. There’s a lot you could do to actually make the death star work. I say this being a former engineering major and a self proclaimed gun nut.

[@silverrenard]

SS2LP I agree completely that there is plenty that could be done, I was just responding to the part about firing the engines as a counter force. It is one thing for two forces to act on the same point or area, but the engines firing the way it was described would be on the complete opposite side of the station. All I was stating, was if this was the case, the inside would have to be strong enough to withstand the forces from both, or the station would be crushed.

[@SS2LP]

Right I understood that just saying they could avoid it in other ways, big thing is that i'm also convinced the force would actually cause it to spin more so than suddenly fly back. All that force would apply to the upper hemisphere of the station and speaking from experience a force like that tends to cause rotational force rather than straight back. Both forces would be so quick and spread out that I don't for see the station crushing it self. I'm actually kinda designing a system in my head that would work. That said its nice to finally see people that know lasers actually have recoil, I remember seeing a video way back when for fallout 4 where people we're complaining about the laser rifle in game having recoil. Props to you guys and Kyle for knowing that.

[@PitFriend1]

In Star Wars the people on star ships are completely unaffected when they suddenly jump to light speed or even come to a complete stop from light speed. They must have some kind of momentum compensation technology to allow this. I assume they could apply this to compensate for the super laser firing. What happens to the equation if momentum is zero?

[@cm275]

It's what Star Trek calls Inertial Dampeners.

[@dohvanetworksmith8882]

90% of the science in Star Wars is explainable, In universe, just takes a good bit of research.

[@Thefreakyfreek]

its warp drive you dont move the ship you warp space

[@LegionPrime]

Yeah, tell that to Dark Helmet

[@KaiCalimatinus]

Ludicrous Speed!

[@jamesdiaz88]

So, I have some problems with your analysis: 1) Some guns have special stocks that reduce the recoil you can feel when firing the gun. Something could probably be done to reduce the recoil. Giant metal springs could be used, a system that uses laser emitters that slide into place into the death star from behind, fire, get thrown behind in the opposite direction, and the emitters could be disposable/use rockets to return(this system would use double sided barrels, like an RPG, with the payload going in one direction, and the other stuff going behind you(in this case, the laser and the emitter). Obviously, introducing inertial dampeners renders the point moot, but I would admit that they would have a high energy cost. 2) Star Wars has materials that don't actually exist. They could probably reduce the issue by using something dense enough to make the gravity ~2-4 Gs, which when combined with other measures, could be enough. 3) I don't believe that the engines are ever shown, but they obviously have to exist, so it's likely that they're off camera, meaning it could be that it's just happening off screen 4) While I am showing possible workarounds, the fact of the matter is that this is a work of science fiction. It makes sense to say that there are issues that engineers/scientists need to fix, but the presence of an issue doesn't mean it's impossible. All it does is pose an issue that the author may want to have an in-universe workaround for. I would not call this an insurmountable engineering question(let alone a fatal flaw), though it is an interesting one.

[@Philbaby]

"One last comparison ford" my god what a beautiful pun 😂😂

[@somarriba333]

Fatal flaw: No safely rails.

[@JrDarkPhantom]

They obviously don't need safety rails bro... If anyone were to fall off the deathstar (which they shouldn't because they are well trained professionals; the best in the galaxy!), they would just fall into a low orbit around it from which they can be very easily picked back up with their tractor beams

[@somarriba333]

You comment on my notifications looked like this, "They obviously don't need safety rails bro... If anyone were to fall off the deathstar (which they shouldn't because they are well trained professionals; the best in the galaxy!), they would just f...". I though you fell because there were no safety rails.

[@JrDarkPhantom]

Can you rephrase that please... I don't quite understand what you mean. Thanks

[@somarriba333]

I cannot.

[@matrixarsmusicworkshop561]

somarriba333 but its not fatal. Just a flaw

[@truckthiss]

The death-stars super weapon is not a laser. if the amount of energy you described were to be focused on small point on a planet most of the energy would simply pass right through it. I'm sorry, but the planet will be quite operational after being shot by the Death Star. There simply isn't a way to effectively transfer that much energy to a planet. even if we used a wide-angle beam, the planet would explode from the outside in. That is the exact opposite of the way Alderaan exploded. I propose the functionality of the super weapon is not a laser but instead a very dense slow-moving pulse of protons. the initial theme would drill a hole to the core of a planet where a subsequent pulse of protons would cause instantaneous decay of elements such as for Ian, plutonium and uranium. the energy released from the sudden decay of all radioactive isotopes in the center of a planet would be more than enough to overcome the gravitational force finding the planet together. The resulting effect would be what we see in the movies, an explosion from within. Unlike photons, protons do have mass. However the speed of a proton blast of this magnitude should produce substantially less recoil then the proposed laser idea.

[@gameninja-x1586]

Nerd

[@QuarkGamingLLC]

truckthiss the lasers I Star Wars are made out of a type of gas that was mined on cloud city. Technically it’s a rail gun that turns the gas a color based on how strong it is.

[@user-yj7ks9mb1e]

No, they just use the gas to make lazers, not to shoot with. We here on Earth also do use noble gases in lasers.

[@mikearcher9390]

NONSENSE say the earth was its target, our molten outer core would bleed away into space. oh well, who needs a magnetic shield [besides MARS], and your other points cut from whole cloth and have ZERO connection to anything seen or heard in the movies

[@mikearcher9390]

@@QuarkGamingLLC except the people who built and operate it call it a laser...

[@DeltaFoxtrotWhiskey3]

In one of the books, I think it was Death Star, they mentioned that the laser wasn’t a conventional laser. It was a laser fired into hyperspace with the planet in its path. This would mean that most of the acceleration actually happened outside the station.

[@Hikaru109Ichijyo]

i wonder if they can make a "galactic" level recoil system like they do for howitzers, or have the laser section in an 'eject-able ' cartridge (and clear the path behind the death star), or better yet, make it remote and have no crew and have it programmed to aim at a distant celestial body to gravity assist as it returns boomerang style (although would take time to slow down so it doesn't trash the imperial fleet . . .) or use several methods in combination . . .

[@deydraniadiancecht8298]

The best solution would be to just have the laser powerful enough to disrupt the planet to the point of breaking, but then leave behind all of the planet's material so that it can reform from its own gravity. The same goal is accomplished- the whole planet is no longer habitable and won't be for at least a billion years.

[@VachicorneOld]

Or just have a second laser in the opposite direction.

[@PapaBear_Gaming]

@@VachicorneOld Blow up two planets for the price of,... twice the energy!

[@kirillustinov7284]

There is a far better method using Star Wars technology. it is called Orbital Bombardment, or Glassing. This literary destroys everything on the surface, as the Empire did to many of its planets after the Emperor's death. It was Palpatine's Contingency plan, and it involved two parts: destroy valuable planets so no one could live on them, (known as operation Cinder) and save good generals and commanders by sending them into the unknown regions to reform and strike back. Good day!

[@himbod2027]

KirillLego sounds like the glassing the covenant employ against the humans in the halo universe

[@ckl9390]

@@himbod2027 Yes it is very similar, both methods employ energy weapon bombardment from either orbit or high atmosphere to heat the surface past the fusing point of silicates, hence "glass". The process also evaporates or burns off all lighter elements and/or compounds, typically they are not retained in atmosphere to condense and deposit on the planet's surface. The concept of glassing is seen across the Sci-fi genre as a tactical, biological containment, or punitive measure. I was first introduced to the term in Halo universe, and only recently heard it with respect to the Star Wars universe. I think it would be interesting to consider the Star Wars Galactic Empire vs. Halo's Covenant.

[@Geninacra]

Only one flaw with your flaw that I can think of. The Deathstar has an inertia damp capable of stoping it from FTL momentum. So... That makes your recoil insignificant.

[@odium3691]

Alekay Argote Viola James it is generally understood that "hyper space" is just like slipspace from the halo universe. Another, compact dimension, parallel to ours. Not FTL. Just a worm hole with extra steps XD.

[@Geninacra]

Even if that is so, this pilots can enter and exit scape velocity without even the need to take proper sit. That's some kind of inertia engine. PS: And the kamicaze move from The Last Jedi is... What? A phisics fisure? I'm genuenly curious.

[@randybentley2633]

starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Inertial_compensator Like Star Trek, Star Wars does need some kind of tech to explain how their craft, from the lowly speeder all the way up to the Death Star, are able to do the maneuvers that they do without turning their crews into chunky salsa.

[@AndreuPinel]

Not to mention that because the cannon is not aligned with the center of the sphere, in addition to suffer the backwards recoil, it would start spinning like crazy, and because the laser remains on for some seconds, it would probably hit many other things (similar to what happens when someone doesn't hold a fully automatic gun in a proper way and keeps the trigger pressed). My solution would have been adding a 2nd cannon perfectly synchronized and aligned in order to neutralize each other's recoil (this wouldn't prevent everyone in the DS from dying but at least the emperor wouldn't loose his toy)... Yes, that would require double the energy per shot and it would destroy whatever other thing is in this 2nd cannon's line too (friend or foe), but hey, aren't we the empire supposed to be super evil?

[@classifiedveteran9879]

I just realized, if a civilization had the ability to make a deathstar, they'd be able to tow planets outside the habitable zone into a warmer climate. Instead, the empire saw fit to destroy worlds instead.

[@TickedOffPriest]

The station was capable of getting from Alderann to Yavin almost as fast as the Millennium Falcon could. Therefore, there may be enough potential to do this. Also, the Death Star does not so much fire a laser, but a lightsaber esque beam.

[@GeoRyukaiser]

My brother and I had a discussion about the travel times. In all media that lists a speed the Death Star is basically as fast as a Space tracter while the Falcon is a sports car in the hood of a small truck. We've come to the conclusion that there is a several days to a week time skip between the Falcon leaving Tatooine and when it reaches Alderann.

[@matthewlewis-fallows6263]

I was wondering if the death star orbiting Alderaan would mitigate some of the recoil? The death star wasn't constructed around Alderaan so it had to travel to do its blowy up business. This would have meant somebody or droid had to calculate how to get there and the best possible firing solution. Considering "that's no moon" maybe obi wan, just by looking, could see the orbit was unusual enough to cause concern.

[@Cryowatt]

What if you worked backwards for this one? Instead of starting with the goal of planet-obliterating power. What if you, instead, calculated the maximum power of the death star with a reasonable recoil? How powerful would the laser be, and how destructive would that get?

[@Creativeaccount0]

Good question and interesting idea.

[@ruyman90]

Am I the only one that thinks that the exhaust port isn't a huge flaw? If you tell me that I have to fly to a giant space station, evade the turrets, defend myself against other thousands flying ships, launch 2 torpedoes that have to do a 90° turn into an 2x2m entrance and those have to go in a straight line for 60km fighting whatever the exhaust port expelling gas, radiation, heat, sewage, or whatever while the station is moving. I would say, "that's impossible. What do you think I am, a SPACE WIZARD???" And would you see, a SPACE WIZARD did it.

[@ChrisHall8908]

It's been a while since I watched episode 4, but I believe the torpedo doesn't have to travel all the way to the center. I recall some mention of "cascading reactions" that will blow up the core.

[@rekrn12345]

It's not a huge flaw. It is a small potentially fatal flaw.

[@ruyman90]

For the presentation in Ep 4 it seems that it must reach the reactor in the center to make a chain reaction between all reactors and explode.

[@CrowandTalbot]

ruyman90 Make a space station impenetrable to literally MAGIC or you'll kill me and my family? Guess we'll just die then. It's more Vader's fault, they should have had a Sith waiting at each exhaust port just in case a magically guided torpedo came.

[@davelong1139]

Since this was done by a very inexperienced teen, from the second shot taken at the port in the first fight at the Death Star. I'd stay it is a huge flaw. Just ask Disney, they made Rogue One to cover that up.

[@visageliquifier3636]

Well, they do walk on the deckplates in deep space without floating, so directed artificial gravity seems to be the norm. Even small fighters have it, so it must be something very cheap and easy to build, maintain and power. We also never see the gravity fields of other ships affect each other, so it must be containable or polarizable in some manner. Given that, it seems that in Star Wars universe it should be a simple matter to engineer a recoil field effect that balances massive G acceleration equally. Taking the capability to generate directed, contained gravitational fields easily, the other problem is one of speed and capacity; can they generate a strong enough field fast enough? I think they would have more than the capacity to do to so, specifically since they have hyperdrive technologies that do not blend a ship's crew. Given that Admiral Holdo's maneuver worked, hyperdrive must impart massive acceleration to the vessel (which you also calculated...). If the crews are not liquified, their vessels must be able to somehow counter that massive acceleration. While the recoil effect of the Death Star's weapon would be impressive, sending the mass of a ship in to super-c speeds should be incredible. Taking a lower-bound estimate of an ISD's mass: (www.st-v-sw.net/STSWvolumetrics.html) as 3.154*10^10kg, accelerating that mass to just 1c in about 0.5 seconds (a minimal hyperspace jump) would be: F = ma => 3.154*10^10kg * (2.998*10^8 / 0.5) => 3.154*10^10kg * (5.996*10^8) => 18.911*10^18 Dialing that up to the range you're talking would be about: Conveniently you state 7.5*10^23 kg*(m/s), which fits the dimensions of the force equation nicely. 7.5*10^23 = 3.154*10^10kg * (n*(2.998*10^8 / 0.5)) => 3.154*10^10kg * (n*(5.996*10^8)) => 18.911*10^18 * n ... so: 7.5*10^23 / 18.911*10^18 = n = 0.3966 * 10^5 ~> 4*10^4 .. so accelerating an Imperial Star Destroyer up to about 40,000 times the speed of light in half a second is about the same amount of force to counteract the energy of the Death Star's recoil momentum. So, do Star Wars ships go that fast? I don't know. To the Internet! (www.tor.com/2014/12/08/star-wars-how-fast-is-the-millennium-falcon/) So we can estimate the Millenium Falcon's travel to Alderan to be at the rate of about 1041.66 light years per hour, keeping in mind they weren't in any particular hurry, and this was a 'piece of junk' bulk freighter and not an Imperial super war machine, that puts them at: light year = 9.461*10^12km so 9.461*10^12 * 1041.66 => 9855.145*10^12 => 9.856*10^15km in one hour c = 2.998*10^8m/s => 2.998*10^5km/s, 2.998*10^5 * 3600 => 107.928*10^5 => 1.08*10^7km/h so: 9.856*10^15km/h / 1.08*10^7km/h => 9.126 * 10^8 times c (holy crap!) Millenium Falcon, a 'piece of crap' 'junkpile' can do about 90 million times the speed of light and can counteract any force of acceleration while jumping, but it masses out a lot less than an ol' ISD. According to the source above, an Imperial Star Destroyer masses out to 36767000 / 860 => 40426.744 times the Falcon. What is the difference between the force counteracted to jump the Falcon to about 9*10^8 c and an ISD to 4*10^4 c: 2.25*10^4 ... which is about 20 times less than the difference in their masses. Given that this is within one order of magnitude and we're working with approximations of fictional stuff, I'd call that pretty much even money. So, yes, the Empire should definitely be able to counteract that much recoil force with whatever mechanism they use to counter acceleration to hyperspace, or, put another way, they probably figured out how much recoil force they could counteract at most and engineered a huge frickin' laser beam that would output about 5% less than that in photonic momentum.

[@AdmiralStoicRum]

^This guy gets it

[@guamson8946]

Whoa... you really did your research, didn't you?!

[@powerofanime1]

As I revisit this video, I remember Interdictors. They're supposed to imitate a mass shadow in order to force ships out of hyperspace, but wouldn't that also give them a strange density?

[@MrLargonaut]

Back here watching old stuff. This man is fearless...

[@daito_navy2379]

There's ALSO another flaw. The stormtroopers stationed there miss everything.

[@inkednpierced4u53]

NavyDevil they missed on purpose though to let the falcon get away to track them to the base.

[@ronpetersen2317]

Stormtroopers don't operate those grass valley video switchers. It is those guys with the backwards hats.

[@christopherschmeltz3333]

@@inkednpierced4u53 Yeah, but they can still only hit the broad side of a barn when the force (a.k.a. plot) wants them to! Imperial training programs seem to be based on the indoctrination of overwhelming numbers, so they may as well be firing black powder muskets or making it rain arrows... Just march in intimidating formations and keep firing until you hit everything that opposes Emperor Palpatine, then blame all the collateral damage on the criminals.

[@jaredkirk1555]

Kyle, Long time watcher, first time commenting... I think you're forgetting about the (assumed) inertial dampeners... they go at light speed all the time don't they (I believe in both the Death Star, as well as other ships)? So they would need to have something to lessen the equal and opposite reaction from that, right? I see two options: 1. They use the inertial dampeners to make the reaction from the laser manageable or… 2. They use a fraction of the light speed engines (which you never really see) to keep them in the same place. (you only mentioned their Sublight engines. Eh?

[@portkapul1283]

completely forgot about the assumed inertial dampeners, i only considered how the gravity projectors could help handle the force, well inertial dampeners solves all the pesky problems of physics

[@benjaminbrown3939]

Well, star wars does have inertia dampeners, which use hyperspace technology to reduce g forces by a significant amount. Maybe the death star has thousands of those. There's also a tractor beam onboard, which could be used to hold the battlestation in place when it fires. Of course the use of kyber crystals would allow for the creation of an antimatter beam, which would annihilate with the planet, creating a gigantic nuclear explosion that should be enough to unbind it. This is especially likely because of the fact that the beam is composed of 8 individual streams of antimatter that collide and merge to form one coherent beam. It is also powered by a reactor that rivals the power production of all the nuclear power plants in the world combined. In essence, the death star is an antimatter weapon.

[@overbank56]

You make science cool & fun dude!

[@alecsmith3448]

Also, they could just do whatever it is that they do to avoid turning to goo when they jump to hyperspace.

[@maskeraade230]

Hey Kyle, sry this is a little bit of topic, but i just got this idea yesterday evening. In your ant-man episode you pointed out that antman had a mass problem but maybe i found a way to fix it (in one direction). When ant-man shrinks or grows, the pym particle somehow changes the space between his atoms and, as you pointed out, his mass should be the same. But in the movies it seems like his mass scales with is volumen, which would also be necessary for quantum effects. But this could be fixed (only when he shriks), cause most people have a wrong perception of mass. The mass of an object is not only detrment by the number of prontons, neutron and electrons in its volume. The mass of an atom strogly depends of the binding energy of the nucleus. The mass of an atom is given by the Weizäcker mass-formula. M(A,Z)= NM_n+ZM_m+Zm_e-B(Z,A) N: Number of nutrons Z: Number of protons A = Z+N The binding energy consists of 5 parts, but is dominatet by the frist one the volume term of the nucleus. So if you could somehow increase the bindingenergy (BE) of a nucleus, the atom would get lighter and the core itself would shrink down thus reducing ant-mans mass. Also particles (protons neutrons) are not hard balls with a definde surface and volumen. Matter can be compressed almoste infinitely, as we see in black holes. This two characteristics of matter would also allow him to continue to shrink down under atomic levels into the quantum space. So i think this could fix ant-mans mass and size problem (in one direction). Sadly you cant decrease BE. This would make his atoms unstable. So i hope you are reading this although its a little bit of topic and sry for my bad english. PS: you once talked about "TATOOIN" as an acronym but this is not realy correct "Tatooin" would be an apronym. An apronym is an acronym but the acronym itself is an own word. Thats not realy important but mabye you want to know as an fan of usless knowledge.

[@thanushgovindarajoo4083]

MaskeraaDe you are the next SUPER NERD!!!!

[@MichaelBerthelsen]

Just a small point, it's Pym particle, not pimp particle...😂😂

[@thomasmiller8289]

The power of the pimp particle!

[@samhawk8603]

Pimp particle 🤣😂🤣😂 I love it!

[@michaelmcchesney6645]

One of the problems I had with the Ant Man movie is about how Janet destroyed the missile and Scott destroyed Yellowjacket. They go subatomic to pass through the titanium, but once through, they are large enough to start smashing the tech inside. That's just a pet peeve of mine I've never heard anyone talk about before. I'm sure others have raised it, but not where I've seen it.

[@uncle-ff7jq]

8:29 My favorite of his bits I've seen

[@martinpaulsen1592]

EU/Legends sources state that the Empire has the capability of generating small singularities, usually mounted on "Interdictor" vessels to prevent enemies, pirates, smugglers, or what have you from escaping into hyperspace - the New Republic uses them as well, although I haven't encountered anything that definitively states whether they build their own or use captured ones. Combine those with solid artificial gravity, though, and you could use them to "anchor" the Death Star when firing.

[@kevsouthwell6136]

Never knew Thor was a KZbinr.

[@patkun01]

Dorito Dude 360 he could explain Mjolnir physics

[@HORRIOR1]

So HOW BADLY would the potential shrapnel from an EXPLODING PLANET affect a Death Star? If we assume the Death Star is as far away from the planet, as our Moon is from Earth, and the planet explodes the same way as it does in the movie, would the planet fragments shred apart the outer shell of the Death Star?

[@AspLode]

There would certainly be pieces of planet traveling at relativistic speeds following such a catastrophe, which makes the part where the Millennium Falcon warps into a debris field that much more dangerous.

[@christianmcdonald419]

But it has shields.

[@mrfister1234]

It would affect the DS but the death star is ray shielded, magnetically shielded and sealed and has sectional deflectors. It would be fine

[@aeternusdoleo4531]

Simpler solution - make the death star have 2 equally powerful lasers at opposite ends. And fire them synchronously. The forces should cancel each other out - so long as the deathstar structure can withstand being pancaked by opposite forces capable of chucking a small moon at 100G. Might it also be that we don't see any engines on that thing because the death laser -is- the main engine? (and if so, I pity the shipyard that launched it)

[@alexgordon4672]

your are a good bloke man cheers for the answers to so many dam questions i have! nice one.

[@billmalcolm4291]

In every shot of the Death Star firing it's primary weapon, it first fires seven beams in sequence, that converge into a single point. I looked up some blueprints for the Death star, because of course I did, and there is an item labeled "Targeting field generator". This implies there is some sort of field that collects the separate beams into a single point. I'm making assumptions about how this would work, but after the separate beams are fired, an energy field is generated outside the death star stopping and collecting the energy before releasing the payload. My point is that in firing it in smaller sequences, it splits the change in momentum into seven manageable chunks and collects the energy from them over a period time, thereby lessening the recoil.

[@benknapp4166]

Just drop 7,000 nuclear space bombs. Lol

[@mrrodgers0]

Here's the problem with that though: dividing the beam recoil by 7 means you're still making everyone experience 300gs, which would have basically the same result.

[@AsbestosMuffins]

@@mrrodgers0 but they have artificial gravity (and not the spiny kind) so all good.

[@physe8052]

To add to what Ford Mulligan said, you also can't "collect" light in a stationary position without a very exotic laboratory setup.

[@twilight_lupinesilva4691]

Asher Flanagan They probably have that.

[@seancondon5572]

11:00 - to be fair, the effect in A New Hope looked like TWO projectiles firing.

[@tankmaster4882]

Yes, he did shoot two down the exhaust port

[@adamnichols476]

@Nathan Sindlinger those were missiles not blaster bolts.

[@StormsparkPegasus]

@@adamnichols476 They were "proton torpedos", whatever the heck those are supposed to be.

[@starwarsfan_1206]

@@StormsparkPegasus its like a sidewinder but with like a 10x larger warhead

[@correa6281]

It would be very fun to do that math if I could

[@andreabindolini7452]

Ironically, the recoil effect of such a weapon is acknowledged, and even exploited, in some episodes of the classic anime "Space Battleship Yamato" (Star Blazers), where the hero ship ("Argo" for the Western audience) has its own Death Star level weapon: the Wave Motion Gun.

[@davidkillawee6]

Not just that anime, Goku uses energy as a propulsive force to defeat both King Piccolo, and Piccolo Junior in Dragon Ball

[@PayneMaximus]

You don't think the Death Star will work, do you? I find your lack of faith disturbing.

[@t.c.bramblett617]

Not in our moment of triumph!

[@jwhiteheadcc]

Irony, is that the guy he said that to was a toady and probably deserved it. :D

[@tay012]

But Kyle, we see in the films there are several smaller lasers that join to create the main laser. Does the difference in angles affect the momentum?

[@mlok4216]

Taylor Shipley given the positions of lasers it would apply forces on station which would lead to the destruction pattern similar to that of opening a bag of chips =D

[@seraphic22]

That shouldn't make any difference. Unless we get another fatal flaw in that those small lasers firing literally rip the death star apart. If I'm remembering right (which I'm probably not, been many a year), you would use the parallelogram rule to say the forces add together into a resulting singular force. I'm sure I am grossly over simplifying there and you would need complex vector calculus to get exact numbers but overall it shouldn't change anything that greatly.

[@zachh6868]

Taylor Shipley that's still the same amount of energy pushing the deathstar back. The setup we see in the movie would help disperse the recoil so that it doesn't apply all the pressure to one point, but the problem is the speed at which the energy is being pushed out remanes the same.

[@egmccann]

I was somewhat wondering the same thing...

[@gustavometz]

The best of the video is the impression of Peter Cushing “You may fire when ready”

[@odiemyers9064]

question, what if they use an anti grav or recoil system, I actually saw on space battleship Yamato, that they deactivated the recoil system to push them through a portal to escape when they fired the wave motion gun at an enemy planet and taking out a portion of the enemy fleet that was gathered there. It was an awesome scene . Maybe an anti grav recoil system combined as well!

[@ckought69]

Did you account for the deathstar having a propulsion system capable of moving it at FTL speeds? It made it from the system that blew up Alderman to another star system where the rebel base was located (which, even if it was close by, would still be several light years away) in a fairly short amount of time. They also have technology that can control gravity, manufacture and store the amount of power used by the laser system, and to build a laser system capable of outputting that power without destroying itself. With all of those technologies (plus more), I'm sure there would be a way to counter the recoil of the laser firing.

[@diegosanchez894]

What if if isn't a laser? What if the death star throws antimatter directly so that half the energy is already on the planet and also the mass would be less so the binding energy would be smaller. Also, I checked to see if it could create a kugleblitz (black hole created from energy) at the surface and destroy the planet that way but the energy for the smallest viable kugleblitz is 10^42j which is much, much more than the binding energy you calculated so I defeated my own point.

[@taerog]

Diego Sanchez the thing is antimatter does not work like in the movies either. Most probably ( physics on the scale is not something to do on a napkin) you would need allot, and the antimatter would hit the atmosphere and annihilate. The flow and speed of the antimatter partial beam would be important as if it was too low you would just make the remaining planet thrust away.. Also beware of antimatter comming back at you from the "explosions", as the followup antimatter will need to go through the energy release deflecting it's path. Plus it will also thrust the DS back as the mater beem has momentum.

[@cjwrench07]

The problem is they call it a laser multiple times. We can try fix it, but canon still has the same problem as Lucas’ “Laser Swords”

[@diegosanchez894]

ta erog yeah the momentum of the antimatter bean would be the biggest flaw to my solution. But whether it is in the atmosphere or on the surface, if the energy is input in the planet it will eventually end it. Considering the amount of antimatter necessary, the atmosphere would be gone instantly, and the rest of the planet would release the gluon energy eventually overcoming g the binding one.

[@Tassadar237]

What if instead of a laser, it is a high-power science gun which catalyzes nuclear chain-reactions in its target? Or even more Science Fiction, what if it is a high-power science gun which (even temporarily) disables gravity, or mass-gravity interaction. What if it is a Anti-Higgs Beam? Or even MORE Science fiction, what if it is a high-power science gun which (even temporarily) disables the Strong Nuclear Force in its target? ...Boom?

[@belzedk]

Doctor Cthulhu That is just what the plebs call it. I imagine the engineers giving a long explanation on what it is and ending it with "... , its like a big laser" "oh its a big laser, why didn't you just say so" "no, that's not... sure what ever"

[@ivanostellato9478]

you can pulse your source emitter forward as you fire .. that creates laser bolts and phazor bolts it slows them and adds power relative to forward bolt action

[@vukkulvar9769]

In your computations, do you account for the laser not being just laser (they change trajectory after a time of coalescing) ? Also, what about space wizards on board ?

[@AronBagel]

I guess that kinda makes Starkiller Base a more viable option - rather than firing out such massive amounts of energy by itself, it transports them through hyperspace, a concept that's been a nice shield against most fundamental physics problems in Star Wars, perhaps avoiding these complications.

[@joshuahadams]

AronBagel it basically eats and then burps out a star, letting the heat and inertia of hyper accelerated plasma do the work.

[@Plasmacore_V]

Galactic Flamethrower

[@stevenle9960]

Plasmacore V plasma thrower

[@vulpinedeity3379]

When did they ever say that it was firing through hyperspace?

It would have to fire faster than light in order to hit another system in an reasonable amount of time.

[@justicepsych]

Solved by Canon: 1) Vader lives on the Death Star 2) The physical limits of the force are constrained only by the force user's will. 3) When they use the laser, Sith Lord Vader holds the Death Star in place.

[@cutcontent6787]

If Vader was that strong he could just destroy the planet himself

[@justicepsych]

@@cutcontent6787 That's not Vader's job. He's union.

[@mysteriousssstranger]

@@justicepsych *predsident of the union. it's why he was allowed into the HR war room with Tarkin and the other imp officers

[@bonfiregaming1747]

@@jacko_3770 And its a joke.

[@Phillisophical]

They did fix the problem. In Star Wars they have a piece of tech called an “inertial compensator”. It completely nullifies all G forces in a vessel of all sizes. Even on speeder bikes. Even toddler toys have inertial compensators. It’s probably the most integrated piece of technology in the star wars gakaxy

[@conwarlock3537]

Love that inserted Wilhelm scream

[@Derek_Baumgartner]

I imagine that another possible methodology for dealing with the 'recoil': the same type of design system utilized for recoilless rifles, like bazookas. A bazooka, for example, ejects the gas utilized in firing the payload, resulting in the 'recoilless' categorization. Another way to achieve this 'recoilless' design is to eject a 'countermass' at the point of firing. The latter would likely be impractical, but the former might be possible depending on the systems utilized to generate the energy for firing the laser. Not sure about that part, though. Another potential offset: if the Death Star is hyperdrive capable - and it is - it might be possible to underfire the hyperdrive at the point of firing in order to counter-balance the laser's energy. But then, of course, you just arrive at the 'hyperspace missile' so often discussed since Last Jedi and ask 'why use a laser in the first place?'

[@irrelevanturchins4429]

You shouldn't have been force choked......until you said Vade

[@williamwolff7134]

I love you just for your avatar

[@lucamasseroni7]

Ok this is in the top 10 of the thing I didn't even imagine possible in this channel.

[@cmw184]

I feel that the lazer does something with the planets core.. Since on jehda, the explosion kept growing after the lazer hit. (Rouge 1)

[@aidanrogers4438]

WE STAND HERE AMIDST MY ACHIEVEMENT! NOT YOUR'S!

[@JamesTM]

This all assumes that the laser itself delivers enough energy to totally separate the planet. But there's two other compounding factors: 1) As the laser vaporizes its way through the planet, energy will be released from that material in the form of heat, vapor, etc. All that added energy would contribute to the explodifying (sure, it's not a real word, but it's awesome) of the planet. In theory, that could even decrease the energy required for the laser logarithmically, if we assume it triggers nuclear chain reactions within the material of the planet. 2) In the movie, we only see that the planet explodes. There's nothing to suggest that it does not reform under gravity later. If we allow for the possibility that the rocks, dust, vapor, and people-bits that made up the planet will eventually coalesse back together, that too would dramatically lower the amount of energy required. I'm curious if, when taking both these factors into account, the momentum "generated" would be at a safe level.

[@liamnicholas5764]

Vaporising requires energy to be absorbed; it's only making bonds that releases energy. Since the laser would doubtless end up vaporising matter as well as breaking it apart, this means that the laser has to spend more energy to break apart the planet. (Since a lot of the laser energy is being spent vaporising stuff, rather then explodifying stuff). Point two does make sense, though.

[@KaiCalimatinus]

In Disney Canon since the novel Death Star that explained it is retconned out, it is just a laser that powerful, but in Legends it was a hypermatter particle beam and Superlaser has always been a bit of a misnomer, and yes, it converted the matter down to and of the core of the target j to antimatter, or hypermatter depending on certain other source material, and literally nuked the planet with a gajilion micro black holes, antimatter detonations and nuclear effects, and also launched the debris slightly through hyperspace to everywhere and anywhere, so it would feasibly take a little less energy than several suns at once. That and the beam is also partially in hyperspace so that totally throws doing math on momentum properly out the window.

[@everythinggoodsfeckingtaken]

Indeed... the centre of the planet is like one giant pressure cooker. Get a pressure cooker or any high pressure canister and shoot it with a regular bullet.... it going BOOOOOM

[@InnaciKorushka]

People bits. Love it lol

[@sstroh08]

Plus, the main goal of destroying a planet would be to wipe out the offending occupants surely correct? Whether the planet reforms or not, surely just blasting it into small chunks would do the trick.

[@robertpenman2331]

Hey just wondering because jn the films it fires several different beams in sequence, would that mitigate some of the recoil

[@sebbes333]

3:34 The solution is easy & obvious! We simply fire another lazer in the opposite direction to cancel out the recoil :D .*The "Death Star" becomes the "Death Pancake"* :D

[@brickempire4427]

The Death Star had gravitational dampeners and compensators, that then made it possible for the workers to survive

[@simonglancy3136]

indeed we already know that the x-wing has inertial dampeners built in, and repulsor tech has been sort in the law of starwars, thus bythe "science" the energy problem simply would not exist, so were back to small thermal exhorst ports that are ray shielded only sigh :P

[@mikearcher9390]

hand-wavy stuff

[@sporegnosis]

even if that were true, the death star needs double the power production, because you need equal power to cancel the directional momentum. So whatever budget you had, double it. This would also mean that the unfinished death star would not be capable of firing at all.

[@sanderspijkers2495]

People accelarate from 0 to lightspeed in just a second all the time in star wars. I guess they jump to lightspeed so often g-forces don 't hurt them anymore.

[@JeffDeLamater]

That's what they want you the think, but it's just a rouse. The unfinished death star is fully operational.

[@AlexanderEmpyre]

I detect a logical flaw my good sir! Planets already consist of hyper dense matter the closer you get to the core. In a manner of speaking, the planet will be doing most of the work if you know where to aim, making the Death Star's laser's size not have to be quite as big as you've predicted. Your original calculation perceived a uniform density of a planet. Which, if I've properly researched my geology, would not be possible due to the requirement of increased density closer the core. Releasing the pressure using an incisional laser could cause a proportionately small, but catastrophic expansion of the planets gooey insides. Have a laser that can compensate for the remaining energy required and BOOM there goes Alderaan. After adding the potential energy of the planet to the calculation, I deduce that the laser would have to be more along the lines of projecting a minimum of 1.5x10^22, making the force of momentum approximately 26km/s. Still quite large, but given the startup time required for the laser to fire, not impossible to counter. Thanks for making me think today! Your show is super tasty. P.S. Strike a pose, your getting photoshopped.

[@iBIONICLE]

Alexander Empyre well aren't you just so smart.

[@portkapul1283]

i don't think a planet's insides should ever be described as gooey

[@gregormuller4598]

but wouldent that not only work for planets with a at least partial fluid core? do solids that were compressed usually extend when the pressure is gone?

[@ServantofBaal]

I always thought the same thing myself, but that only explains it up to a certain point, I feel. This could cause a massive eruption, but the planet would probably seal the hole. It would create a massive volcano that would make Mustafar jealous, but a planet is simply too massive to obliterate by causing the mantle to start leaking. It wouldn't even reach the core, because the energy would be displaced before it gets there. You wouldn't even be able to cause a nuclear reaction by bombarding it with energy, because the core, being iron, would absorb more energy than it releases in the exchange and would stabilize. I'm not even sure if the amount of energy he described would be enough to cause a planet to instantly vaporize. Planet destroying lasers just aren't practical in any way. It would be easier to create a singularity stable enough to devour the planet than blow it up with a laser, and even easier yet just to nuke it into a ten thousand year ice age

[@JeremiahNunn]

another factor that would reduce the energy required, you don't need to pump so much energy in such that the planet would never reform, just enough that it's "destroyed" for an hour or 2 for cinematic effect would be sufficient.

[@MichaTerajewicz]

It wouldn't be thrown back, it would just shutter into pieces. Great video, as always 🙂

[@thenewmodelworkshop5743]

You see the engines fired in Rogue One, and it has a Hyperdrive

[@eluminaryxarrais7735]

Star Wars Universe has artificial gravity, if you have that technology inertial dampeners could be used to cancel all of this out.

[@samxrl]

Eluminary Xarrais yes, but it would have to exactly perfectly match the acceleration to the micro second otherwise you would put out too little and everyone dies or too much and everyone dies so even that would be absurdly difficult

[@eluminaryxarrais7735]

samxrl it could all be automated easily. We have the technology now to automate the process your phone has accelerometers on it that's all you would need just a very sensitive accelerometer connected to your artificial gravity machine... We have the accelerometers just not the anti gravity machine part... It would need massive power, actually about equal to the laser itself

[@eluminaryxarrais7735]

samxrl the more I think about it there is proof they have these in the movie... If they didn't have these they would die evertime they went to hyperspace

[@crgkevin6542]

Not to mention that the Death Star's compensators would know exactly when to engage because they'd be linked to the firing system. It'd also know how much force to compensate for, given that the recoil would've been calculated in the design process...

[@arfived4]

You can't counter science with technobabble.

[@ryozen9413]

The laser in the films seems to be even more powerful than your calculations, since the planets in the movie explode - not just drift apart at a measly 11km/s. More ketchup for everyone!

[@t.c.bramblett617]

The Death Star was also WAY too close to the planet it blew up in Rogue One. It would have been destroyed by planetary debris immediately (not to mention torn apart by tidal forces). I prefer A New Hope because (due to budgetary constraints probably) they didn't show the death star's location in relation to the planets it was targeting, so it could have been the way more likely distance of several million km away.

[@metamorphicorder]

Its ketchup from everyone. Everyone on the deathstar at least.

[@evknucklehead]

In Rogue One, they only used a single reactor's worth of power to devastate the surface of the planets (they used it twice in that movie). They didn't fully destroy either of the planets like they did with Alderaan. (granted, I don't know what percentage of the station's full power a single reactor produces, as I don't know how many reactors it has in total) Edit: Also, the 11km/s was for if the laser were fired from a planet with the mass of Earth. It had nothing to do with the speed of the debris coming from the planet it hit.

[@ryozen9413]

Good point! As for the 11km/s, all I was saying was that for a planet to blow up like we see in A New Hope, the derbies would need to fly apart at a much greater velocity than 11km/s (earth's escape velocity). Therefore, the laser would need to be much more powerful to achieve this.

[@evknucklehead]

He never says that the debris would only be reaching escape velocity based on the calculations. He says that it will be enough to completely disrupt the bonds of gravity for the entire mass of the planet. Reaching escape velocity isn't destroying the gravity of a planet, which putting the GBE into the planet does. Besides, as the mass of the planet decentralizes, the escape velocity of each remnant will be much lower due to each fragment having less mass than the intact planet. I do admit that I got confused as to where you were getting the 11km/s from. I thought Kyle had given a number when he was demonstrating the effect of firing the laser from the earth.

[@psychedelicartistry]

Also Idea for a topic, how to stop the death star's momentum or any ships momentum for that matter when it comes out of hyperspace

[@lukass3409]

could you recalculate the resulting back force on the death star, under the folloing assumpoton? Since the main laser blast is composed of 8 smaller blast that are agnled towards a 9th central blast there should be some distribution of the back force around the hull of the death star. My question would be if this could provide a possible solution, , maybe by further angling or spltting the ray oy maybe by some clever construction wich distributes parts of the back-force so that its cancels itself out (at leat partly). This all of course operates under the assumption that there is a way of colliding light beams one another, such that they will conserve their inital energy in its inital state and form a unison. (i am quite sure this isn''t possible, but then also i am still baffled by the concept of laser-recoil)

[@mrp1l0t32]

You may fire when ready. *Everyone slides forward on the deck as Deja Vu plays in the background.*

[@SupermassiveGaming]

If the problem is from sudden acceleration due to the laser firing at full blast, couldn't they just slowly amp up the laser's power and avoid the acceleration issue all together?

[@odium3691]

Supermassive Gaming it is still being released all at once, wich is the issue. Now I suppose they could put the laser on ultra low power and cook the planet slowly. But that would take a little while not very showy.

[@gumlykid]

Marty Hickman serving alderaan medium rare

[@davidthornton5327]

If there is a bottle neck on the end of the laser it would amp up the power for free.. Like a hose pipe. The photons would indeed go further. Still no push back though, rather unlike a hose.

[@MageProTrue]

Don't worry guys less than in 3 years your planet will be gently destroyed :))

[@Gooberpatrol66]

He already assumes it takes all 5 seconds of the laser firing to do that

[@xx3868]

Also... Can the laser width needed as shown in the movie be enough to hold this much energy over 5 seconds?? Can that be calculated? They DO show the station moving to position and you see no chemical exhaust so maybe their anti gravity drive could counter the laser? Also wouldnt those two pressures crush the ship from both ends? or tweak it enough to break seals and windows cracks ect?

[@Kian2002]

I always thought that the tractor beam array around the Death Star superstructure was the recoil compensation system used to resist the energy discharge of the super laser; I never thought the Super laser destroyed the planet but instead super heated the planetary core, using orbital plate tectonic analysis, to punch through the mantel and cause the planetary breakup through release of convection energy given an [out] by the laser's deep impact crater?

[@SubscribersWithNoVideos-mh3ic]

_Its flaw is that someone could _*_put a mirror in front on the laser_*

[@mlok4216]

10,000 Subscribers With No Videos?? I think that a mirror with 99,99% reflectivity wouldn't withstand the 10^30 remaining Joules of energy and it would vaporize...

[@alecsmith3448]

10,000 Subscribers With No Videos?? A laser that strong would just melt the mirror.

[@rumblingend8443]

Calm down people it's a joke

[@Renniuq11]

mlok4216 [S-N] Well, even if it did just melt it, it would still reflect 99.99% of the energy until that happened, which means it would send about 10,000 times as much energy back as it absorbed before melting, which I think would still be a problem for the station on the other end. Also it might be able to divert enough energy from the laser away from the planet to let it survive. Probably not survive well, and it would still have drastic negative consequences to it, but it might not be gravitationally seperated, so... worth?

[@ServantofBaal]

Or launch the torpedoes down into the laser channels and cause them to collapse, and likely destroy the weapon system. Seriously, giant chasms like that leading to the main weapon system that could easily disable it and they want to try and risk the thermal exhaust port, a much smaller target? Just bombard the laser channels into oblivion

[@ibexing6383]

Because Science, I am completely hooked on your videos. Your ability to make out very little in mistakes in the design of imaginary objects and heroes is impressive to say the least. Your personality is also the main reason I watch your videos. Your enthusiasm and ability to make something seemingly boring to something exciting through your drawings will surely lead you to success💫

[@daleburks5790]

Well what if it was that dense and there is artificial gravity on the ceiling that pulls at 14 G while the actual station has 15 G so it is comfortable (I think I don’t know if that’s how it works) Loved the show thanks

[@petercampbell4220]

The opening sequence alarm panels look like nuc plant alarm panels, from a 1970's design power plant.