Could the death star really be constructed ??

Disregarding the in-fantasy-everything-is-possible argument, could it been possible to build? i mean, it was much, much larger then everything ever constructed on the GFFA. It would be beyond the tecnologycal and financial possibilities of the galaxy, perhabs not too far from the mass of the 8km deep planet-wide coruscant city. On our earth, it would be like constructing a plane the mass of NYC and in only a few years (i think it would be even bigger then that)...it would take the world entire GDP to build it (the a380 will cost more then 7 billion US$ to develop), and it would be even tecnologically impossible to make it. It would even raise questions (like in SW) on whether it could be destroyed once constructed...


Make your comments about it disregarding fantasy

 

With the sheer volume of material needed, I wonder how they were able to keep it's construction so secret that not even a smuggler like Han Solo would be aware of such a large project.

Also, it would have been a great place to scavenge raw materials after it blew up.

 

In the Star Wars Universe... anything is possible.

I too am confused as to how the construction was kept secret, it would be impossible for not for the odd rumour to go flying around. Perhaps we can assume that Imperial Security is very thorough?

 

It possibly could be built, it would take a very long time and be very expensive though. Why would you want to build one anyway?

 

There was some mention in the EU *cough* cough* about there being some kind of black hole/collapsed star or something that kept the production hidden. My memory escapes me of what exactly it was.

It was a post-Trilogy book that dealt with a brilliant young high-ranking female officer of the Empire.

 

Yes, it is possible to build one with the military might of the Empire (especially all of the resources that it controlled ) and the advancement of the technology in the Star Wars Universe at that time.


It would definately take much time, but if you remember the plans came about by the Geonosions under the direction of Count Dooku (Darth Tyranus) then it is safe to assume that it was built inbetween AOTC and ANH, which seems logical.



According to the CUSWE:

The satellite-sized battle station was designed by Tol Sivron at the Maw installation, and was built by Bevel Lemelisk and Imperial Engineering. It was believed that the original theories and plans behind the Death Star were developed by the Geonosians, under the direction of Darth Tyranus.



It [the Death Star] was built in orbit around the prison world Despayre. Labor for the construction was taken at will from the prison below. When the first Death Star was complete, Tarkin ordered the superlaser tested on the planet Despayre itself. Needless to say, this initial test exceeded even Tarkin's wildest dreams.



This may seem surprising, as it was not kept a secret from the public at all. However, the actual purpose of the weapon was kept a secret-

The superlaser was designed to be targeted at anything from a capital ship to a planet. This objective was known only to a select few, for Tarkin and the Maw's top scientists decided that they should downplay the role of superweapon to keep the project on schedule. They told the project engineers that the station would be used to break down dead planets in an effort to reach the core of elements easier.


This, of course, being a lie since it was Tarkin who ordered a superweapon be created for him to be able to control the entire outer rim, and Emperor Palpatine himself who contracted the basis of the project.


It is safe to say that the Death Star was built in a number of steps, the last being its final design in the Maw Installation and its construction over Despayre.


Darth Banal: It was called the Maw Installation, a secret scientific "factory" of sorts, located in middle of the cluster know as the Maw Black Hole. It was commanded by Admiral Daala, the highest ranking women officer in the Imperial Navy and personal patron to Grand Moff Tarkin himself.



In reponse to why it was built:


Grand Moff Tarkin had asked for a superweapon with which he could control the entire Outer Rim Territory, and the Death Star was the result. It housed a huge superlaser which combined the output of multiple lasers into a single, focused beam. A huge focusing lens was built to accomplish this; it located on the upper hemisphere.




So, in conclusion, yes it is possible to build a Death Star in the Star Wars Universe.


Ken Kenobi- And you have a nice day

 

The easiest way would be to use or tow a metal rich asteroid of the desired size to the location you would want and use the material on hand.

 

Give me a week,glue,paper mache,wire and an empty washing up liquid bottle and you shall have your Death Star!

Oh and cookies and a barbie doll!

 

bump!

 

What really amazes me is not how they managed to construct a space station that is tens or hudreds of miles in diameter.

The real question would be, how the heck they get the propulsion needed to move this gigantic battle station at supraluminal speed?

 

In space there is no mass or resistance (as long as you are far enough away from any gravity producing objects) so, once it was built it would be moving around with no problems.

 

What the ......?????

Of course there is mass in space!!!!!

There is no resistance by AIR. But if the DS were hipotetically built at rest, it would take a force directly proportional to its mass to put it in motion and accelerate it.

Go read Newton´s laws of motion

 

Yes, make no mistake, even with super strong, super lightweight materials the DS is going to be massive.

There are designs, some in great detail, of building large orbital colonies in (for example) the shape of a cylinder, it rotates along its axis for gravity. On one end you could attach or nuclear(Or one day anti matter) engine that would propel it through space, albiet at what might be a slow acceleration. In this case it would have to be a slow acceleration so it does not mess with the gravity provided by the rotation of the cylinder.

The DS, and its pseudo science, has to have control of gravity and it can have whatever acceleration it wants up to the abilities of its thrusters vs its mass, and not disturb the occupants.

 

How does the Death Star move, you ask?......



Propulsion


Repulsors

The region within approximately six diameters from a habitable world is known as "antigrav range". Within this zone the use of repulsorlift against the planet's gravitational field is a more efficient means of support or outward propulsion than the ion-drive sublight thrusters which are most useful in deep space. The Death Star I fired upon the planet Alderaan shortly after reaching this proximity. The fact that a control room technician announced the station's passage through this threshold in the novel of A New Hope implies that the Death Star was able to support itself using immense repulsor fields. At this distance from Alderaan, if the battle station supported itself entirely by repulsorlift, without engaging in any orbital motion, then its repulsors would need to oppose the local gravitational field strength of about 0.07 m / s². This characterises the lower limits of the accelerative ability of Death Star I's repulsors.

This observation accords well with the physics of Return of the Jedi, and might be able to help solve a minor mystery. As will be detailed below, the Death Star II required a significant repulsorlift force to sustain it in a low orbit about the sanctuary moon of Endor. Naturally, the second battle station could not have provided its own repulsor support during the early stages of construction, but it is comforting to know that repulsors of sufficient magnitude to lift a Death Star were within the reach of Imperial military engineering. at least during the earliest phases of the Endor construction, the ground installation which generated the security deflector shield would also have provided an upwards repulsorlift force.


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Sublight drives

The sublight drives of the Death Stars were not conspicuous when the battle stations were viewed from afar. Various sources claim that the sublight engines were housed around the equatorial waistband, but the actual nozzles were too small to be seen from more than a few kilometres away. The Mandel blueprints indicate that there are 68 "antimatter engines", which presumably are the sublight drives.

The tiny size of the sublight drives in proportion to the whole vessel is an important hint to the nature of this technology: clearly the effectiveness of this propulsion mechanism does not increase greatly according to the aperture area.

Though not impotent, the sublight drives of the Death Star were not strong enough to move the battle station's immense bulk around the planet Yavin in less than half an hour. According to dimensions of the Yavin system calculable from data in Galaxy Guide 2: Yavin and Bespin, the average of the velocity of the Death Star in this trajectory must have been of the order of 400km/s. Of course a sustained acceleration would make any sublight velocity attainable after a sufficient time, but this was the maximum attainable within the constraints of time and the celestial mechanics of the Yavin system.

Rebel starfighters were capable of accelerating well enough to meet the Death Star within only a few minutes. Unsurprisingly, this is much better speed than the battle station could make.

The STAR WARS blueprints quote the maximum acceleration of the first Death Star as "0.0001 grav", which probably means a ten-thousandth of the surface gravity of a standard habitable planet. This would mean something like 0.001 m / s² in metric units. If the Death Star I emerged from hyperspace at rest with respect to Yavin then it would have taken over four and a half days to accelerate to its proper orbital velocity. Either the "0.0001 grav" is in error, has been misinterpreted by me or else vessels are able to emerge from hyperspace at whatever realspace velocity the pilots choose.

For the Death Star II to achieve mobility and firepower similar to its predecessor, its po

 

Wonderful post Ken Kenobi, very detailed, but now that we're into the murky depths of the fabled 'Star Wars Physics', don't be surprised if it all changes tomorrow

 

It seems perfectly reasonable to me that the construction could be kept secret. It could have taken place in an isolated system that was protected by a few Star Destroyers that dealt with any ships that entered the system. As for resources, If you accept EU the empire contained over a million worlds so I'd say almost anything was possible.

 

Why would we want to build one? To blow up planets!!

 

Many asteroids exist in large sizes that are metal rich. Much of the metal in them comes pre-smelted as it were.

The only thing that stops us Earthlings from building large structures in space is money, the know-how is already there. Space travel is expensive for the time being.