Thanks to Talk Polywell for the links to several more articles on Mach Propulsion
Keith H. Wanser from the University of California has used Newton’s second law to explain propellantless acceleration, and he explicitly compares his findings to Woodward’s work on the Mach Effect.
Utilizing Newton’s second law of motion, it is shown that an isolated system consisting of two particles with time variable masses interacting with each other via Newton’s third law forces and no net external force can produce a DC (unidirectional) acceleration of the center of mass of the system, without any net loss or gain of mass in a cyclic process. There is no rocket type thrust in the usual sense of ejecting propellant, since it is supposed that there is no relative velocity along the direction of motion associated with the mass changes. A surprising result is that it is necessary to rederive the expression for the acceleration of the center of mass of a system when the masses are time variable, the usual expression producing zero acceleration of the center of mass under very general conditions of time variable masses and any Newton’s third law forces of interaction between them. There is no violation of momentum conservation, since the total mechanical momentum of the two particle system is not conserved, a result which is independent of the exact mechanism for producing the time variable masses. Explicit expressions are obtained for the acceleration of the center of mass and time rate of change of the total momentum for a simple model of forces and mass fluctuations with harmonic time variation. Implications of these results are discussed, including their application to propellantless Mach Effect Thruster’s (MET’s).
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Using two masses you need one mass much larger than the other mass. The larger mass is the anchor and provides a non-accelerated frame while the smaller mass provides the accelerated frame or mass modulated frame.
To further maximize the effect you need to mix frequencies to create asymmetric acceleration. There is a 1f frequency say A*sin(w*t)+1/2*A*(sin(2*w*(t+%pi/4)))+… and the series can continue to maximize the asymmetry in acceleration.
The missing momentum I suspect is that large accelerations create friction with the vacuum which creates a bulge in the vacuum expanding the plank length, speeding up time, reducing mass, and behaves as negative gravity (i.e. its repulsive. I think its symbolic of pumping energy into the vacuum. It makes the accelerated object feel heavier but that’s because of something like friction with the vacuum via increased interaction and energy being lost. I think it is similar to the black hole merging effect where black holes under rapid acceleration lose energy to the vacuum and merge.
I think if the local space can be inflated enough the effect might allow for FTL non-local behavior while in actuality locally everything still behaves as if its behaving at the speed of light. This would be due to the inflated vacuum and increased non-local speed of light.
Enough stored energy needs to be built up to the point these effects. There are speculated systems of black holes where asymmetric acceleration leads to propulsion.