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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Pbartender" data-source="post: 3198166" data-attributes="member: 7533"><a href="http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=3197019&postcount=50" target="_blank">...Or the overload of fuel tends to make them explode?</a>   <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />I kind of like that.   <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /> Better yet, you simply use a fusion ramjet to scoop away all the available fuel within a given volume of space -- these things will need to scoop in interstellar hydrogen and helium from a swath several light seconds or light minutes wide in order to collect enough fuel.  Ramjet passing through the area before it filled itself back in would suddenly die out.What's more, a persuing ship would have to be careful not get caught in the tracks of its prey, lest they get the wind taken out of their sails, so to speak...  A lead ship would leave a tunnel through the interstellar medium, with a thin, concentrated, but slowly expanding, trail of ionized/plasma exhaust down the middle of it.  If you're not careful, a trailing ship could get stuck in the empty tunnel, without an operable ramjet.But remember...  Just because the ramjet dies out, doesn't mean you're dead in the water.  You still have your forward momentum, and you still have any other drives and maneuvering you'd have available.  You just lose the big, long-lasting efficient engines is all.  You use your thrusters to get out of the dead zone, and fire up the ranjet again.</blockquote>

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