I meant that the sun would be in the plane of rotation, so that one side
of the ring would eclipse the opposite side, thus sheilding it from
direct exposure. The fresnel lenses would be an extension of the
cylinder, so that the opposite face would get light bent around the
north and south ends of the ring. Yes, using this, more light could be
gathered when further away from the sun, but the downside is that with
structures of such intermediate size, the "day" would equal the period
of rotation, and would be more like the minute hand on the clock.
Possibly a seriously disorienting experience, going through 48 light
cycles in a day, but possibly balanced by artificial lighing. They could
however, alternate between reflective and refractive states, thus
allowing natural lighting for the full circuit, and having colony wide
day and night cycles.
-- TANSTAAFL!!!Michael Lorrey ------------------------------------------------------------ President retroman@tpk.net Northstar Technologies Agent Lorrey@ThePentagon.com Inventor of the Lorrey Drive Silo_1013@ThePentagon.com
Website: http://www.tpk.net/~retroman/ Now Featuring: Mikey's Animatronic Factory http://www.tpk.net/~retroman/animations.htm My Own Nuclear Espionage Agency (MONEA) MIKEYMAS(tm): The New Internet Holiday Transhumans of New Hampshire (>HNH) ------------------------------------------------------------ Transhumanist, Inventor, Webmaster, Ski Guide, Entrepreneur, Artist, Outdoorsman, Libertarian, Arms Exporter-see below. ------------------------------------------------------------ #!/usr/local/bin/perl-0777---export-a-crypto-system-sig-RC4-3-lines-PERL @k=unpack('C*',pack('H*',shift));for(@t=@s=0..255){$y=($k[$_%@k]+$s[$x=$_ ]+$y)%256;&S}$x=$y=0;for(unpack('C*',<>)){$x++;$y=($s[$x%=256]+$y)%256; &S;print pack(C,$_^=$s[($s[$x]+$s[$y])%256])}sub S{@s[$x,$y]=@s[$y,$x]}