Talk:Hyperloop/Archive 2

Ralph Purtcher (talk · contribs) has added the following 'Human factors considerations' section: "The low-pressure tube would be breached in certain rare circumstances. Such circumstances might include structural failure due to land slide, seal failure, terrorist attack or natural disaster. It has been claimed that rapid re-pressurisation of the tube and that debris carried with it would put nearby pods at high risk of destruction, and may require re-pressurisation of the entire loop, putting it out of action for long periods. The exact risks and safety mechanisms that would be deployed in such an event were not discussed in Elon Musk's White Paper, and so have been the subject public doubts about the project^[1]."

I have no problem with a criticism section. My main problem with the above is that it is unsupported except for a YouTube video by a crank. Get some industry experts in a professional reporting media and we've got something worth listening to. This is covered by WP:PROVEIT.

Also, such things as terrorist attack and natural disaster could be equally applied to normal trains. I haven't seen a train article that says what happens if a terrorist blows up a section of track and waits for a high speed passenger to come. Seal failure due to age and poor maintenance (ie likely scenarios) woudl be a more appropriate topic to cover.  Stepho  talk  01:40, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes, there's no issue with having a Criticisms or Risks section, but that source is completely unusable. Beyond being unreliable, he gets so much wrong its silly. — Huntster (t @ c) 02:41, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

The thing is: The failure of one bus, train, car or airplane does not automatically cause a cascade of failures of other buses, trains, cars or airplanes along the same route. At the proposed 30 second headway, one capsule coming to a rapid standstill would not allow the next capsule to brake in time and keep people in it alive before slamming into the next one. You would need a deceleration higher than humans can survive. And the problem of rapid re-pressurization is indeed unique to the Hyperloop and poses similar challenges. While a Youtube video might not be the best source for this, the criticism certainly is valid and may have already been raised in more quotable sources. Hobbitschuster (talk) 22:59, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

The thing is: one bus, train, car or airplane can cause a cascade of failures. A car or bus can fail on the freeway (eg front wheel falls off) and crash into other cars or have others crash into it. We see trains derail on one track and then have a train going in the opposite direction on the other track hit it. A part fell off a DC10 and caused the crash of a Concorde. I could list these types of accidents for hours. High tech, fast speed and lots of passengers has always been a risky business. I'm sure Hyperloops will have some form a failure in the future but that the risk will be no worse than what we have now for other modes of transport. So, risk of failure is not the issue here.

The real issue is having professional opinion on modes of failure and those opinions being in reliable media (ie not an opinion piece in the New York Times and definitely not Joe Random in his own video on YouTube).  Stepho  talk  04:40, 29 July 2016 (UTC)

Thing is, the destruction of one airport, or one vehicle, usually doesn't shut down the entire transportation system, since there are alternative roads or airports for the independent vehicle, now you might say, "Trains have this same vulnerability". But yet, if a Train carriage slips off the tracks, people can escape from the Train cars easily once they have come to a halt, whereas a Hyperloop bogie would have to contend with a vacuum sealed tube system and very intermittent emergency exits, which would obviously create a huge logistical challenge for both emergency responders and evacuation procedures, if there was also a tube failure, it would likely be massive due to the vacuum pressures involved.

Therefore, if there were to be a catastrophic vacuum failure, there would be massive fatalities due to the pressure wave generated from the tube failure rupturing the Hyperloop bogies, i can't imagine what that situation would be like for terrorists. Even excluding those problems, due to there only being one station, what if someone had say a heart attack? Or was violently sick on the bogie? They wouldn't have any easily reachable first-aid kits, defibrillators, washrooms or areas to perform CPR.

I just think this article is way too positive on the outline of the Hyperloop and many media outlets just simply have got their heads in the clouds on this project, i think this article needs to be grounded a bit more in reality and the reality of the situation, even though this youtube is a minor youtuber, he has gone to university and (i think) has gotten a degree in either Physics or Chemistry, since he has videos where he works in a nuclear reactor facility, i just think we shouldn't dismiss citizen science so quickly or easily. On your other point about op-eds by publications like the NYT, the writers often don't have credentials in Physics or complete unbiased understanding of situation, because many columnists simply disregard the problems with this project, which i highly think to be unscientific. --RuleTheWiki (talk) 03:35, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

Never mind the fact that a recent estimate of the cost to build the Hyperloop would round out to be $100 billion USD. --RuleTheWiki (talk) 04:35, 30 July 2016 (UTC)^[1]

Let's do the cost one first. It has a decent reference, so no problem of you want to add it to the article. But don't use both the '$' and the 'D' because they both represent 'dollar'.

The destruction of one vehicle can stop an entire transport system - or least a decent size chunk of it. An airplane crash at an airport stops the entire airport - especially if the plane hit the control tower. A car/bus crash on the freeway during rush hour can cause grid lock for hours afterwards. A derailed train can take that track out of commissioned for days.

Your other point about passengers not being able to exit in the case of an accident (as opposed to a train accident) is unknowable until we know more about the capsule. If the tube was ruptured and the capsule stopped then it is quite possible for the capsule design to have an escape hatch at the rear. Some of the capsules shown so far have oxygen supplies so that passengers can wait for rescue. Some also have a battery and small wheel motor so that the capsule can trundle slowly home (assuming it can avoid the tube hole, possibly going backwards).

Heart attacks, etc: same deal if it happened on a long distance bus - sometimes life sucks.

You haven't shown decent references that the Hyperloop is inherently more dangerous than most other high speed forms of transport. If the Hyperloop has an especially risky basis to it then it is likely that someone with decent credentials has done an article in a respectable journal. A self-publisher YouTube video (even from a university graduate) doesn't cut it - see WP:SELFPUBLISHED.

If the NYT has an opinion piece and reports something simple like the date a milestone was realised then I am happy to accept that. If the same writer starts reporting about physics then I will want to see some better credentials. Does that writer normally cover technology subjects? What is the writers technological background? Where did he get his information from?  Stepho  talk  08:59, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

Ok, i'll acknowledge that if SpaceX (the company the owns the Hyperloop) haven't released detailed materiel on what the Hyperloop or its bogies will be constructed upon, then then it is fair to argue that we cannot pass judgement on the strength and the ability of the Bogies & Tube to be damaged.

However, your assumption that if one plane crashed into an Air Traffic Control tower, subsequently shutting down the entire airport, is nonsensical, as the Aircraft still have sensors on them that relay their location to other aircraft in the area, not withstanding the fact that the pilot can either keep the Aircraft in a holding pattern, or can divert to another Airport, thus negating the fact of the destruction. Cars on a highway can still get off at different exits if a single crash blocks the road, it also generally doesn't cause the entire system to stop moving as would be the case with the Hyperloop.

Sorry if i also meant escape hatches on the capsule, that's not what i was implying, i was trying to say that on the actual vacuum tube itself, there is a startling absence of regular emergency evacuation points along the tube, if there are any planned, this makes my previous case stand true, if people are seriously injured then first-responders wouldn't be able to reach them inside the tube, or they wouldn't be able to last out the resources that they have inside the Bogies and would dehydrate etc. Also the second proposition of mine that you said wouldn't need to be worried about was the lack of Defibralltors or space to operate them in the Hyperloop, while concepts differ about how the interior of the Bogie will be designed, if the individual seat proposition is to be selected, then they would have a problem with the ability to resuscitate and revive passengers, making it like a literal death trap, compounding the problem is that there isn't enough free space for people to either use a vomit bag etc.

Due to this, i suspect the article has to inject a bit of doubt into it, as it seems relatively optimistic and biased about the project at hand, which i think isn't a very good idea. --RuleTheWiki (talk) 09:15, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

I note that provisions have been added from my talk discussion and that is welcomed, the only issue now is the issue of the vulnerability of the system due to different shocks, like economic (ticket prices, economic slowdown affecting regularity etc) political, (i.e. terrorism or the California state government) and systemic (explosion of one of the bogies causing tube rupture, emergency evacuation affecting all other cars). These situations would not affect a normal road, train or airway system, due the multiple options for diversion and resilience of the said networks. Therefore it should stand to reason that these issues be supported in the article. Also another reference for the Hyperloop vulnerabilities. Not to mention the fact that this mode of transport brings the impracticality of space transport down on land.^[1] --RuleTheWiki (talk) 09:09, 31 August 2016 (UTC)

WP:VERIFY says that any claim made in an article requires supporting references from reliable, published sources. The YouTube video is WP:SELFPUBLISHED - so it doesn't count. The Daily Caller reference is froma journalist who watched that exact same video - so it doesn't count either. So far you have no reliable references to back up your claims.

Without supporting references I have 2 choices. If I think that there is a reasonable chance that the claim is true then I can mark it with a {{cn}} tag and hope that somebody finds a supporting reference in the near future. Or if I think that there is a reasonable chance that the claim is false then I can just delete it. You have repeatedly said that a little bit of thought shows it to be true but every time I put thought into it I find your claims fall over.

You claim that in case of a failure the entire system fails and that this is somehow unique. Yet exactly the same thing happens when a train derails. You haven't defined what you mean by "system". I have assumed "system" means a single route, similar to a train track. To make a concrete example, lets assume you had a number of Hyperloop tracks leaving San Fran, one towards Seattle, one towards Dallas and one towards Mexico city. Also assume the Dallas line has further spurs that go off to other cities (but not physically part of the San Fran-Dallas line itself). If the Seattle line failed then your claim says the entire system fails, including Dallas, Mexico City and beyond. Obviously this is not true. Which is exactly like a train being derailed - it takes down one route, not the entire system.

Similar for airports. The air crash at Dubai airport a few weeks ago shutdown the airport for half a day and caused considerable trouble for a significant amount of air travellers between Europe, Asia and Africa as flights were delayed, turned back or diverted across half the globe (Dubai is a major hub for entering and leaving Europe). So your claim that airway systems are robust against single failures has been shown to be false by practical example.

Similar for roads. I personally have been in traffic jams that lasted hours in multiple countries (Australia, Sweden, China) caused by a single accident on a major highway during rush hour.

You claim that access to defibrillators is not possible. Wouldn't this be the same as having a heart attack in a Cessna in flight? Or on a long distance bus. Not unique at all. Not being able to stand hasn't outlawed Cessnas and a lack of defibrillators a long way from hospitals hasn't outlawed long distance buses or outlawed living outside of cities. And I am certain that they can design a defibrillator kit that can be used in seated conditions.

I could similarly go through the other claims made in the video and show that either the claims are so much rubbish or are not unique to the Hyperloop. But in the end it comes down to one thing - you must back up your claims with references from reliable, published sources.  Stepho  talk  22:50, 31 August 2016 (UTC)

You're not the one who gets to decide facts though, you can't just delete viable criticism of the concept of the Hyperloop. To address your claims, the same thing doesn't happen when a train derails, as there are connections that can be made to different rail lines. Also, the fact that you claim there "will be a number of Hyperloop tracks" isn't even factored into the white paper, you're the one throwing out hypotheticals without them even being announced by the company yet. Thats my point, the fact that you're talking about multiple Hyperloop Tracks is what astounds me, they haven't even planned that yet!

As for the claim about the Dubai Airport crash, they had other airports to go to, like in Saudi Arabia, Qatar or Oman, sure it might have caused massive delays but it didn't shut down the entire system! The thing is, that planes have the freedom to move around, not confined to a single space, unlike the Hyperloop which is restricted in more ways than one, owing to the closed-loop system and the space-like conditions of the track. As for roads, i mean come on at least you have a chance to divert the traffic, or go off onto an interchange, its not like being confined in a vacuum sealed transport system.

As for a Cessna, you're comparing Apples and Oranges, one is a major public transport initiative (The Hyperloop), the other is personal-like aircraft, at least people aren't confined in a long-distance bus as they are in the Hyperloop, which is so tightly packed together that you wouldn't be able to do CPR or use a defibrillator. All of those factors you've listed have some degree of self-control or a quick emergency plan, unlike the Hyperloop, which has no reliable emergency exit plan, or easily accessible escape hatches.

From my perspective, you're the one making the baseless claims about the Hyperloop, not me. --RuleTheWiki (talk) 07:53, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Nonetheless, I added his video to the Criticism section and used language that put his video's content and his statements down as "claims" (as should this entire article) rather than phrasing them on the page as factual, so as to prevent the page from appearing or being biased. Bitsdotliestalk 08:05, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

May I interrupt the argument for a moment with a voice of reason?

Talks pages exist merely to discuss improving the article. They are not about the thinking and analysis of particular editors about why this or that design approach—or missing factor in the design approach—may or may not work, or be safe, or be compliant with this or that governmental regulatory body. That all will (and is getting) hashed out in the real world, in real stuff that is built, and in news and book sources, or in scholarly sources, etc. Talk pages are also not to be about "the editor"; rather, they are and should be about the content of the encyclopedia. So neither the fact that, nor allegation that, editor n believes xyz is relevant to this Talk page.

So let's make it about improving the article, with reliable sources with qualitycitations and not the other stuff.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled programming and discussion. Cheers. N2e (talk) 12:56, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Agreed, WP:RS should rule this discussion.  Stepho  talk  22:19, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Here. I found a source for my claims, by a reptuable person, w/credentials. http://www.mercurynews.com/troy-wolverton/ci_23856460/wolverton-elon-musks-hyperloop-hype-ignores-practical-problems — Preceding unsigned comment added by RuleTheWiki (talk • contribs) 13:57, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Yes, that reference is reasonable. He quotes industry experts and doesn't make wild claims.  Stepho  talk  05:11, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

Dr. Mason went way outside of his field of expertise and shows a dearth of basic physics and engineering concepts. It's been thoroughly debunked by others. His portion should be removed, or references to the debunkings included. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLSPi1JFx4_-Gz0Fm0qq2KUz4c22UbZCco 71.88.248.125 (talk) 20:19, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

Yep, as detailed in the long discussion above, a self made YouTube video by someone who is not an engineer and not a recognised expert in the field is not a reliable source, as per WP:RS. Let's delete it yet again.  Stepho  talk  14:14, 31 December 2016 (UTC)

There is no need to argue over it, try to start one or self-advertise, just remove the incriminating links and discuss it in the Talk page. Not that it matters but that's not much of a "debunking" by your own definition; it appears the video's OP possesses no degree in the sciences at all, and the person he collaborated with has yet to even complete his school to earn a bachelor's. Bitsdotliestalk 05:01, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

If I interpret you correctly, then we can just completely drop Mason's video and the video debunking him. Good, I'm happy with that.  Stepho  talk  04:49, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

@Stepho-wrs: -- Gaming the WP System I think we agree that hyperloop claims outstrip current technology. For them to make their way into the article, a company executive says them to a reporter who describes them as claims. We discount the tech rags. We accept Fortune or NYT. The claims remain fanciful, but they get published. On the other hand, we have to discount Mason for the reasons described already. To get a credible and notable source, a professional would have to be paid to disprove a claim. He or she would have to be interviewed, and the reference find its way into the article. Who's going to pay to disprove a claim? What's the payoff for a journalist to claim hyperloop is vaporware? The system advantages the commercially motivated narrative. When the next (almost) credible source publishes something that sounds skeptical, I suggest we be more accepting. Rhadow (talk) 18:34, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

• Hello Stepho-wrs The article -- and the talk page for that matter -- is a place to discuss the article and sources. We don't do engineering here. The speed of sound has nothing to do with sea level pressure. It is dependent on temperature. Let's wait for a reliable secondary source to talk about whether hyperloop can exceed the speed of sound and the tube tolerate the sonic boom, not speculate. Rhadow (talk) 00:21, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

Um, not sure your point here. The article said that the Hyperloop would not produced sonic booms because it only ran at 760mph. The supplied Bizweek reference mentioned nothing about sonic booms, nor about the speed of the Hyperloop. Therefore I removed the unsupported claim about sonic booms. Where have I added sonic boom speculation to the article?  Stepho  talk  01:04, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

I suggest readers would be better served by a more cynical approach to press accounts of commercial competitors in the Hyperloop arena. A critical read of press accounts including speeds, costs, routes, and development schedules will indicate the speculative nature of most assertions. Hyper Chariot was deleted quickly and reasonably. Arrivo was deleted, reasonably, for being TOOSOON. Now it's back, apparently with a contract in hand. Zeleros may also be TOOSOON. Hyperloop will soon reach the 100K standard for long articles. We need to start thinking about what doesn't belong. Rhadow (talk) 13:09, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Hyperloop pod competition already has its own article, so that section can be reduced to a single paragraph. Many of the entries in the 'Hyperloop companies' section have full articles, so those can also be reduced to single paragraphs. In fact, the whole 'Hyperloop companies' section can be split into its own article with just a single paragraph left here. The 'Proposed routes' section is basically a list of 'company X has proposed route Y', so might be better handled in the new 'Hyperloop companies' article with just the original proposal left in the 'Initial design concept' section. That should cut it down to about half without losing any information.  Stepho  talk  12:31, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

The majority of the Hyperloop project is still conceptual. The Hyperloop One test in earlier this year demonstrated only the propulsion system, and did not address the feasibility (or the lack thereof) of the vacuum chamber, the pods, or the other functions and engineering features of the project. I suggest that the page's text and phrasing be made to emphasize that it is as of yet a concept, and there has been no physical demonstration that it will or will not work. I made a few changes to the text to start putting this change into action in the introduction/summary section, as well as added a link to the Hyperloop Alpha in my recent edit/undo. Bitsdotliestalk 04:47, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

From the article "Hyperloop is a proposed mode of passenger and freight transportation". The word 'proposed' covers what you are trying to say and says it in the second meaningful word of the article. I changed your offsite jump (usually a surprise to the reader) to a reference. I also changed a few other things to make them clearer and more within the way that things are normally laid out on WP. I hope I have kept the spirit of what you wanted.

I did however remove the claim about what to do for emergency passenger evacuation. The given reference did not cover that. We can add it back in but only if we have a reference from a reliable source (see WP:RS).

The Mercury reference asks what happens during a power outage. The alpha doc already covered this on page 53. I left this as a comment rather than go into a point by point refutation of the Mercury article.  Stepho  talk  04:43, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Given the current language, would it be preferable to change the tense from "... is a proposed mode of transport... that propels..." to "... that would propel..."? I think they're both technically correct, though I think the latter one probably sounds better. Scoundr3l (talk) 23:30, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

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"According to Musk, Hyperloop would be useful on Mars as no tubes would be needed because Mars' atmosphere is about 1% the density of the Earth's at sea level. For the Hyperloop concept to work on Earth, low-pressure tubes are required to reduce air resistance. However, if they were to be built on Mars, the lower air resistance would allow a Hyperloop to be created with no tube, only a track."

Should this part of the article remain? Hyperloop without the tubes is in the end not particularly different from a Maglev, which already exists on Earth. Sarrotrkux (talk)

Not quite. The original paper on hyperloop relied on aerodynamic forces to raise the pod, not magnetic levitation. Hence it wouldn't work in a vacuum on the Moon but is likely to work in a rarefied atmosphere like on Mars. It would still need some form of rail or guideline and propulsion and power systems similar to the Earth bound system.  Stepho  talk  09:22, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

I was wondering if anyone knows af any group discussion about transforming the hyperloop concept into a way to travel with an electric car on long distances. It seems to me a good idea especially because range is the main obstacle to electric car success. How to effectively accomplishing it I dont know, I have many ideas from car rental at stations to street capable mini pods. The low pressure environment simplifies things in one way and complicates them in another, security concerns are obvious. Anyway, just checking, thanks, Bepi

sorryifiamwrong (talk) 19:19, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

In the intro it says:

"The paper conceived of a hyperloop system that would propel passengers along the 350-mile (560 km) route at an average speed of around 800 mph (1,300 km/h), with a top speed of 760 mph (1,200 km/h)"

How can the top speed be lower than the average speed?

Yogarine (talk) 13:41, 28 February 2018 (UTC)

I removed the 800mph claim. It's not mentioned in the source.

I can't see anything about it that is a loop. It's just a single tube running between A and B. If a second tube went back to A again, you could call it a loop, but I haven't seen any version of the concept that looks like that. Is Musk picking up a name from some previous version of this vacuum idea that was called a loop? UBJ 43X (talk) 15:36, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Musk named it and he likes quirky, grandiose names.  Stepho  talk  19:32, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

I've created an article for the proposed Missouri Hyperloop, perhaps the most developed hyperloop proposal in the United States. However, I have little specialized knowledge about the technology itself. If anyone can enhance the article please do. Grey Wanderer (talk) 23:18, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

I've noticed that there is no consistency in the article with whether or not the word "hyperloop" is capitalized. Is there an industry standard? On a grammatical level does it function like say "Linux" (since it is open tech) or like, say, "solid state drive"? Justin Grove (talk) 12:32, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Possibly because there is no longer any (official) consistency over what constitutes the system. It no longers bears any resemblance to the distinguishing features that Musk elaborated (air-suspension, turbine-propelled), and has devolved, or evolved, for the most part into the concept that it was intended originally to displace: vacuum-tunnel maglev. It's a no-name orphan like the abandoned kitten my brother brought home one day which never got any name that stuck beyond 'cat'. JohndanR (talk) 16:51, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

• "Abu Dhabi explores Hyperloop link with Al Ain, potentially transforming cruise tourism in the city" (https://cruisearabiaonline.com/middle-east-cruise-news/2016/12/12/Abu-Dhabi-explores-Hyperloop-link-with-Al-Ain--potentially-transforming-cruise-tourism-in-city) --Sinucep (talk) 15:52, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Suggest either expanding or removing the section about potential hyperloop on Mars. It currently describes the potential to construct a hyperloop on Mars without a tube. But the low-pressure tube is the sine qua non of hyperloop; without it you've just got a maglev train. If there is really something "hyperloopy" about the envisioned Mars train, it needs to be identified, otherwise this section should be removed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.71.185.176 (talk) 16:38, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Why In the Year 2889, the Jule Verne book is not even mentionned ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.153.88.139 (talk) 13:55, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Plenty of information about the actions of various hyperloop corporations were extensively documented already in the article under the relevant development sections. There was also the issue of advertising language in the section, as well as extensive details about the history of those companies. This article should remain on the topic of hyperloop, not on corporate promotion or corporate history unrelated to the development of hyperloop. As such, the corporate section was changed into a wikitable and moved the section down the page. I mistakenly marked the move as a minor edit - sorry for any confusion. Mewnst (talk) 07:50, 23 October 2021 (UTC)

In case it matters, I have no idea whether hyperloop should be capitalized as Hyperloop in the page or not. Both are used frequently. My personal preference, if it matters, is keeping it lowercased just as "train" and "maglev" and "vactrain" are all lowercased. Mewnst (talk) 14:29, 24 October 2021 (UTC)

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): ACN98.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:45, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Historically, there are various concepts:

• George Medhurst's patent for a method of transporting goods and mail at high speed through an iron tube (1799)
• Brunel's "atmospheric railway" (1844)
• Goddard's "vactrain" (1904)

Following the recent edit warring, the article currently refers to the earlier concepts by anachronistic names. It also claims that the hyperloop is extremely closely based on the 1799 concept, although the close basis is not mentioned in the cited sources and hence contravenes WP:NPOV. Input from uninvolved editors would be appreciated. Rosbif73 (talk) 15:32, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Be aware that while the Hyperloop has much in common with those (a tube with much of the air removed), it has a fundamental difference. There is an economical and technological limit to how much air can be removed beyond which is not practical/economical to go but in general, the more air removed, the better - a pure vacuum being theoretically ideal. But Hyperloop (in the original proposal) requires a certain amount of air to remain. It is needed for fan propulsion and needed for airfoils to lift the vehicle off the floor. Removing more air would make it perform worse and in a pure vacuum it would not work at all.  Stepho  talk  22:32, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I think the position above (by Rosbif73) is a bit contradictory. On the one hand the objection is that the hyperloop concept proposed by Elon Musk is noticeably distinct from earlier versions of the idea, yet at the same time there's an objection that using terms like "vactrain" is anachronistic because these should all be termed "hyperloops" (if I've understood the point correctly). In essence we seem to be simultaneously arguing that Musk's version is distinct yet that it should also be retrospectively used to rename earlier versions of the idea. That's resulted in the article becoming a bit of a muddle with the history section almost entirely about Musk's idea and the rest of the history of the idea being added as "related projects" (a term that only really makes sense if they're "related to Musk's version" but which makes little sense if this article is just about the broader idea). Either "hyperloop" is a broad catch all term for an idea that has existed since 1799 (in which case Musk's version is just one of many versions, beyond his coining of the name) or it's specifically a modern idea first proposed by Musk that is related to earlier ideas that have different names (vactrains, etc.) It can't be both at the same time. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7D:6616:CE00:CC32:D393:2FF1:7A39 (talk) 08:11, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

There is a very simple way to separate them, stop arguing in circles on the degree of vacuum involved and focus on propulsion instead.

Since the topic is 'hyperloop', and since, by as defined, a hyperloop is NOT powered by atmospheric pressure, you can simply strip all the historical 'atmospheric propulsion' based systems out and just focus on the Goddard and later systems where low pressure is only used to reduce drag, and not as a propulsion source. To emphasise: Atmospheric propulsion is a sufficiently distinct type of transportation that it should be in it's own (linked) article and not polluting the hyperloop one. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.100.41.92 (talk) 00:43, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

Lately, a lot of people have been repeating the claim that Hyperloop was proposed to derail the California High Speed Rail project or is responsible for stalling the project. This is a very tenuous claim. The CA HSR project had been in the works since the early 1990s and was already moving at a snail’s pace for about 20 years before Musk ever mentioned Hyperloop.

Also, people are forgetting that Musk wasn’t the world’s richest man in 2012, as Tesla was still a very small company at that time.

Furthermore, the Hyperloop idea was never going to stall the HSR project, because no civil engineers were going to stop work on a proven technology (trains) to replace it with a fanciful idea exists in idea only. Marshallj25 (talk) 06:25, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

Howdy! I decided to look into this more. The claim that Musk sabotaged California High Speed Rail through Hyperloop publicity was popularized by the technology journalist and Musk critic Paris Marx, who had a popular tweet. In an interview with Gizmodo, Marx says the following:

So the Hyperloop, for example, he admitted to his biographer that the reason the Hyperloop was announced—even though he had no intention of pursuing it—was to try to disrupt the California high-speed rail project and to get in the way of that actually succeeding.

The specific Musk biographer here is the journalist Ashlee Vance, who wrote the 2015 biography Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future. The 11th chapter of the biography states thus:

At the time, it seemed that Musk had dished out the Hyperloop proposal just to make the public and legislators rethink the high-speed train. He didn’t actually intend to build the thing. It was more that he wanted to show people that more creative ideas were out there for things that might actually solve problems and push the state forward. With any luck, the high-speed rail would be canceled. Musk said as much to me during a series of e-mails and phone calls leading up to the announcement. “Down the road, I might fund or advise on a Hyperloop project, but right now I can’t take my eye off the ball at either SpaceX or Tesla,” he wrote.

In a Jalopnik piece, Vance was directly asked about whether or not Marx's interpretation was accurate. Vance's response was thus:

he called Marx’s conclusion “vaguely accurate but a disingenuous take on the situation.” From Vance’s point of view, Musk’s initial announcements on Hyperloop were “more of a reaction to how underwhelming California’s high-speed rail [proposal] was.”

In short, Musk had no love for public transportation and did desire for the California High Speed Rail to fail (which is typical of car manufacturers), but the widespread interest in Hyperloop as a sexier transport alternative was not intended. That was the work of the over-excited technology press.

I hoped this digging helped! Mewnst (talk) 03:05, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Crap, I forgot to link the Jalopnik piece checking in with Vance. Here it is. Mewnst (talk) 03:07, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Maintenance templates are not meant to be in articles permanently.

As I just made a number of changes, I probably should not be the one to remove the template. But does the template still belong, or has the article come along enough to not warrant it? -- Rei (talk) 11:59, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Which template are you referring to Rei? I have just started some copyediting and cleanup to eliminate a lot of the top-of-article orange banners, and started a new Talk section to discuss it earlier today. (see bottom of this Talk page) N2e (talk) 18:59, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

There are multiple article-level improvement tags at the top of the article, but I'm not finding any discussion on the Talk page about them. These include allegations of WP:NPOV and WP:ADVERT, as well as problems with the Criticism section.

I have begun a thorough WP:COPYEDIT of the article, looking in particular for these problems. Through the History section, I'm not seeing any of these issues. In the Proposed routes section, there are many problems, and the section length is likely WP:UNDUE for a number of what are merely early proposals and feasibility studies. I've tagged several specific issues, and added section-level tags for the more general problem.

I'll plan to continue the copyedit and working through the article, but am not seeing that the article-level tags are appropriate. I'll remove them in a few days unless other editors have reasons they should remain. Cheers. N2e (talk) 18:17, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

 Done; removed the article-level tags. Believe that a number of weak areas in the article are now tagged at the statement (often, needs a source) or at the section level. In my view, the article continues to need substantial work in those sections tagged for improvement, to avoid the article being a hodge-podge of various groups putting a Powerpoint presentation together and saying they have big ideas, while attaching the (noteable) name "Hyperloop" to whatever it is they are doing. Need some sign of serious capital raises or government commitments to make these myriad announcements be wiki-worthy. N2e (talk) 23:40, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I haven't checked, but do all pre-existing inventions and concepts become "Part of a Series About Elon Musk" as soon as he decides to start ham-fistedly muddling around in them? Are the articles on electric vehicles, social media, flamethrowers, rocketry, and neuroscience also "Part of a Series About Elon Musk"? If not, do they need to be updated to reflect his status as the preeminent factor in all things toward which he casts his glorious, shining countenanance? 2600:6C40:4300:2A6:A5C5:5D69:5D38:8344 (talk) 16:36, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Considering that he came up with the idea of using a fan and aerofoils (which require air pressure) inside a vacuum tunnel (which has minimal air pressure) and then also put his companies at work to flesh out the idea and then used his companies to run trials. I'm no Musk fanboy but yes, I do believe he should get credit for this one.  Stepho  talk  00:08, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

"I'm no Musk fanboy" - Yes. Yes you are. 24.182.239.226 (talk) 18:13, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

No, no I am not. He hypes up nearly every press release, promises things that happen much later then told. There are allegations about many of his wrong doings that I would be willing to believe (although I have no direct proof and am not making that an official claim). But when he does come through with something positive then I give him credit for that. If you believe that he didn't come up with a new wrinkle to vac tunnels then it is up to you to show that it is not sufficiently different (ie, in the requirement of partial pressure for fans and aerofoils) or that it wasn't him that came up with this new wrinkle.  Stepho  talk  22:10, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

"That word, coined by Elon Musk, constitutes his main original contribution to the technology." 2600:6C64:493F:7900:DED7:6A1C:789B:E44 (talk) 01:30, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

That's from the IEEE. 2600:6C64:493F:7900:DED7:6A1C:789B:E44 (talk) 01:30, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

See my detailed reply in #The idea was around since 1910 so how did Elon Musk propose the idea? for why that IEEE is rubbish.  Stepho  talk  06:58, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

@24.182.239.226: Your comment and name-calling make it obvious that you have an axe to grind against Musk. See WP:NOTHERE. 2001:569:7F63:5900:817E:84EF:6D3D:815A (talk) 21:28, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

I dont share that sentiment, while he put the idea into the current conscious. His involment doesnt go futher than hosting a science competition between universities. The companies which actively try to build that product In the recent years there also has not a mention of the hyperloop in any serious manner on the sides of Musk(if there was any). Its also debatable how much the competition even contributes to the specific research as the designparameters of the tube are fixed which is in contrast to maglev systems where the track and train are developed in symbiosis BikingFish (talk) 13:10, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Your "debatable" comment reminded me of the Rainhill trials. The organisers built the track and requested others to bring the engines. This is listed as a significant event in almost every train history book.  Stepho  talk  21:19, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Im not saying research is bad. But in those trials they evaluated a near production ready product(its quite normal that companies do irl tests of products, military does it often) and started a a year after its use in transport. How is this in any way comparable? This is a competition where unis train their EE students. BikingFish (talk) 21:31, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

You made a point about the track being fixed making the competition useless. I addressed this by pointing out that the Rainhill trials also had a fixed track. Fixing certain variables makes it easier to compare competing theories.  Stepho  talk  22:09, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

No, my point is that in all maglev development projects the track is developed in combination with the train. And musk never made the claim that the wants to run a train on that specific track system shortly after the competition concluded. BikingFish (talk) 22:38, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

@2600:6C40:4300:2A6:A5C5:5D69:5D38:8344: Your comment and edit make it obvious that you have an axe to grind against Musk. See WP:NOTHERE. 2001:569:7F63:5900:817E:84EF:6D3D:815A (talk) 21:28, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

silent Is The Best Answer All Stupids Question 🙂 Bijoy90 (talk) 22:38, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

In my view, while it is probably fair to include "Hyperloop" in the Musk series template, by whatever editors care to work on such templates; there is no need for THIS ARTICLE to prominently display the "Part of a series on Elon Musk" template.

PROPOSAL: I propose we remove the prominent visibility here, in the Hyperloop article, 'cause while the term and alpha concept are Muskian, the hyperloop concept and what it has come to mean in common use are clearly much much wider than Musk. — N2e (talk) 18:35, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Seeing no support for leaving it in, have removed the template. That template and the large amount of article real estate it takes put WP:UNDUE emphasis on Musk here, where Hyperloop is just one of many many ideas Musk has produced, and "Hyperloop" in this article has gone on to be in much wider use than the particular alpha concept Musk and his engineers published a decade ago. N2e (talk) 01:42, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Robert Goddar actually invented the idea of vacuum trains. It is just that Elon calls it Hyperloop instead. Synerator (talk) 06:03, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

Look at Related projects\Historical section. War (talk) 06:27, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

Synerator, you are partially correct. Vac trains have indeed been around for a long time. However, vac trains want to get as close to a power vacuum as than can, subject to to technical and economic limits. The closer to a vacuum they get then the better they perform. But Hyperloop (at least in its initially proposed form) requires a certain amount of residual atmosphere to make the aerofoils work to lift the vehicle up. If the vacuum gets too pure then the aerofoils stop working and the vehicle rubs on the floor instead of floating above it.  Stepho  talk  07:54, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

I think this overlooks the fundamental problem with this article. What we're really talking about is a lot of different variations on a single idea that has been around since the 18th century. The article makes it sound as though Elon Musk has some kind of unique claim on it simply because he was responsible for attaching the word "hyperloop" to it. I'm not interested in the kind of pro/anti Elon Musk edit war thing that seems to happen with him on Wikipedia, I just find the way this article deals with the topic a bit muddled. Part of it reads like a discussion of Musk's version and part of it reads like a discussion of the broader idea. One of the main reasons for that is the history section is almost entirely (save for the first paragraph) about Musk's idea then there's the rest of the history tacked on at the end under the heading "related projects". This doesn't make any sense because if "hyperloop" is now the word we attach to this idea (which is debatable) then these "related projects" belong in the history section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7D:6616:CE00:CC32:D393:2FF1:7A39 (talk) 07:56, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

The idea that "This article is part of a series about Elon Musk" is ridiculous. The whole article has to be recast from scratch with Musk demoted to his proper place in the succession of ideas, one of which might be his variation. Zaslav (talk) 06:07, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Well, it's his name on the hyperloop white paper. No-one is claiming that he invented vac trains - only that he thought of a new variation (partial vacuum instead of pure vacuum, using aerofoils for lift and a propeller for movement).  Stepho  talk  07:17, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

There is no variation. This is retarded, even your source, (IEEE) claims that musk's total contribution is the stupid name. 2600:6C64:493F:7900:DED7:6A1C:789B:E44 (talk) 01:28, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

I see you adhere to the Trump school of debating:

1. Always give a derogatory label (eg "retarded") to your opponent and/or their argument.
2. Don't bother addressing any point they raised. In fact, don't even bother reading what they said. After all, if they were saying anything smart then they would be agreeing with you.
3. Don't bother adding anything of substance. You've already said it's retarded with conviction. Trying to substantiate it will only sound defensive - the act of a weak player.
4. If there are 10 references against your view and 1 for it then that single reference is the only valid reference - the rest are obviously rubbish.

Let's deal with facts:

1. Vac trains work better the closer the vacuum gets to 100%. Only the ability and economics of maintaining that vacuum get in the way of going all the way.
2. The Hyperloop (at least in the alpha proposal) requires some air pressure for the air foils to work. No air pressure means no lift.
3. The Hyperloop (at least in the alpha proposal) requires some air pressure for the propulsion fans to work. No air pressure means no propulsion.
4. The addition of air foils and propulsion fan are what differentiate the Hyperloop from vac trains.
5. That IEEE reference (which was not added by me) did not address the use of air foils or propulsion fan, therefore it totally misunderstood the difference from vac trains.
6. There are many other references praising Musk. I have some respect for Musk (he does get things done) but I am not particularly a great fan of his (he also cuts corners and over-hypes things). To ignore many, many references saying the Hyperloop is great and using only a single reference that says he's a charlatan is not a balanced view. For the record, only taking the references that say he's great is also not a balanced view.
7. I do grant that many of the later implementations have dropped the air foils and fan. These later ones are in fact just vac trains and are just using the Hyperloop name as free PR.

Now, do you have anything of substance to add or are you just blowing wind?  Stepho  talk  06:55, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

I will try to answer your comments.

1. Nobody here ever made the claim that lowering pressure would not reduce drag.

2.-4. Your are hung up on the initial Whitepaper released by Musk and see its as the sole Authority on the matter. A whitepaper for developent is a theoretical Proof of concept, nobody has to validate the assumptions done in such a paper. You even ignore later statements by the very same people who authored the paper. In the "SpaceX Hyperloop Pod Competition Rules and Requirements" from 2015 they specifically do not require an air cushion as a component of a pod. Additionally you made a comparison to the Rainhill trials. This is not applicable as they used production ready locomotives in that trial. The winner model was then later used on said line. No person will ever be able to use the pods from the Hyperloop competition. Just by scaling up a model one generates engineering challenges. Some aspects get easier and some harder. So you would then have to design something from the ground up anyway for production use. Additionally the winners of said competition used magnetic levitation. How can it be that the winner of a Hyperloop competition hosted by the person who created the Hyperloop Whitepaper does not use the core aspect of a hyperloop you consider important. Even in the first competition instance they used linear induction and not fans to propel themselves. Some pods had fans, but that was to reduce drag and the TUM model dropped it afterwards. Additionally TUM, the winners of many competitions, now scale up their research and will focus on magnetic levitation. They state the definition is as followed: "The hyperloop system consists of sealed and partially evacuated tubes, connecting mobility hubs in large metropolitan areas, and pressurized vehicles, usually called pods, which can move at very high speeds, thanks to contactless levitation and propulsion systems as well as to the low aerodynamic drag.". Under their service module they list that they use magnetic levitation. I found no mention of air cushion levitation.

5. IEEE is nothing but not authoritative(is it always right or good? No.). As goes with any other large certifying or standardization body. TUV Sued specifically, but not exclusively mention magnetic levitation. Why do you assume authority on what a hyperloop consists of when the people responsible for manufacturing, researching or certifying it do not make this distinction?

6. Please post these recent praises of Musk wrt. the hyperloop. Because I could only find articles stating that the "the train trumps it every time" or "What happend to it?". In these articles Musk is only mentioned as a side node that he thought up the idea or held a competition.

7. If the distinction of it having an air cushion is that important, then why are there statements of companies and organisations who do not make this distinction. One such example would be the Hyperloop competition, the whole segment about "Hyperloop research programs" BikingFish (talk) 14:27, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Can somebody please go take a look at the 1974 concept art of a vac train, as found here for example and explain how putting propellers on a vac train is a revolutionary brand new idea invented by Elon Musk? As far as I can tell, the only innovation in Musk's "hyperlook" proposal is that instead of having vacuum trains that can carry hundreds of passengers, he has vacuum pods that can carry a couple dozen passengers at most. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 176.176.183.197 (talk) 09:11, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

Sure. It's a 2018 article listing vac trains, atmospheric railways, pneumatic trains, etc. Each type gets a single paragraph with few details beyond time and place before hastily moving on. The 1974 image has the caption "A 1974 concept painting of a vacuum train." and attributed to a Flickr user (who lists hundreds of similar historic magazine covers and movie images but I couldn't find this image in the first 10 out of 218 pages). The article never mentions anything from anywhere near 1974 in the text. That leaves us to derive everything form the 1974 image itself. We see a cutaway of the tube with a capsule inside. Each end has 3 legs from the capsule to the tube that appear to just rub along the inner surface of the tube. So, no aerofoils to worry about. That leaves us to speculate about the fan at the back. We don't know what air pressure is inside the tube or in what form (vacuum, partial vacuum, atmospheric pressure, high pressure). Without further information about where that image came from it is hard to make any solid conclusions. It's obviously an artist's impression but whether it is for a serious design or just the artist imagining something vaguely futuristic is unknown to me.

The article never points out that somebody had previously thought of putting a capsule with its own fan in a tunnel. It does however say that MIT had a 1990 design for a magnetic track "like Musk's plan". Except that Musk's alpha plan didn't have a magnetic track - that was added as an option in the 2016 competition. To me, the article looks like a filler piece that was put together quickly. Three of its images come from Wikipedia, plus the one copied from Flickr (twice). Nothing radiates professionalism like copying from Flickr. It also attributes some facts to a gizmodo article and a few other news articles that could have been easily found in a minute by web searching, further confirming the rushed nature of the article rather than serious research.  Stepho  talk  16:06, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

The whole basis for this being a separate article is that the hyperloop proposed by Musk is different in function to the Vactrain. But this contradicts his own actions by funding/hosting a competition where magnetic levitation is explicitly allowed.

As such the best pod from the last competition used magnetic levitation. It cant be therefor be argued that the hyperloop as it currently exists acts different to a vac train. Its akin to suggesting that preproduction car designs are representative of the final product.

BikingFish (talk) 13:27, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

There is a final product? When (if) it is finally made and if it does not use aerodynamic lift and also does not use aerodynamic propulsion, then yes, you can have your wish at that time. Who knows, maybe the next competition will return to both of those features. Be careful not to put the cart before the horse at 400 km/h.  Stepho  talk  21:07, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

SCMaglev manages easily 500km/h and is in an actual construction phase. Also how do you then justify the existence of a separate article? Can reverse your argument and claim that as there is not even a prototype using aerodynamic propulsion the idea is just a continuation BikingFish (talk) 21:33, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

All the Hyperloop projects (commercial/academic) that i know of, you can list others, use magnetic levitation. How would a air cushion then arise in development? BikingFish (talk) 21:37, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

You mention lift a lot. Is it the same story with propulsion? But this debate won't be finished until they actually start operation. Until then we have no idea whether it will be a traditional vac tunnel with magnetic levitation/propulsion (Hyperloop in name but not really matching the original idea) or Musk's original idea with aerodynamic lift/propulsion or something else.  Stepho  talk  22:17, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Then why split the articles if we dont know? BikingFish (talk) 22:38, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

In my view, a merge would be a poor idea, and would be a net loss for the encyclopedia of all human knowledge.

As a wise Wikipedia administrator told me once—in a contested debate over the appropriateness of having an article on a proposed spaceplane that, at the time was only in prototype form (of a less capable version) and still in the hangar having not yet been flown—paraphrasing here: "Heck, Wikipedia can have an article about a balsa-wood spaceplane model, as long as there are sufficient verifiable sources to demonstrate notability of the balsa-wood model." Cheers. N2e (talk) 18:43, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

But this article is not about a specific prototype/model/.. but about a general transportation concept, the core differentiation to vactrains is touted as the air cushion from the original whitepaper. Nowadays the concept of a hyperloop moved to include any levitation train in a low air pressure tube, which brings us back to vactrains. A person reading an article about hyperloops in context of goverments or companies will likely land on this page and would get a wrong image of the proposed technology. My position is that the whitepaper is superseded and a tighter integration with the vac train article is beneficial. BikingFish (talk) 15:44, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Reliable sources tend to treat it as a distinct concept, thus so should Wikipedia. It is not up to us to 'fix' what the independent sources are doing (see WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS). MrOllie (talk) 16:08, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Which sources? I find certification, standardization bodies and universities(not research papers but the university statement) highly reliable. I elaborated in #The idea was around since 1910 so how did Elon Musk propose the idea? that these bodies explicitly do not make that distinction. This whole debate sole revolves around the conceptualization of a whitepaper and not the use of the term as it currently is. BikingFish (talk) 17:08, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Which sources? - The ones cited in the article. Your personal standard of reliability doesn't really matter here, the one in explained in Wikipedia:Reliable sources does. MrOllie (talk) 17:21, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

So we have contradicting sources what now? In the article the IEEE source quickly moves on to maglevs. No mention of air-bearings is in the article which is the source for that statement. And the other is the white paper. While a certification body and university building a hyperloop research campus specifically do not mention the use of air bearings. BikingFish (talk) 17:43, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't see any evidence that there are contradicting sources. I also do not see the relevance of the points you raise here to a potential article merge. MrOllie (talk) 18:07, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

The reason why its separate is due to it using an air cushion. TuvSud and HyperloopTT define it as not requiring that and only state a minimum levitation height, TU Munich, winner of the Hyperloop competition, do not define it as a requirement . I checked the sources in the article and could not find any reliable source defining what a Hyperloop is. BikingFish (talk) 20:58, 25 January 2024 (UTC)