Alex,

Your arguments seem very rational to me. I suspected that the time might be quite a bit longer than one would expect.

Now, we have one question left. What about frictional heating. The velocity of the earth will be roughly 50,000 miles per hour through the suns atmosphere. One should expect a shock wave with compression heating up to temperatures in excess of vaporization temperatures.

I suspect the time period of survival here would be much shorter. Is it hours or days? I suspect it could actually be less than an hour as the extream difference in temperature could result in a violent activity.

This (if true) would lead one to expect that the earth might not survive the initial expansion itself: i.e., it might be destroyed by the rise in the solar wind as the transformation occurs.

Thanks -- Dick

• Friction heating could be intense. - alexander - March 19, 2001 - 19:28 UTC
  • What about the forces? - doctordick - March 19, 2001 - 22:39 UTC
    • yes, pressure is Dv^2 - alexander - March 19, 2001 - 22:57 UTC
      • duh -yep-yep-yep - doctordick - March 20, 2001 - 01:58 UTC