Priveate Space initiative

Some freinds and I are going to Mars(and beyond..eventually) Here's some ideas, look at them will you? Your welcome to join us. I also realize that I can't remember exact sources for some of this stuff. If you can get these for me, I'd greatly appreciate it.

First thing: surface to orbit transportation. Payloads can be classified into two categoties: bulk material(oxygen, food, construction materials) and sensitive stuff(satallites, people, probes). these two categories can be launched with two different systems. bulk materials can withstand the high G forces required by a gun based system, as was intended by the High Altitude Research Project(HARP) conducted in the 1960's. this technology is one of many that NASA has apparently overlooked. Anyway, this would free up space on the shuttle and rockets for the other sfuff. in a Ppular Science a few years ago(don't ask which, I don't know) I read about a system that would use an electromagnetic accelerator as the first stage of launch. The current space shuttles could be converted to this system, cutting R&D time and costs. In Discover(I think) I read about a group of researchers who found that by varying the electrical charge of a plate of superconducter they could create an artificial gravity field. development of a "levitron" could provide a source of lift for a S/VTOL shuttle, a nessacary vehicle for exploration of a planet(as spaceport facilities such as Cape Canaveral will not be available to allow for a return to orbit). this is message 1 of 4 reposted by Gifted

The Mars Polar Lander and the Climate Probe both experienced navigational errors. While the errors were started on Earth, it might have been possible to correct these problems had the scientists and technicians in Houston been recieving LIVE data from the probes. Let's go to a science fiction series written by Orson Scott Card, which starts with Ender's Game. In this series, devices called ansibles use "philotic strings" are used to communicate over interstellar distances instananeously. in another Popular Science article regarding teleportation(I beliave it was a cover story) the system uses superpositioned electrons to transport matter. While the teleporter uses a regular communications channel to coordinate between the sender and reciever, IF the channel between the electrons is instantaneous and not limited to the speed of light this "ansible" can be used to communicate between a mission and control.

The ISS has gone way over budget. If this is any sort of clue, the next large space construction project will probably go over as well. I have a simpler way to build a space station: take a suitably sized asteriod, knock it into earth orbit, and do one of two things: 1) domes on the surface, or 2) cut holes in the rock and pressuize them(we just destroyed an example of how this would work when we took out the Tora Bora region of Afganistan). To make a ship, simply strap on engines. Artificial gravity can be created with the same technology used by the aforementioned levitron.


A spaceship going to the stars(let alone Mars) must have a power source that does not depend on the sun, because such a ship will not be in close enough proximity to the sun to get the large amounts of energy requiered by the various systems the ship would have. Fission is not practical due to the large mass of the reactor and the opposition to such a system demonstrated before the Cassini mission. Fusion is possible. the gravitational maniplulation I mentioned earlier should be looked at as a more efficient containment field than the magnetic fields in current Tokomaks. If this doesn't work, than the antimatter drives currently being developed could provide the power. An alternative to antimatter would be to use the gravitational manipulation to bend space, a system proposed in an article in Discover magazine.

 

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A couple of links I find useful and interesting:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/basics/index.html
http://www.nuclearspace.net/

 

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Welcome to sciforums, Gifted.

I would ask that you not cross post the same message in different forums. I realize that it is common practice at other sites. Here things are a little different.

First the superconductor...

To achieve the necessary temp and keep it there will require a source of cooling. If you use lox, that is weight you must tote into space. Weight better used for the tremondous amount of propellent needed to reach escape velocity. Superconductors do indeed achieve a kind of "lift" above the surface it rests on with your given circumstances. However, it is an extremely small amount of lift that would have to be magnitudes of orders over what is presently being done today. We can not yet do that.

The ansible of Enders Game is another thing we have no clue of how to do. Nice touch for a novel but not something we will be able to do anytime soon, if at all.

I agree that living bodies in space would have stood a good chance of fixing the problems of lost communications.

Government projects seem to develop a life of their own. More often than not they do run over budget. Sometimes massivelly. This is one of the biggest reasons to see the space effort become a civilian effort.

 

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I agree, but it appears that as of February 2002 NASA will be getting 500 Million Dollars more than last year, totalling in 15 billion for the agency. (info here)

I believe the biggest problem facing NASA is the fact that there are no planned missions to mars, or to establish any permanent colonization bases on the moon. The ISS does need to be completed, but I really don't understand why they didn't use the flying wheel design from 2001, it's just so much better and it also enables a good deal of protection of the inside components from meteorites coming in from the side (s). Where is all of this money going? Here are some debateable goals that NASA should reach before 2020 if possible:

1) Permanent base on moon

2) New Space Elevator space station, to eliminate the need for rocketry on the ground using the recently discovered 'third form of carbon: C60 (or also called Buckminsterfullerene-from the Epilogue of 3001). The wires are rumored to be indestructable (I'm not kidding!)

3) Exploration of Europan Surface with manned vehicles, no more unreliable satellites. Mars can wait, Europa is definitely more important. If there is no life then the water could be a fueling station for ships using hydrogen fuel (from 2010, remember the
Tsien?). The Jovian system should definitely be explored.

4) Drain the funding from satellites and all of the less-useful projects and put the money into research and development of these projects. I don't doubt that some are important or scientific but I think the public's interest would be rekindled if we started sending people to the Moon, Mars, and Europa. A space elevator, with a giant space station revolving around the world, would be in the zone of things that NASA could accomplish if these steps were taken.

5) Clean up of broken or useless satellites (Sputnik could go in a museum if they found it) using giant magnets that would sling them into an unstable orbit.

Any thoughts? Is anyone out there unbelievably rich and ready to start doing these things?

 

I would love to see a manned mission to Mars or Europia. Some of the stuff that needs better developing is:

• A better propulsion system developed. The best thing they have at present on the boards is the ion engine. It has anything but a fast take off and could certainly use a good bit of additional sustained power. At present it takes a long time just to get moving up to speed.
  
• Better sheilding from solar winds that can be expected during solar storms and from the radation of Jupiter. At present the best we can do is build a small protected room for all the crew to wait it out in.
  
• Better methods to deal with long term exposure to weightlessness. A necessity if we are to use manned missions to other planets.
  
• Improved computer componets. This seems to be an ongoing problem with the ISS.
  

 

-You're right with propulsion, at the moment we seem to have many different versions, i.e archaic rocketry that is not cost or size effective, the ion engine which really does take a significant time to accelerate (and decelerate-possibly more important when in the far reaches of space), and finally the solar sail, which must be enormous to generate any real propulsion. We seem to have many pieces to the puzzle of space travel but the manufacturer painted them wrong (sorry, bad analogy

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). We need something else, something new.

-This may be an unrealistic answer to the 'radiation question,' but is it possible to safetly decontaminate a human from radiation, at least theoretically? I mean neutralyzing tumors and cell damage, all of the harmful affects of whatever the sun or Jupiter had to dish out to us. As long as the radiation was not left over I don't see what's wrong with a small room to protect the EXOnauts from.

-The rotating wheel, ah I always say the rotating wheel!!! It's the doggedly simple solution to this problem!

-What needs to be improved? Compatability with other countries systems or their speed or what? Maybe it's time to commission a team of people to construct a HAL to solve our problems...

 

Gifted

Anyway, this would free up space on the shuttle and rockets for the other sfuff

Are you suggesting to use the existing shuttles for missions to Mars ? The shuttles were never meant for that and would require massive retrofits which would not only compromise the design but would also compromise the safety of crewmembers (radiation).

I have a simpler way to build a space station: take a suitably sized asteriod, knock it into earth orbit

Simpler ? How do you propose to place an asteroid into Earth's orbit without the asteroid plummeting to Earth. Not only is that dangerous but totally impractical. It would make more sense to mine the asteroid where it already exists.

A spaceship going to the stars(let alone Mars) must have a power source that does not depend on the sun, because such a ship will not be in close enough proximity to the sun to get the large amounts of energy requiered by the various systems the ship would have.

What's wrong with solar sails ? It might take time to get a ship up to speed using solar sails, but they do work.

If this doesn't work, than the antimatter drives currently being developed could provide the power.

Can you please provide references to these alleged antimatter drives.

An alternative to antimatter would be to use the gravitational manipulation to bend space, a system proposed in an article in Discover magazine.

Again, please provide references to alleged gravitational manipulation of space engines/drives/whatever.

It would appear much of what you're proposing is in the "science fiction" stage of development.

Pollux

Permanent base on moon

The delta-V required to go from low Earth orbit to the surface of the moon is 6 km/s and the delta-V required to go from low Earth orbit to the surface of Mars is 4.5 km/s. Therefore you expend more energy getting payloads to the moon and then to Mars as opposed to going directly to Mars. A moon base is impractical.

 

Knocking the asteroid into orbit is impractical, after all how the hell are you going to get it there in the first place? I think that it would also be a little bit on the dangerous side even if you could get it into a stationary orbit.

(Q), could you comment on the rest of the thread? You may be correct, but it would becool to have a base on the moon. It could be used as a refueling station for hydrogen-fueled spacecraft (apparently there is water there-read this) or a communications relay.

 

Yes, the results from the superconductor experiments is somewhat disappointing, 2% decrease, and that much questionable. I meant to edit the thread a little before I posted it, but forgot. I would like to say that this needs more research. If this affect can be increased, the same way an iron core increases the normally little amount of magnetic power in a copper wire, than there should be a way to increase the affect of these plates, especially as they can't get them more than 30cm across, and you would need a field 5m across to be able to begin to use it on rockets. In space temps regulary fall to within degrees of absolute zero in the shade. The lox and/or hydrogen used in the rocket engines could serve as the coolant for the superconducter.

The shuttle has something that the space-gun doesn't: it can put humans and delicate instruments into orbit. A projectile fired from th egun can be expected to hit a least 20,000 g's a cockroach might be able to survive this. The shuttle can achieve the lower velovities humans, animals, and certain instruments can survive. The guns could easily remove the burden of satellites, ISS supplies, etc.

I was proposing nukes as a thrust source for the asteriod gig, and a NEO, already closer to the orbit required, could be used. A Moon base would serve for Lunar research, and as a tourist attraction, encouraging cheaper modes of travel.

The ship I am thinking of for would be able to sustain three months in Martian orbit, during which dozens of missions would be made to the Martian surface and the moons. The crew will be at least 100 people, and you will need the food, water, life support, energy to run everything, and thrust to get the ship to a speed that will allow it to make it to Mars in 3 to 6 months.

Sorry about the double posting, I tried to move it to astronomy and it didn't work. I will look for those sources.

 

Pollux

It's true there is some Helium-3 but very little water for anyone to sustain any industrial activity. As well, the moon has very little metal ores, carbon and nitrogen to produce anything. Let's not forget the moons cycles that would plummet the base into darkness (extreme cold temperatures) for days and then into blinding light (extreme hot temperatures) for days. It would be far more practical to build a station in LEO.

The only practical use for the moon IMO, is to use it for a gravitational brake for incoming spacecraft.

 

Then we have two good reasons for establishing a base on the moon:

• A large communications relay for communication with the outer planets
• A natural gravity break for incoming traffic

I believe in Arthur Clarke's 3001 (I just finished it for the second time [great book] so bear with me here) the people of the 31st century use an intertia drive to move through the solar system, a propulsion system that more or less moves every atom of not only the craft but the inside participants, enabling any g force to be eliminated. This seems like the most workeable idea, but I couldn't find anything on a google search, apparently there's a scifi intertia drive in Babylon 5 or something (never watched it).

 

Stage One Put a ship in orbit around Mars. Humans aboard, possibly two, maybe more. Test how humans handle the distance, while actually getting something done. Hopefully while prepping a base on one of Mars's moons.

Stage Two Send a return vehicle that will generate its own fuel, then follow that up with a habitat module, etc. This point we actually do the Apollo 11 landing and check out the surface. Possibly we have two or three Mars Direct missions, leaving habitats and equipment behind each time.

Stage Three This is the large field team going to Mars. They'll bring a rover, possibly a flying rover of some kind. They'll use the habitats provided by the earlier missions if possible. Part of the mission establishes a base on one of Mars's moons.

Stage Four Cycling ship is built which drastically cuts down on future expenses. Drop ships that catch up to the cycling ship and aero brake off of the Mars atmosphere and dock with the base on Mars's moon become common. A Lander that goes from the Mars moon to the surface and back is developed and we've got the capability to permanently settle the small Mars habitats we have and create a science base or two.

Stage Five We are now at the same stage as Antarctica. It's unpleasant, but the infrastructure for getting people in and out safely is there. I think you'll find people willing to go to Mars for short stays initially, hell we've got people in Antarctica. They have to stay inside often. Granted nobody is talking about moving to Antarctica and you can still breathe outside.

Stage Six Once we've had people on Mars long enough as part of military/scientific/Antarctica type bases, its likely that you'll have a combination of adventurers and miners willing to spend up to a decade of their lives working their in exchange for a lot of money. Ask the Alaskan oil folks about this. So we build our population slowly.

Stage Seven Once we've got mining, and science (and the early stages of terra-forming to build up the pressure if not the oxygen) the bases will have enlarged a bit and things start to appear safe to Joe Risk taker on Earth. Joe wants to start over in a new frontier. He's still a risk taker, but this risk no longer seems insane. After all those mining guys go there and come back with increasing regularity.

 

What are the chances of two people living in the same space for 18 months without one of them going crazy? instantaneous communications could help(you can talk to people on earth), but two is crazy. The Navy has experience in keeping a hundred people from going insane, but they don't have two person submarines that go for six month patrols. A Mars ship will be a little bit easier than a sub because the volume constraints are not there, but I think even twelve would be too few. This ship needs to be able to take care of any emergencies(no help will be able to come to their rescue) which means backup systems, and people t omaintain those systems.

 

Gifted

What are the chances of two people living in the same space for 18 months without one of them going crazy?

Slim to possible. What's your point ?

instantaneous communications could help(you can talk to people on earth), but two is crazy.

There is no such thing as "instantaneous communications." It takes time for signals to travel back and forth from Mars to Earth. There is nothing "crazy" about it.

The Navy has experience in keeping a hundred people from going insane, but they don't have two person submarines that go for six month patrols.

Again, what is your point ? Are you inferring that it can't be done ? Perhaps you're under the impression the candidates that would go on such a mission are not highly trained professionals. Try adding some logical thought to your argument.

 

What of Carl Sagan's proposel that we use the asteroids as a sort of stepping-stone to Mars?

However, I concede that they don't have quite the appeal that Mars does.

As for the psychological aspects of it, well, this may sound odd, but I am researching work on artificial personalities - of creating a computer program that has somthing resembling a human personality. Right now, it's in its beginning stages (they have had some good work modeling belief systems, but the 'personalities' lack unpredictability.)*

Anyways, could we use such artificial personalities to provide companionship?

I really don't think that isolation would be a huge problem.

Separation from families and loved ones might be a bigger problem but - *Xev grins* - some people would like to be that far away from their families.

*Sorry, it's a U of Michigan press book - I'd cite a web source if I could.

 

I always thought that MIT was the frontrunner in A.I development, I recall hearing about a machine with roughly the same intelligence as a baby named 'Kismet.' Of course I'm surprised no one has added this in but hybernation is the solution to going stir crazy and lonilness in the first place. Assuming that the speed of light cannot be broken with any plausible means then hybernation is the next best alternative.

The problem is that we can't seem to figure out how to hybernate. There was a report on the CBS Evening News a few weeks ago headlining a new pill that kept its users comfortably awake for up to two days. The users stayed awake and were not energized but rather just normal and they went to sleep as if they had only been awake for around eighteen hours rather than fourty eight.

I wonder if it's possible to reverse this process. Maybe long-term hybernation is out of our league but it would certainly ease the strain if you could sleep for two days rather than just a third of a day. When you'd wake up you could come post an update of your journey on sciforums!

 

Hmm, this depends on who you pick to go. You also need the type that is more a handy man than a rocket scientist. The communications delay would prove a bit trying when getting something fixed. It would be likely that all the simpler things would have written procedures on computer but the special problems would have to be dealt with by recommendation from teams on earth. That is what they do now.

In system, there is nothing that I know of that would prevent the use of them. In fact, they are a cheap way to provide propulsion where time is not of the essence. They are looking at the self healing aspect of these newer materials that have been developed to see if there is a way to use them in space. This would be an excellent application for the solar sail. My question to their use comes at the heliosphere. I think we will need a probe to determine the properties of for real before we reach the point of trying to break through it with a solar sail. When you reach these distances it might be necessary to have a larger sail to increase the light collection capability.

(Q), I like the idea you put forth of the stages. That seems to be a very workable plan.

I guess what we are saying, Gifted, is that we have a long way to go in the space exploration department. Nothing wrong with dreams. Dreams have gotten us where we are today. But we are in the baby steps of space exploration today and it is likely that it will continue long beyond your childrens generations. (assuming you have kids or will at some point) But notice something here, everyone will spot what doesn't work and suggest more realistic ways to achieve what we can really do. Please continue your input.

 

It is depressing and likely that it will take that long to really become the spacefaring creatures that we're capable of becoming...but it will always be my dream to retire every night to a double star sunset around Alpha Centauri.

 

Magnetic Propulsion!

Why not use magnetic propulsion? Not just for the initial thrust, but for the main, steady power source? Magnetic Propulsion is not perpetual motion (which is impossible due to a law [3rd?] of thermodynamics, the Conservation of Energy Law). Magnets simply have flux waves of electrons. The electrons are what is special about magnets, and is the most logical reason why magnets attract or repel each other. A PERMANENT MAGNET MOTOR could be the solution to having a --nearly-- everlasting energy source. It could be just converting the spin of a electron into a larger form of mechanical energy which could be converted into electrical!

See this site (kinda crazy but advertises my point). www.freeenergy.co.za/

 

The relatively high-escape velocity of the earth, is what is making virtually ALL of the propulsion systems expensive, hence I vote we invest heavily in a permanent self-sustaining moonbase and do further space exploration from that foothold. The availabillity of raw materials combined with the low escape velocity will make all propulsion systems cheaper and less technical requirements.