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posted by janrinok on Thursday August 11 2016, @02:52AM   Printer-friendly

Moon or Mars? It isn't a mutually exclusive choice but we'd be idiots to ignore the ideal staging post.

NASA engineer, Wingo, makes a detailed, costed argument that the current best-of-breed technology should be directed to the Moon. Specifically, the Saturn program should be continued in preference to SLS. The reason is quite simple. With advances in manufacturing, materials and guidance systems, a known quantity with known corner cases can be made safer and cheaper. (It would also avoid launchpad upgrades and other superfluous costs.)

As a matter of international co-operation, this could be augmented with Russian technology and suchlike. Yes, redundant airlocks or airlock adaptors may be required. However, does it really matter if a substantial structure requires seven payloads or eight payloads? From our current position eight is cheaper and more certain even if seven would be better in the long-term.

What would this structure be? A waystation in high Earth orbit for fueling and crew transfers. Fueling of what? Initially, craft to bootstrap a permanent base on the Moon with solar and nuclear power. Fueling is also needed until there is sufficient infrastructure on the Moon to produce fuel locally. Even then, fuel is required in high Earth orbit for emergencies. Overall, this is a plan to go from zero presence to an economic break-even point and beyond.

[Continues...]

A mineral mining expedition to the Moon has an estimated ROI of 22 years. More worryingly, the total cost is dwarfed by student loans, mortgage fraud and bank bail-outs - and that's just counting US figures. That's the most damning part. If we never get off Earth it will be due to the soul-sucking 1%ers and the legions of B-Ark space-cadets. On that basis, we deserve to not get anywhere.

Admittedly, figures for mineral mining assume that a glut in the market won't cause a price crash. There is a certain irony that a mining expedition to the Moon may never be economically feasible if it makes resources too plentiful. But seriously, that is a risk worth taking because it provides opportunity to move the majority of heavy industry outside of the biosphere. Even ignoring this, it would be possible to drop titanium airships into the atmosphere with a cargo of tritium from the Moon's South Pole. Or lithium. Or neodymium. Do you think there's enough lithium or neodymium for everyone to have an electric car? There is if we mine the Moon. (Or maybe that's why we don't go? Would we use the resources sensibly prior to mass population reduction and careful management of MTE?)

The typesetting is a bit dodgy but the message is clear. Until transport to the Moon becomes routine, human missions further afield are a work of speculative fiction. Actually, there comes a point when sending robotic probes further into the solar system becomes cheaper when sent from the Moon. And that's the point where we should seriously consider further expansion. Not before.


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by VLM on Thursday August 11 2016, @03:53PM

    by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Thursday August 11 2016, @03:53PM (#386621)

    Unfortunately it costs more to piecemeal redesign a half century old design where every piece has to be compatible with legacy systems than it costs to just make a new clean sheet system.

    Look at the onboard engine control computer, for example. You'd like to think a computer thats 1000000 times faster would be lighter, but its not like pressure vessels and coolants and connectors are smaller or lighter. In fact the "denser" source of heat might be harder to cool... Its just cheaper to redesign.

    Hydraulics would be a nightmare, the original engines did some weird funky stuff because the hydraulic system operated at a lower pressure than the engine chamber pressure so it bled chamber pressure to operate hydraulics after liftoff or some crazy stuff like that. Which works well because regulators are small and light. Back then a typical engine chamber pressure was 1000 psi and hydraulics were lower (maybe 500?) but that industry has really taken off and commercial airliners run 3000 now. We'd have to reinvent the entire aerospace hydraulics industry to make old fashioned 500 psi actuators. I mean you can run 3000 psi gear at 500 psi (mostly, although valves will be higher friction etc) but they'll be heaver than hell. Why not redesign to use cheap cheap cheap 2016 era COTS aerospace hydraulics and a modern pressurization system? Its gotta be cheaper than trying to re-enact an entire industy sector from 1960.

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  • (Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday August 11 2016, @04:42PM

    by frojack (1554) on Thursday August 11 2016, @04:42PM (#386639) Journal

    But you see, they don't have to be compatible with legacy systems. Nobody is going to mate a saturn V with a lunar orbiter any more.

    The design of the sheet metal, ribs, mating collars, engines tankage, pumps don't have to interface with anything new. And making them (other than the engines) isn't particularly hard.

    Computers? Yeah. Start from scratch.

    And these rockets are a lot simpler than the car in your driveway.

    --
    No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
  • (Score: 2) by mhajicek on Saturday August 13 2016, @04:55AM

    by mhajicek (51) on Saturday August 13 2016, @04:55AM (#387388)

    I think all that stuff could be made noticeably lighter. Modern metallurgy, composites, and manufacturing techniques could significantly improve strength to weight ratios of a lot of components.

    --
    The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek