New Mars Forums

OK, I have elaborated a bit more:

A bit like a fishing rod that can pivot on the bottom of the solar array.  Forward<>Backward or Left<>Right, or clockwise or counterclockwise.

This may help it dodge space junk below it, or to come close to the object that is to be netted.  The netting apparatus may have small thrusters, to fine adjust quickly the netting event.

Like a fishing rod the cable can let out line with a drag function, to keep the line from snapping.  And like a fishing rod after the event in in control the netted object could be pulled in.

So, I am thinking that the data center elements may orbit just a few 10's of kilometers below the orbit of this service device.

If the service device and the data centers were both in circular orbits, then the net will be moving at a slower speed than the data centers as it depends as part of the catching and service device.  So actually, the timing has to be such that the pendulum has moved the net to it's maximum pendulum speed in a forward direction, to overtake the data center.

Here is further elaboration:

Ideally fetched materials will be reusable part to part, but of course some old stuff might be made into something else, if nothing else then radiation shielding.

>>>>>>>>>>>>

A second fetch method would be to beam power to a Neumann Drive or Magdrive to bring large junk objects up to the service station.  For instance expended 2nd Stages of Terran-R or Rocket Lab, or maybe even Falcon 9's.

So, I feel eventually it makes not sense to drop mass that was lifted to orbit to burn up in the atmosphere.  It's value in orbit is larger than its value as dust in the atmosphere.

So, mass will accumulate in orbit of Earth and perhaps the Moon, even before mass can be extracted from the Moon.

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OK, then referencing the two initial posts, perhaps you include a net that can travel up and down the pendulum tether.

Granted, you also could do a rotavator, but I think that might be more difficult to use with a giant solar power platform.

Then I antihate that you would have electrodynamic tethers that extend upwards and which draw the solar panels upwards against the decay of orbit from air molecules and the snatching process.

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The idea of artificial worlds has quite a lot of history.

I recall as a boy reading a book that suggested that asteroids could be melted and inflated like glass bubbles with gasses.

Then https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerard_K._O%27Neill and company suggested mass drivers on the Moon to shoot packets of Lunar regolith to a L4 or L5 location, as I recall.  Image Quote:

Apparently, they felt that an economic case could be made for beaming power from space to the Earth.

Recently Anthro-futurism: https://www.youtube.com/@Anthrofuturism has made a case for moving useful mass from the Moon to a span between the bottom limits of the Van Allan Belts, to LEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DUydTgyGQ0&t=16s  Quote:

These will not be emissions of Lunar Regolith but creations of processed materials with on board propulsion capabilities.  They seem to intend to bring some resources, and the propulsion systems are expected to be materials repurposed.

It seems that Elon Musk/SpaceX intend to make Satellites and loft them in a similar fashion from the Moon to Sun Synchronous orbits.

Before they do this from the Moon they will send such Satellites to Sun Synchronous Orbits as Data Center elements.

In any case this leads to the question of materials recycling as these devices will over time malfunction and also become out of date.

Star links are dumped into the atmosphere in a planned way if possible, at this point.  The Sun Synchronous Data Center Elements will be in a higher orbit.

So, I presume that it makes more sense to rebuild, recycle, repurpose these as they go out of service, rather than to dump them into the atmosphere.  This may become true for Star links eventually as well, I think.

These devices will probably include a power supply, likely solar in nature, radiators, Data Chips assembly, and perhaps radiation shielding, as parts.

Space Startup News: https://www.spacestartupnews.com/ seems to opinion that Aluminum is a very recyclable material.   So, I am going to guess that radiators will be highly recyclable.  Other parts such as chips and solar panels, probably less so, might be melted to make some radiation shielding, at least.

If there is going to be a recycle center in LEO+ orbits, then I kind of like a two Starship scheme.
1) You want 1 reusable Starship, and
2) You want a modified expendable (Not Really) Starship.

#1, might be mostly for propellant delivery to LEO.
#2, might have an Aluminum upper Fairings mounted on the Stainless-Steel propellant tanks.  No flaps, heat shield, header tanks, Landing Propellants.

#2 would bring Satellites to LEO and then be refilled by #1.  Then #2 would travel to Sun Synchronous Orbit.

If you are going to have a recycle center for old Satellites, then it also might be able to render a Expendable (Not Really) Starship as well.

So, the Starship could be rendered into useful parts, and so recycled and also old Satellites.

Propulsion for the rendering space station might be Magdrive or Neumann Drive.  I understand it needs lots of electricity.  But you could have power satellites in orbit that could beam power to the rendering space station so that its mass can be kept to a reasonable limit.

It could propel itself using that beamed power and some of the waste mass from Expendable (Not Really) Starships and old Satellites.

So, this may be a way to begin creating larger space habitats as well.

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This perhaps continues the recent dialog: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … &FORM=VIRE  Quote:

So for the moment the merger is being talked about by some, not sure it will happen as suggested.

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One take-away from "Larry" I think is that this business model does not require a reusable Starship to be economically fit.  I presume that the 1st Stage needs to be reusable though, like for Falcon 9.

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And I say if the Starship is not reusable you still might have the option of Disposable-Not-Rally.  IF the two header tanks were filled with Argon instead of Oxygen and Methane, then if you had a Electric tug, you might tow the expended Starships to a higher orbit to be scrapped, rather than to toss them into the Pacific.

The expended Starships might be converted to space Stations, or perhaps hardware for other things, like perhaps somehow to integrate with data center efforts.

It is a different game to reuse the mass you sent to orbit in orbit.  Otherwise, you are dumping ships into the pacific

We may also involve Magdrive or Neumann Drive.  These may be practical if you have beamed power in space.  We think of beaming power from orbital satellites to a Neumann Drive or Magdrive, but in reality you might be able to beam power up from the surface of the Earth to a Tug that tows Starships from LEO to just below the Van Allen Belt.

Some weather conditions may allow it.

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I would speculate that a pair of ship, one tanker and one light weight expendable might be ideal.

The light weight expendable, might have it's upper part made of lighter materials like Aluminum.  So, it would bring a load to LEO, and then a Tanker would refill it, and it could carry data center Satellites to Sun Synchronous and release them.  Then a recycle center would overtake the expendable ship and salvage it into useful materials to help maintain the data centers.

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Here I have exaggerated the linking passage between two spinners which are hosted inside of sinter shell.

As I indicated on the drawing I exaggerated the size of the connecting passage.

Each spinner red or blue has an inflatable spin lock.  Actually, inflating each spin lock which pulling vacuum on their outsides will cause the to bow out a bit, and you could put some kind of bushing/seals to limit the leakage though the connecting tunnel from the place of doors.

So, I have described the spinners as starting and stopping, and they might do so, but don't have to because if the mechanisms are working properly, could move from one spin lock to the "Doors" area to the other spin lock through "closable to be airtight doors".

In a case where there is a massive leak of air into the vacuum (Grey Color), the volume of vacuum is sufficiently small (We intend) that the depressurization will not be a major medical issue.

The Sinter-Shell(s) which are to be stationary, are to be corseted by tensile strength using things like Steel bands, or Carbon band/net, so that the Sinter-Shell can endure pressurization in that event.  The Sinter-Shells may also have a balloon like air retaining liner as well.

So, great arrays of these things might be linked together, and people might pass between them relatively safely.

(I hope)

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I want to consider a "Carbon Wrapped Sinter Jar", as habitat.  Nod to Tesla and E. Musk.

I have had my eye on Deimos/Phobos/Mars as a good place to make orbital civilizational structures as well as on Mars.
I have looked Urine Bricks as a substitute, but this case might work well for the sinter method.
I think similar structure on the Moon might be suitable also.

Tensile wrapping a sinter jar, can be supported by this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EE-AGrN4JDs
Quote:

(I wanted to post the video somewhere, and this will do).
https://scitechdaily.com/turning-lunar- … sintering/
Quote:

Sintering: Sintering objects on the Moon involves using lunar regolith, the surface soil of the Moon, to create strong, homogeneous building materials. This process, known as in-situ resource utilization (ISRU), allows for the construction of lunar infrastructure without the need for transporting materials from Earth. The Moon's regolith, composed of silicates, oxides, and tiny bits of metallic iron, can be heated and sintered using microwave sintering, which is particularly energy-efficient and can be performed during the lunar night. This method has been tested and is being developed for use in lunar landing pads and other infrastructure on the Moon.

I am interested in extracting some materials from the regolith before sintering the "Tailings" into a sintered Jar.

Various methods are available.  Salt Mining apparently is one good one: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=11305
"Index» Life support systems» Flash Recycling, Salt Mining"
We might hope to extract the Iron from regolith using a method in this video: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … ORM=VAMGZC  Quote:

A recent probe to Deimos suggests that it is made of Mars basalt.  Previously it was thought that Carbon would be present.  In any case there should be some Iron.

In any case Mars, itself can provide Chlorine, Carbon, and Hydrogen to the process if necessary.

If the above method will not be practical then you could roast the dust of Phobos and/or Deimos in Hydrogen and extract a concentrate of Iron magnetically.

So, there will be several processes.  I expect that Iron and some Oxygen will be extracted at least.

Then you might sinter the "Tailings" into a "Double-Cone-Jar".  On our Moon, perhaps you could sinter it into single cone jars that perch on the surface.  If you import Carbon, you might wrap those in Carbon or Steel tensile materials.

The Jars might start thin but have more materials added to them over time.  Perhaps to be thick enough to block radiation sufficiently.  Perhaps 2 to 3 Meters Thick, perhaps?

You probably would need to protect the outside from impactors and thermal shocks with some sort of materials.

The double or single cone jars are not the only shapes that could be used, but I start with them as it seems sensible that all parts of them can be wrapped with tensile bands or webs of some sort.

Inside of the jars, I would expect to have a balloon type envelope to help hold in air, even if the jar cracks.

From post #29 again:

Although you could, I do not intend that the "Jars" will spin themselves but have spinners inside of them.

Part of a day, you might have a high spin and evacuate the air from the gap between the jar and the spinner.  Part of the day you might lower the spin to tolerate full air pressure in that gap.  So, during that period people could pass between Jars, fairly easily.

The number of attached Jars could be extremely large, perhaps even encircling a worlds orbit, if you could compensate for tidal forces in that orbit.

For this reason, I see Mars colonization to be as much about the surface of Mars as in the orbits of Mars.

Such schemes like this could work for the Asteroid Belt, Mercury, and the orbits of Jupiter.

And if bulk materials can be extracted from out Moon, and volatiles can be brought in from the more outer solar system, then this could work for the Earth/Moon.

But Deimos/Phobos/Mars, looks like the easiest place to do it the soonest.

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I see your immune system is active.  That is not necessarily a bad thing.

As for my assessment of future events, "I DON'T KNOW" explains it efficiently.

I am elder and retired, and for me it is potential entertainment on my way to my termination of existence in this world.

I already do not drive this world at all, if I ever did.

I will see what happens, until I don't see what happens.

That's about it.

I dipped my toe into some low-level programming before I retired.  I was tempted to continue with it as a Hobie, but I anticipated that everyone in the 3rd world would want to make money coding.  And I was while employed responsible for the software of my department.  So it was less a toy than a stressful task.

I did know that Excel could write macro code, so I figured, coding would eventually make me outdated.  I was very correct.

I am along for the ride, until my dirt nap comes. 

I hope things will go well, but history says very likely monkeys at the steering wheel will also make some things wrong.

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I have had an amusing thought.  "Foot-Hand-Shoes".

Shoes with fingers, may be possible, by adapting robot hands that are under development at this time.

Or lobster claws shoes: https://earthlymission.com/vadoma-ostri … rodactyly/  Image Quote:

Hand or Ostridge/Lobster robot shoes.  With a brain in each shoe and eyes as well.  Able to respond to toe movements and perhaps verbal commands.

With Neuralink, you might also be able to wirelessly communicate with them.

Of course, these might be valuable in low gravity environments.

And of course they might be useful for humanoid robots that were to work in such low gravity environments as well.

I have some liking of the gravitation of Ceres for orbital gardens in synthetic gravity.

Such robotic feet may be of value in such environments, and also very amusing.

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Well, I think this item from the Electric Viking might fit in to some version of what I have suggested in the previous two posts: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … &FORM=VIRE  Quote:

Perhaps it could be blended with what I have attempted to think about, and also perhaps also associated with an irrigation system:

Presumably if cleaning happened at night the gel on the rear side of the panel might absorb some of the evaporation from that process.

Another option in some locations would be to air cool the soil in the wintertime, using the buried piping.  Winter air pushed through the pipe might allow to formation of a "Semi-Permafrost".  But of course, in buried pipes you would have to avoid bursting pipes with expanding freezing water.

During the day, when there might be excess solar energy, you might run the convection fan to push cold winter air though the underground piping.

When spring would come then you might push humidified air from the solar panel gel into the pipes, again in such a pattern to avoid pipe damage.

Even if you had frozen the soil to some depth, over the winter, in Alaska, it is not uncommon to grow gardens on top of permafrost.  It could complicate things though.

And of course finally you might involve your underground piping it a heat pump process somehow.  I am just saying you might.  By pulling heat out of the ground you might heat some buildings.

Heating buildings might cool the ground.  IF you had a closed air circulation system then you might not lose moisture from the soil doing this.  But when the time came to collect the moisture from the gel cooling the solar panels, you would then use more of an open-air flow.

Heating an industrial process using ground heat might be a more practical option.

OF course the more complex a system becomes the more expensive.  But with more complex robots to make hardware, the costs of hardware might go down.

If you were cooling the soil with a heat pump method, then you would not have to push it to the freezing point.

And if you have irrigation water available, with a system like this you might get the best use of it.

The solar panel system explained by the Electric Viking apparently can collect rainwater as well.

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Posting again about "Salt Mining": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMI_ITPgirI
Quote:

I am thinking about regolith rubble created by the solar system over billions of years, and also remnants of saltwater oceans on other planets such as Mars.

The evaporites, on Mars are likely covered over with wind borne deposits, and perhaps by ice layers.

If this tech does work as well as the advocate claims in the video, then the solar system will have much to offer.

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