New Mars Forums

I want to bring something here from also: "Index» Business Proposals» Data Centers (Including Off World)"
https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 30#p238130
https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 35#p238135

The physical logic for Earth is in contrast with the physical logic of the Moon.
Since the focus in space is at least for a time shifted to the Moon, the logic of hardware will be different.

For Mars, Starship made of Stainless Steel, also works as you need the heat shield.  But for the Moon Aluminum or Carbon might be attractive.

Granted, there is some good logic in sending a Starship to stay on the Moon.  If it came to the Moon with cargo and would then be converted to some use on the Moon as habitat.  Putting a regular Starship with full faps and heat shield, on the  Moon is possible, but not that adaptive.

There are two logics for the binary world Earth/Moon.  (We are not allowed to call Earth/Moon a binary planet, but I thin binary world is allowed).

It is hoped that over time, activity on the Moon will shift to use of local resources as much as possible.

But at least for initial setup, you might have a "Startup Method".  While it might be impressive if you could make a gun out of rocks, it may be more practical to bring one, at first.  I understand that guns are not the tool of importance on the Moon, but from a historical notion of the pioneer, this logic is obvious.  Eventually you may make tools out of rocks, but at first it may be better to bring the starter tools, to accelerate Lunar development.

Blue Origin and others have plans to make a variety of "Tools", like solar panels out of Moon rocks.  But these may be low quality, at least without brining special chemicals to the Moon.

NASA wants to bring a nuclear reactor to the Moon, and of course it will be a long time before nuclear fission reactors can be made from the rocks of the Moon.  Imported Nuclear reactors would be a good initiation tool, but have entanglements in National and International relationships.

SpaceX/Elon Musk\G. Shotwell, seem to want to rely on solar panels on the Moon, but do not specify import or Insitu for the method to render them into existence on the Moon.

I am looking to expand the utility of delivery methods to the Moon both for full import method or a hybrid.  A Hybrid method may include bringing, some of the materials to make and energy producing device to the Moon.  I often look for such a option.

Looking at Starship, I also am thinking of external cargo.  I am looking at "Drop Cargo" as one such method.  Typically we think of Moon Cargo as being carried inside of a Starship.  But a Lunar Starship could have pairs of cargo attached to its outsides, that would be dropped just prior to landing the ship.

The Starship has vastly more engine power than what it needs to land on the Moon.  At least that is what I understand.

I am looking at such drop cargo as a startup pathway to get very useful materials to the Moon with a lower cost: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 24#p238124
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So, "Airbags" filled with Urea-formaldehyde, might be dropped from a landing ship just prior to landing.
If done wrong, this might lead to a collision on landing, if the cargo bounces back at the ship as it is landing.
But if done correctly, you reduce the dry mass of the ship just prior to landing, and so reducing the landing method rigors.  (Landing Legs).

Such a content of "Urea-Formaldehyde" could have many uses on the Moon.  Easy use would be to make a radiation shield for a Starship placed on it's side.  You may be able to mix to materials with Lunar Regolith to make such a radiation shield.

Various other pathways would exist for this material to be useful.  You could extract the component chemicals, and perhaps produce some Urea and water.  Then use that to cement regolith into solid objects, using microbes.

The Carbon and Hydrogen could be reformed to sponsor Mushroom growth and also mycelium to again glue regolith into blocks.  Or Mushrooms and mycelium to make things not including regolith.

But also other things could be included into the foam inside of the "Airbag".  Chlorides of Metals and other substances perhaps.  Maybe in small packets inside of the foam.

We may hope to get Chlorine from Moon rocks, but as with many things, at least at first bringing the substance makes for a faster startup of capabilities on the Moon.  The Metals of other substances might serve to "Dope" things like Solar Calls to make on the Moon.

I am under the impression that "Salt Mining" using Chlorine could allow a lower temperature extraction of Iron from regolith.  The Chlorine supposedly can be recycled to go ahead and get more Iron in that manner.

I think that the above process may liberate the Oxygen which is tied to the Iron.  Another method to extract Oxygen from Iron in Regolith is to use Hydrogen and Heat.  This process is said by some to be regenerative, as Lunar regolith does contain small amounts of Hydrogen, and the process may recover that as well as the Hydrogen initially available.

It can be noted that the "Airbag" foam will contain Carbon and if salts are added will include substances allowing Iron to be made into Steels for some kind.

My impression is that Aluminum may be harder to extract from the Lunar Regolith.

So, I am interested in the Terran-R rocket for that reason.  My impression is that the Terran-R will be made primarily of Aluminum, and will not have the ability to re-enter the Earth's atmosphere without burning up.  We are going to have to limit the amount of materials that we burn up in the atmosphere, and the Terran-R is still a useful object, (Probably) once in LEO.

If Starship could refill the Terran-R, it could likely go part-way to the Moon at least from LEO.  I don't have the numbers on tankage for it. 
But we could "Wish" to get it to the Moon with at least a drop cargo.  The Drop-Cargo being the Foam filled airbags I have previously mentioned.

Even without putting landing legs on the Terran-R, if it has the fuel and does not malfunction it may be able to get such airbags close to the surface of the Moon, release them and then crash.  IF you put landing legs on a Terran-R, perhaps they could be propulsive.  As drop tanks or perhaps, solid rockets.

For instance, if Starship could bring solid rocket legs to LEO and they be attached to the Terran-R, the legs can burn to help get the assembly to the Moon.  The shells empty of propellant may still serve as crushable landing legs.  The landing legs might be of Aluminum, but that is not typically preferred.

Here is a depiction of a possible instance of such a use:

In LEO, a Starship brings the solid booster landing legs to attach and the drop foam bags.  Perhaps another Starship refills the Terran-R.

The Terran-R burns the landing legs to empty, using its engine to steer, (I hope).

The Assembly prepares to land on the Moon.  At a suitable altitude the "Drop Bags" drop.  The Terran-R attempts to land using its Metha-Lox engine(s), and uses the burned-out leg boosters as crushable landing Legs.

Hard to say if the Terran-R ever is reused after that or becomes a source of useful metals.

So, a partnership between two types of ships makes sense to me.

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I have thought about this some more, there can be some question about orbital and Lunar markets for scrap materials and reuses.

Just to keep a narrow focus, Suppose SpaceX and Relativity Space would form a partnership to some degree.

Terran-R 2nd stage is to be of Aluminum, I believe, and of course Starship is to be Stainless Steel and that with the full recovery mass as sell, if it is to land back on Earth.  Recovery equipment includes Header Tanks, Heat 'Shield, and Return Propellants, and features for a Landing Method.

Terran-R not to be recovered would have none of that and would be of Aluminum.  Even so it is to be able to lift 33 1/2 Tons to LEO.  What if Starship could refill it with Methane and Oxygen?

As Ii see it, a Starship/Terran-R partnership could work very well for the Moon.  Lots of options once you are in LEO.

For instance, how many Starship tankers would it take to fill a Terran-R?  If needed, could you put drip tanks on the Terran-R once in LEO?

Once you have a Terran-R in orbit, perhaps you could add Drop Tanks to it, that also serve as landing Legs?

Now as far as power goes, as far as I have seen, a 2nd stage is way overpowered to land on the Moon.  At least true for Lunar Starship.

And if you like you can attach cargo to the outside of the Terran-R once you are in LEO.

So, in this case you might have a Starship that brings landing legs that also are drop tanks up to the Terran-R.  It might also bring extra cargo to attach to the outside of the Terran-R.  Then you might need at least one Starship Tanker to fill the Terran-R and it's Drop Tank Landing Legs.

In this case then the Starship would not go to the Moon.  The rigged-up Terran-R would and would land with its Cargo and Drop Tanks.

The Terran-R and Drop Tank Legs being of Aluminum, would be of value on the Moon, as it is easier to recycle Aluminum than to get it out of the regolith of the Moon, I expect.

OK, I tried to get the dry and wet mass of the 2nd stage, But I think I got bad numbers.

But I think the idea is not a bad one.

An alternative would be to have a Starship escort the Terran-R 2nd Stage to Lunar Orbit, and use the Terran-R as a repeat lander.

Some of my thinking on this is that it looks like Iron will be relatively easy to get out of Lunar Regolith, but Aluminum may be harder.  Recycling used Aluminum, on the Moon from landers that did a useful task, seems like an option to look into.

Of course I have gotten some of this thinking from Space Startup News.  https://www.spacestartupnews.com/

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This has a little entrainment value: "Utube SpaceX's Brilliant Solution to Build A Colony: Starship Mars Cycler!, 2h ago"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H59x0ycdZws

The article supports cyclers at first and then says that maybe it will be possible to send people to Mars in a one-month period.

Both ideas have appeal but are easier to say than to do.

The idea of the Mars Cycler has been around for some time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_cycler
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In the video earlier in this post they seem to suggest that the Moon could "Host" materials for the cycler, be the major supplier for materials for it.  This could make sense, if indeed someone can make a mass driver to launch Satellites as it seems SpaceX/Xai hope to do.
Chemical burn fuels are scarce for it though, from the Moon.  Oxygen is possible.  Metal propellants as well.

But I noticed that the green path in the diagram for the cycler seems to brush the Asteroid Belt.

Here is perhaps a good article: https://pages.astro.umd.edu/~dphamil/HO … than_0.pdf

It does look to me that the Cycler would not only be useful for Earth<>Mars, but also might be useful to access the inner Asteroid Belt.

So, would it be possible to make a Host Station in a relatively circular orbit that has the proper timing to intersect a cycler at aphelion?

Such a station being fairly near the inner asteroid belt might feed from it.

This is what they might feed on: https://www.nasa.gov/solar-system/aster … roid-belt/  Quote:

Threre may be a distribution of types: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-type_asteroid
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So, perhaps between encounters with a cycler they might either have a robot bring a small object to process to them or they might wander to it to process it.  In this then the size of stations would grow and also the number of stations.

At 2 AU the sunlight is to be 1/4 that of what it is in Earth orbit.  So, mirrors should work fine to concentrate the sunlight.

Into this I will add a Deimos/Phobos/Mars Semi-Cycler.  In my view this would be a platform that can slide into orbit of Mars repeatedly using ballistic capture.  It will need propulsive methods to assist it in this.  But it can launch and then do a flyby of Earth or maybe a 2.0 AU, space station, before passing by Earth again and then reparking in Mars orbit.

The purpose of it parking in Mars orbit would be to take on supplies, and repairs periodically.  On launch it's intention would be to seek the orbit of a cycler with Propper timing, and to add supplies to it.  It might do a pass of a 2.0 AU space station, but I don't yet have that thought out well enough to say.

The 2.0 AU stations might send materials to Mars by various means, for supply to the Semi-Cyclers.

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I think my drawing in the previous post leaves much to be desired.

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Think of the shaded area as an edge-on view of a "Stanford Torus.  Then imagine a cone tent pitched on each face of it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_torus
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The "Hub" becomes the central tent pole for both tents.

This may not be the ideal way to go, but I am trying it out to see if it may have value.

This is how an Eloy thinks: (Image Quote):

But a Morlock deals with heavy and also intricate machinery and gets in the dirt.

The Eloy of the western society seeks the ability to manipulate Morlocks to make the do the dirty parts of existence. So, then the picture above is the Outer Space version of the Eloy plantation.  But space will require machines and industry.

I have encountered suggestion that the British display this contrasting polarity of existence.  The gentlemen farmers hated industry for being dirty and they only wanted green plantations with obedient servants.  To glorify themselves, they determined that it was their skill set that was the most important.  In recent years they have sought to get rid of industry as a competitor for social power.  But their way of doing things is a consumption not a production.  Their types always accumulate debt trying to live above their means.

So, our upper-class science thinkers tend to be stained by association with the Eloy.  But it is understandable why presentations are made to appeal to the Eloy's.  The Eloy's, in realty are very skilled with language and violence.

But I am not a Marxists or a silly Socialist.  My purpose is not a vengeance, but to translate this into practical means of production.  It is not assured that I have done it or will do it but my purpose is to work in that direction.

In trying to set up a self-replication of machines from the dirt, I am looking for a practical progression from a seed to a tree, if I were to try to explain it to Eloy with limited machine and dirt capabilities.

The habitats of the imagination of my youth, 70's approximately was very much about windows and sunlight.  I think technology is developing in the direction of Electricity and Machines.  Windows and sunlight may hav their place, but I am not thinking that they will yield a high productivity, for the amount of effort required to be expended.

More, another time.

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02-15-2026:  Change title from "Rubble Pile Sinter/Glass Jar" to "Rubble Pile Sinter/Glass Jar/Double Cone Tent"

Double Cone Tent, Working with rubble in orbits.

Orbital Artificial worlds have so far generally been Torus, Cylinder, and Sphere.

I have recently considered a cone as an option that is between Torus and Cylinder in character.

But now I am looking at a double cone tent as a starter device.

It is related to this concept from others.

This is some of the inspiration for it: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/as … 45363/full
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One problem I see with the concepts I have seen, is that they have to start big.  You cannot do a little and then work your way up.

But I feel that with a double cone you might start modest and then work your way up.

In the concept I have there is a Ring/Torus and a Shaft/Hub and joining tensile bands and even then webs of fabric like a tent, where over time you can make the structure more substation, as is desired and convenient.

This drawing will probably be rather challenging to interpret:

Imagine a torus without spokes, and a hub shaft joined together by ropes.

To minimize it more imagine that the torus is actually like a cable tray that an electrician would lay cables in.
https://electricalampere.com/types-of-cable-trays/
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This ring is were the strongest synthetic gravity is to be, but you don't have to make the whole thing into pressurized space.

Instead, you put two or three capsules space out equidistant from each other on the ring-tray.  It is walkable but only pressurized in the capsules.

I am reducing the substance of the device, to start with, adding the notion of expansion being available later.

The "Hub-Shaft" might just be a long pipe to start with.  You might put docking ports at each end.

In this scheme you only have to provide radiation shielding maximum around the capsules on the ring.

In my drawing I show that as brown.

The tent is inflated by spinning.  At that point under a rather low spin you can add the fabric to be the walls of the tent.

Then you can spin it up more.

Although a cable lift might be good for people and things to move from the capsules to the hub shaft, it may be possible for a human to walk up the angled walls to the hub from a capsule.

It can be understood that I am looking at ways to keep humans heathy to work in orbits near Deimos and Phobos or some rubble pile asteroid.

I am trying to minimize the needed starter mass.

Humans most likely will direct robots to extract and process materials from the two moons or an asteroid.

In truth a Starship, or collection of Starships spun about might do better as a start.  But I am exploring the double cone as a habitat in space for humans.  The idea is to start with a minimal frame and make it more substantial over time.

So, please have patience.

I have added a solar and a radiator disk.  I am hoping to make this behave more like a Standford Torus than a single cylinder.

I don't want it doing gyroscopic flip-flops.  I don't know if it will work or not yet.

I am trying to find a method to build a useful structure largely from the two moons materials, using methods including this: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=11305
"Index» Life support systems» Flash Recycling, Salt Mining"

I expect that the Chlorine and Hydrogen has to come from Mars, but it can be recycled, to a large degree.

I am hoping for lower temperature method to extract Carbon and Iron and other substances from the regolith to create Carbon and Iron/Steel and other parts for the device.

The remainder of the regolith can then be incorporated into things like radiation shielding.

Over time a completed torus ring and a completed shaft/hub could be the direction of upgrades.

Left over rubble having the easy materials extracted might be incorporated into Urea-Concrete-Simulant created by microbes or incorporated into blocks of materials bonded by Mycelium growth.

The idea of getting iron/steel, using lower temperatures is attractive.

A first double cone structure could be rather inglorious, but then as it may serve to protect humans and robots to build grander ones, it might be a useful pathway to build substantial and very protective structures of similar nature.

Although I want to try to get them to be of a nature of not doing gyroscopic flip flops, I do think that over time they would be part of a common structure that they would rotate inside of.

When a more substantial version was made, the cones would be strong enough to hold a low pressure ~333 millibar O2 atmosphere, and the Torus and Hub would be able to hole an higher pressure N2/O2 atmosphere in them.

Well, I will put it to bed for now.  Maybe others or I some time can do better.

Ending Pending

I ran into a video about using mushrooms for structures on Mars: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … ORM=VAMGZC  Quote:

I have recently read that high efficiency electrolysis of water is possible with Alkaline water without the use of Iridium, but perhaps with Nickle or other metals.

It has occurred to me that this topic dealing with the creation of Carbon Solids from things like Methane, the production of Hydrogen and Oxygen can be another path to useful things. 

Precision fermentation, possibly using consuming CO2 and Hydrogen will produce Methane as a byproduct.

Methane can make Carbon Solids, and simple Carbon Solids could grow Mushrooms/Mycelium, I believe.

So, by involving non-biological and biological paths, various options may exist.

You could split water and keep the Oxygen as a propellant, and then do precision fermentation using CO2 and H2>>>Methane
For Rocket Fuel.

 
Or....
Then Split the Methane into Carbon and H2>>>back to the Precision fermentation.

Mix Carbon Solids with soil and then grow Mycelium on the Mix to produce structure and/or mushrooms for food.

So, with this process, (I think), you don't have to have biomass to grow Mycelium/Mushrooms, but could perhaps use non-Biological Carbon production to get structure and food.

And your precision fermentation can also produce things like synthetic milk.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precision_fermentation
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So then you might be able to get foods from precision fermentation and mushrooms.

Possibly cellular agriculture also to make artificial meat????

The point is you might bypass photosynthesis altogether, perhaps.

If you can base your foundations on CO2/H2/O2 + Energy >Food + Methane +Oxygen and Methane gives you Carbon and H2.  You have a lot of what plants can do for you.

Over time with bioengineering Mushrooms might be improved per human food needs as well and for structures.

I hope I am correct in this.

Ending Pending

Ceres is a place that has very low gravity but not microgravity.  So, perhaps it would be a good place for this: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … &FORM=VIRE
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So, then perhaps the gravity is enough for nearly Earth-Like processes, and then also you could have centrifuges if you need more.

I think this could be better then trying to process Bennu or other rubble piles.

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Here is some more materials from the same source: https://www.youtube.com/@Rowow

I thought this was interesting: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … &FORM=VIRE  Quote:

I will not at all try to pretend that I have military competency.

However, I do like what happens when inventions flip-flop advantages.

My impression was that competitors had come close to making Aircraft Carriers obsolete.

And the idea of drones both air and surface water, are relatively cheap and can overwhelm our very expensive rocket type weapons.

But this seems to turn the situation on its head.  This then may allow those who have such Laser systems to prohibit unfriendly drones, and yet allow, perhaps drones from the Laser owners side.  So, for now if this is all true, then our cost of insertion of power by navy drops very low relative to what was otherwise going to become the case.

Of course then if the other side eventually has the same, this is perhaps neutralized.  But the USA has a better economy to afford better toys then most others.

Ending Pending

I think this is very important because I consider that the Middle East is a burned-out civilization and a vampire.  It has glowing embers of intelligence still, but mostly power and economics is dominated by Verbal and Violent types.  By allowing verbal skills to displace other skills they degrade their capabilities.  Fortunately, this makes it harder for them to play vampire and conquest people who are less deteriorated then them.

So, there is hope for the human race after all.  We may not be eaten by the vampires of verbal and violent religious power.

Ending Pending

Space Elevator for Earth?

The title of this is strange.  No Elon Musk is found.  Mining will not be zero cost.
https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … &FORM=VIRE  Quote:

I believe that space elevators have been suggested for multiple worlds.  To me Ceres seems like a likely place to try it first.  Although for Ceres, you could use rockets and mass drivers rather well instead.

The diversion of SpaceX to the Moon to run parallel to other Moon bugs, will allow rapid invention to build robot swarms.  Also, the tech to run robots as avatars, can also be developed.

Once you have that for the Moon, you can likely use it on Deimos/Phobos/Mars and in the asteroid belt, particularly Ceres as a possible choice.

The Finns are an interesting source of thinking.  I believe that they are more like the Yamnaya than many Europeans, so they handle reality differently.  And they needed a certain form intelligence to make a living in the north woods.

They came up with this: https://www.sciencealert.com/could-huma … anet-ceres  Image Quote:

They feel that Ceres will have Nitrogen in a weaker gravity well.  And of course, it will have Carbon and water, and minerals.

Many people might want to go nuclear at Ceres, but some people have discussed solar: https://space.stackexchange.com/questio … eroid-belt
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Of course there would be two types of solar.  Orbital and Surface.

Interesting facts about Ceres: https://facts.net/nature/universe/35-facts-about-ceres/
#25:

So, you would not need as much energy storage with a surface installation as for Earth or Mars, both because of rapid rotation and no clouds.

The gravity being slight, sun following robotic solar installation on the surface should not be that hard.
You can try solar cells with mirrors or heat engine in orbit.  Heat engines may not work as well on the surface as Ceres will emit some heat.

The size of the hill sphere for Ceres is very large proportional to the size of Ceres itself.  So you could likely have lots of orbital solar power.

And that would tend to be 24/7 without clouds, and without atmospheric attenuation.

Hill Spheres: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_sphere
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The hill sphere for Ceres is larger than that for Mercury.

So mirrors in orbit and on the surface will likely be able to provide massive amounts of power.

If robot swarms can be developed for the Moon, they will probably include a handful of humans.  Such swarms sent to Ceres could build the place up a great deal.  There would be a distribution of materials and massive supplies of energy.

A Space Elevator System might not be required, but Ceres would be a great place to try it out before trying to do it for the Moon, Mars, or Earth.

They might mass produce the devices in this post #183: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 26#p238026
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Now, I think I have something for this.  If we could toss snow at this thing using a Mass Driver.  Then perhaps we can give it a heck of a push.  We can include ice of water, Co2, and Oxygen.  The Oxygen might be magnetic, which is what we want.

SpaceX intends to make a Mass Driver for the Moon, so if they can then this might be possible.

This opens up some interesting options.

Pause...............

IF you sent Oxygen Ice dust only, then you might create a chemical reaction on impact.  If you added some CO2 then that might suppress it and the CO2 will have more inertia than the Oxygen Ice powder.  If you add Water ice powder, the effects are uncertain.

But the impact should push the convex face of the mirror assembly and may erode it and might vaporize on impact.

Of course, a regular type of mass driver might push the devices to several hundred km/hour first.

You might also use pusher plate detonations to push the craft similar to a Orion Nuclear starship.  Here, I am thinking of chemical explosives.  Adding water or CO2 to the explosion might be useful.

For most of these options you may need a rather substantial mirror structure.  But that may be OK, as the mirror structure is to be plastic and aluminum which you may want to deliver to another location, such as Earth/Moon, or Deimos/Phobos/Mars.

You might stop by a metal asteroid to pick up some materials on the way.

Some flight assistance might come from electron beams also, perhaps, at a distance.

Along the way the device might reconfigure to be as this from post #183:

And having been pushed closer to the sun the mirrors concave feature be used to power a burn-as-you-go Hydro-Lox propulsion system based on a tank of water.

Upon arrival to the destination the device can be rendered into metals, Plastics, Carbon Parts, and Water and Methane perhaps.

If you had mass production these could arrive at more inner planets continually to support desires and needs for a solar economy.

Ending Pending

How weird.  Within a few minutes of my post #1, this video showed up on Utube:

https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … ORM=VAMGZC  Quote:

So, the video seems to answer hot to separate the Iron from the acid with the Chlorine in it.

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Here is something to have a look at, I think:

A dome rests on a small world like Ceres.  Its walls have compressive strength, and it also has tensile cables anchored into its walls.

It is inflated like a Shell world with a form of air.

It could actually be warped into a torus that encompasses the equator of the host world.

Part dome, part shell world, part space elevator, part world house.

Probably you can wear wings and fly at least in the microgravity area.

Any comments?

Ending Pending