Space stations beyond ISS

Terraformer · 2008-02-19 08:07:48

Like I was saying, the smelter would be the next station. You seemed to be saying the next station should be built.

JoshNH4H · 2008-02-19 08:16:23

I have to agree with the wiree concept. Plates may be more efficient, I don't know, but they certainly cannot be launched from a mass driver on the moon. I would assume that the plates would be surrounded by an insulator, such as carbon fiber or Alumina(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/alumina)which would be heated to about 2000 deg. C. The iron it surrounds would melt, but it wouldn't. It would be good radiation shielding, especially if it was surrounded by carbon fibre/plastic after that.

dicktice · 2008-02-19 10:03:35

Extruding wire in orbit from masses of molten metal has its own problems, but gravity isn't one of them.
Confining solar heated molten masses in the case of aluminum or other nonferrous metal, as well as drawing through dies without an existing structure against which to pull opens up a whole, new field of heavy industry under microgravity conditions, in vacuum. There wouldn't be any size constraints out there. The initial assemblies could emulate spider webs, in concept, with Bigelow-type inflatable habitats positioned here and there as needed during assembly (themselves supported from within by wires in tension). Imagine initial single wire filaments being propelled across miles of space by spider-like tugs, to link up with previously deployed wires....

neviden · 2008-02-19 11:13:06

Plates may be more efficient, I don't know, but they certainly cannot be launched from a mass driver on the moon.

The only thing you would need to launch is "material" (dirt). After it is in orbit, the smelter would reprocess it and make it into something usefull (=plates).

I would assume that the plates would be surrounded by an insulator, such as carbon fiber or Alumina(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/alumina)which would be heated to about 2000 deg. C. The iron it surrounds would melt, but it wouldn't. It would be good radiation shielding, especially if it was surrounded by carbon fibre/plastic after that.

Why an insulator?

Any station would have more problems with the question of how to get rid of the heat then with how to stay warm.

Grypd · 2008-02-20 06:47:53

Plates may be more efficient, I don't know, but they certainly cannot be launched from a mass driver on the moon.
The only thing you would need to launch is "material" (dirt). After it is in orbit, the smelter would reprocess it and make it into something usefull (=plates).

What we have found is that if we design a station that requires lots of launches to construct then we will pay a lot of money for a station that will take a lot of time to be ready for our purposes (ISS white elephant). The single biggest expense is to launch the item in the first place and for a next space station launching materials to have smelted to then construct the station in space does not make sense.

My plan would be to launch the central part of the planned rotating space station in a single piece. Using the beam maker technology that we have already used in space we can then extend outwards to a point where we will place a series of inflatable habs. A couple more launches and the station will be core complete and ready for use it will not be a circle just a large T. It will have artificial gravity but to save mass it will be only about 0.5g. Astronauts will be able to move along the beams from the various Habs to the center and since the center would be clear it would be perfect for future space craft construction and docking.

The future could allow easy expansion just increase the beams at first to form a cross. Shirt sleeve enviroment could be achieved by the equivalent of a poly tunnel covered lift to allow acces to the branches and to the center hab and then later to have a circle formed around the center hab.

The plan for this sort of spacestation is to go further than LEO and in that case some of the benefits we get for being in LEO disapear. Future space stations must have storm shelters as part of there makeup to protect from the infrequent solar storms and they must also have a lot of backups in case of accident. Having what is in effect two stations in one allows these backups in the case of puncture or damage.

Tom Kalbfus · 2008-03-18 09:32:53

I think a rotating space station would be best for cycling spaceships and for spaceships on voyages to the outer planets. It would take years to reach Titan for example, not months as would be the case for Mars. If the crew of an exploration team is going to spend years in transit, they are going to need a rotating habitat. Surprisingly, a spaceship resembling the Discovery from the Movie 2001 A Space Oddesy, would make a great start on designs for ratating space ships, the internal centrifuge is just too small however, but if we could get it to do what we saw in the movie 2010 Odessy Two, that is flip end over end, that would be about right. Such a ship, when it wanted to make a course correction would arrest its flipping motion by storing its roational energy in a flywheel that is not inhabited, and when it is done, it would release the rotational energy back into the spaceship as a whole so that it flips end over end once again.

JoshNH4H · 2008-03-18 13:55:45

Plates may be more efficient, I don't know, but they certainly cannot be launched from a mass driver on the moon.
The only thing you would need to launch is "material" (dirt). After it is in orbit, the smelter would reprocess it and make it into something usefull (=plates).
I would assume that the plates would be surrounded by an insulator, such as carbon fiber or Alumina(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/alumina)which would be heated to about 2000 deg. C. The iron it surrounds would melt, but it wouldn't. It would be good radiation shielding, especially if it was surrounded by carbon fibre/plastic after that.
Why an insulator?
Any station would have more problems with the question of how to get rid of the heat then with how to stay warm.

My plan it to:

A: Make the wire frame
B: Cover it in an insulator
C: Have a solar powered electrical heater slowly go around the outside and melt the metal underneath the insulator, by heating the insulator with an electrical current.

But what orbit would be the best for such a space station?

Terraformer · 2008-03-21 07:04:49

Highly Elliptical Orbit? Craft from Earth dock while at Perigee, craft from the Moon/Asteroids dock while at it's Apogee.

JoshNH4H · 2008-03-21 09:21:26

I was thinking of something along the lines of a lagrangian transfer orbit:

HEO to lunar L1 to lunar L2 to lunar L1 to HEO etc. so basically a figure 8 around the earth and moon.

Terraformer · 2008-03-21 10:26:40

So.... a Cycler?

Martian Republic · 2008-03-21 16:12:49

As far as trying to use metal to build that space station, it pretty much a lost cause. You have to make too many launches to get a sufficient amount of metal to be able to build a sufficiently big enough space station to make the effort feasible even in the next twenty thirty year time frame. If we try it, we will only have a more glorified ISS space station to show for it and still not get the job done that you say you want done.

But, if your still bent on putting up such a White Elephant, the best effort to be able to get such a project done would be to bag it and use polymers and epoxies to build that space station. Take bag out there that several hundred feet to maybe thousand feet or so and turn a rocket engine backward into the bag and inflate it to full size. Then go across that carbon fiber bag with other carbon fiber pieces to thicken outside wall and add strength to the outside wall. Add radiation shielding and insulation and other such things. Also put carbon fibered cords for structural strength of the space station. It has the advantage of not having all those seams that can leak on you. Beside, once you have the outside layer, you can increasingly be able to project the Astronauts from harmful radiation and such. You also have a foundation to work off of to support future projects some time in the future.

Larry,

JoshNH4H · 2008-03-31 14:31:36

So.... a Cycler?

basically

Commodore · 2008-03-31 22:12:15

The most practical way we currently have to build large simulated gravity spacecraft or stations is to string several Shuttle/Ares tanks and spent stages together. This would provide lots of volume with minimal extra structural mass.

I think that is the most effective way to go for the Moon, Mars, and beyond, on the surface and in space. Even the humble Ares I contains a second stage with dimensions ranging near 18' x 100', with an internal volume that dwarfs the ISS. The Ares V EDS stage could do better. Then theres the big enchilada, the ET itself. Think about that. An ISS sized station or larger for tiny fraction of the cost and time.

Theres challenges of course. Devising an outer coated to shield the hull from wide temperature swings while isolating the fuel it contains, deposing of or exploiting the J2X, and engineering an interstage segment that allows access for personnel and bulky cargo to the interior to the H2 and LOX tanks and connecting to other spent stages without compromising either. And figuring out how to get them to through atmospheres and safely on a surface. Nows the time to flesh it out more, before we get stuck.

I'd like to see NASA fling a ET into orbit before we retire the shuttle, just to see how it holds up out of the box.

Swoosh · 2008-04-01 05:33:14

Doesn't the External Tank have something like 98% of the velocity it needs to achieve orbit when it is discarded? Sounds like an awful waste. If we could just give it a little extra push, we could use it for all sorts of great ideas (I believe this was one of Bigelow's original ideas for a space hotel). What about a Shuttle C with a small second stage?

I assume that ETs would be easy to pressurise. What about construction? joining several together and cutting windows, etc. Welding would work in space, wouldn't it?

Martian Republic · 2008-04-01 08:53:26

I think I will jump on that idea before GCNRevenger get here to jump on it. This idea has been floated across this board several times and that idea has been shot down several times too. The problem with sending up the ET tank are:

1. It takes more fuel to take the ET tank all the way into space and virtually eliminates the use of the shuttle bay, because of the need for more fuel to get that tank into space.
2. The tank deteriorates over time with that insulation on it and leave insulation in orbit.
3. You would still have to cut hole in the end of those tanks or put a collar
on the ends of those tanks and do other modification in space on those tanks to use them for the purpose that you stated you want to use them for. Then they would still not be good for the purpose that you wanted to use them for with a major overlay of material over those tanks to put radiation shielding on them and other such things.
4. We could not modify those tanks on Earth to solve that orbital problem of re manufacturing those tanks in space, because dual use tanks would be twice as heavy or heavier than the current tanks, which would be too heavy for our use as an external tank. Beside dual use item don't work very good for either use you want to put them to, because of the need to design them differently for each of those two purposes.

The only way that you could even come close to doing something like that would be to make ten to twenty special launches for that pacific purpose, but not using those ET tanks, but using Bigelow habitat.
We would have to go with a Bigelow habitat on a cargo shuttle and where we discard the shuttle and put the Bigelow habitat in it place se be get the maximum size for our habitat that we can get. The you would have to launch ten to twenty cargo shuttle and Bigelow habitats to get a sufficient number of Bigelow habitats into make our ring. A Bigelow habitat that big would probably cost five hundred million dollars per habitat. A cargo shuttle launch would probably cost between one to two billion dollars to launch. So it would probably cost forty to sixty billion dollars to put up that kind of space station of the wheel type.

Larry,

JoshNH4H · 2008-04-01 14:32:17

possibly we could modify my idea for use with kelvar/ plastic only?

Swoosh · 2008-04-01 21:22:14

I'm not talking about sending the ET up with a shuttle, but a second stage instead of a shuttle. And it'd certainly need a lot of work once it's up there to become a space-station per se (eg radiation shielding, life support, etc), but just getting a pressurised volume that large would be a huge achievement. As for the foam deteriorating, that's not structural is it? It would act as a great micrometeoroid shield. Surely the ET structure is capable of containing one atmosphere of pressure?

And assuming the Space Shuttle ET is in fact inappropriate, wouldn't the concept work anyway? If a new launch vehicle were developed to put not payload as such, but its large main tanks into orbit, that could be a cheap and relatively easy way to create large pressurised volumes in orbit.... or have I missed some fundamental flaw that has been addressed in another thread?

Commodore · 2008-04-01 22:00:34

Both the second stage of Ares I and the Ares V EDS is based on the S-IVB Saturn upper stage, the same hull used for Skylab. The concept is the same, only the product is larger. So both of those are open for business.

The ET, or now, the core stage, is trickier, but very worth the effort. The Ares V EDS goes to orbit and beyond without isolation, so its quite likely the ET could as well. The biggest problem is likely to be access, but we know the tank has hatches to do internal repairs, its just a matter of enlarging them and placing them in a good spot, without adding a whole lot of mass.

The trouble has always been the shuttle. It had far to little margin to play with to make the required modifications to the tank to make it work. And frankly we didn't have anyplace to put them, and anything to do with them once we got them there.

Its a new ballgame now. We need the volume. We have the margin. If the tank is the spacecrafts hull, nothing we are likely to want to put in it will seriously challenge the Ares V lifting power, even with modification.

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