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martienne

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From: EU

Registered: 2014-03-29

Posts: 146

Which type of fabric would be feasible to produce on Mars?

Let's say there is a future settlement on Mars. But distance and cost of space travel necessitates a high level of self-sufficiency.
What fabric is likely to be used for clothing?

Cotton? Hardly, right? It requires lots of water and space to produce.
Silk.... Maybe, takes less space, but you need a lot of mulberry leaves!
Hemp or Linen?
Polyester? Very complex production process and requires oil.

What do you think?

RobertDyck

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From: Winnipeg, Canada

Registered: 2002-08-20

Posts: 7,926

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Re: Which type of fabric would be feasible to produce on Mars?

What is Polyester - Manufacturing of Polyester

1. Condensation Polymerization: When acid and alcohol are reacted in a vacuum at high temperatures it results in condensation polymerization. Once the polymerization has occurred the material is extruded onto a casting trough in the form of a ribbon. Once cool, the ribbon hardens and is cut into chips.

2. Melt-spun Fiber: The chips are dried completely. Hopper reservoirs are then used to melt the chips. A unique feature of polyester is that it is melt-spun fiber. The chips are heated, extruded through spinnerets and cools upon hitting the air. It is then loosely wound around cylinders.

3. Drawing: The fibers consequently formed are hot stretched to about five times their original length. This helps to reduce the fiber width. This fiber is now ready and would into cones as filaments. It can also be crimped and cut into staple lengths as per requirements.

How is Polyester Made?

Polyester is made up of long-chain polymers. Today there are two primary types of polyester called polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and poly-1, 4-cyclohexylene-dimethylene (PCDT).  PET is the most popular type as it is applicable to a wider variety of uses and is stronger than PCDT.  However, PCDT is more elastic and resilient and is used in heavier consumer applications.

Synthetic polyester is made using a chemical reaction involving coal, petroleum, air and water.  Polyester is made up of purified terephthalic acid (PTS) or its dimethyl ester dimethyl terephthalate (DMT) and monotheluene glycol (MEG). It holds 10% of the market share for all plastic materials, coming third in terms of popularity after polyethylene (33.5%) and polypropylene (19.5%).

A website I wrote. I initially posted this on the original Mars Society forum in 1999, then created a local chapter website when that forum was taken down. My starting point for this was Robert Zubrin's book "The Case for Mars". To make plastic, you start by reacting CO2 from Mars atmosphere with hydrogen. Using different catalysts, you can make methane or ethylene. Those two are then further reacted to build-up almost all petrochemicals, including polyester. You always have water as a byproduct. Hydrogen is made by electrolysis of water, so this takes a lot of electricity.
Mars Society Winnipeg: Plastics

There will be a lot of synthetics on Mars. However, natural fabrics do "breathe"; that is they allow moisture to absorb into the fibre, and sweat to evaporate. There will be cotton and hemp. In fact, expect paper to be hemp, not wood. Don't forget, in a sealed greenhouse any water that evaporates just condenses on windows and walls, drips down into collection troughs to run back into soil. Agriculture in a sealed greenhouse does not take as much water as an open field.

Besides, there will be plenty of water. I have often posted to this forum my belief that a site must be (1) close to the equator where it's warm, (2) low altitude so there's plenty of atmosphere overhead for radiation protection, (3) flat so it's safe to land (not a valley or ravine), (4) where there's plenty of water, most probably as ice, (5) other resources nearby such as hematite for iron, anorthite or bytownite as aluminum ore, white sand for glass, potash salt deposits for potassium fertilizer, (6) something scientifically interesting to study. This list appeared to be self-contradictory; ice occurs mostly at poles, there is some ice in the sides of dried-up river valleys at mid-latitudes, but no ice where we want it. There is some permafrost at Meridiani Planum where Opportunity landed, but that's high altitude. Then members on this forum pointed out the frozen pack ice of Elysium Planetia. NASA thought it was lava, but the European Space Agency studied it, said there's no way lava would form that. It's ice. In fact there are multiple "sploosh" craters that show large meteorite impacts that dug a crater into the ice. That shows how deep the ice is. It's hard to confirm how much ice is still there, but it was at least formed by ice. ESA estimates it's 800 km x 900 km (500 x 560 miles) x 45 metres (148 feet) deep. That's a larger surface area than all the Great Lakes combined, not as deep as Lake Superior but as deep as Lake Erie, and more ice volume than all the water of the Great Lakes combined. Or to put it in European terms, as large and deep and volume as the North Sea. It's the bottom of the dried-up ocean basin so low altitude and relatively flat/smooth, and only 5° north latitude. If the ice is still there, building on the shores of that would provide all the water a settlement would need.

Last edited by RobertDyck (2018-02-10 09:42:46)

martienne

Member

From: EU

Registered: 2014-03-29

Posts: 146

Re: Which type of fabric would be feasible to produce on Mars?

Wow interesting!

Yeah, this one too - used in North Korea which needed to be self-sufficient in fabric for a while, but didn't have the climate or resources for any classic fabric production.

Vinalon - a synthetic fiber produced from polyvinyl alcohol, using anthracite and limestone as raw materials.

Void

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Registered: 2011-12-29

Posts: 7,773

Re: Which type of fabric would be feasible to produce on Mars?

RobertDyck

Wonderful work!

I want to modify one thing though, if BFR allows jumping from one point on Earth to another, then this should also be possible on Mars.  So, several distant communities could be linked this way at some time in the progression of civilization, before large scale transport was implemented.  So, while I agree that your criteria for the location of the main settlement is good, there should be considered the possibility of other smaller settlements in less favorable environments, but environments that offer a special mineral option for instance.

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elderflower

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Registered: 2016-06-19

Posts: 1,262

Re: Which type of fabric would be feasible to produce on Mars?

Earth has plenty of mining towns, and plenty of metropolitan cities that don't have their own mining activities. A lot of the latter are transportation hubs. There are bound to be settlements established in different places. The location of the first will be wherever seems like a good idea under the circumstances at the time. It may expand or wither away depending on the advantages of its site. Human geography is very dynamic.