Cloth Diapers - Yes...you heard me right -- Diapers.

Ian Flint · 2004-06-29 13:47:08

I was discussing breastfeeding with Cindy on another thread, and it brought to mind other baby needs at a Martian colony.

****Diapers****

Nearly everyone in America uses disposable diapers. I think Europe is a little more environmentally friendly, but still, a lot of Europeans use disposables as well.

The sheer mass of disposable diapers would make importing them far too costly for a nacient Martian colony. Whoever goes there will have to [Pauses for effect] wash out poop!!!!

Don't panic. Don't Panic! It'll be Ok. It's likely that none of us will get to Mars anyway.

Interesting, isn't it? We take two steps forward to Mars and one step back to pre 50s childcare.

Other retro child basics on Mars:

1. Breastfeeding -- no formula producers on Mars.
2. Simple clothes -- no Baby Gap.
3. Wholesome food -- no prepackaged babyfood.
4. Few toys -- no sweat shops making crappy toys either, darn.
5. Parents raising their own kids -- day cares probably won't pop up for a while.

Even with the higher levels of radiation, risk of depressurization, possible risks from low gravity, and crowded living spaces, Martian kids may be better off than their terrestrial counterparts.

Palomar · 2004-06-29 14:06:36

*Yep.

How well I remember my sister washing loads of cloth diapers. Then helping her hang them out to dry, folding, etc.

That big bucket of dirty diapers soaking before wash...I don't remember what kind of detergent she used for that. It made a good "door stop" as well (no lock on their bathroom door).

Is that 20 years ago already??

--Cindy

P.S.: Certain adult personal hygiene products will likely also have to be cloth.

Ian Flint · 2004-06-29 14:18:46

And toilet paper, too.

Sorry, guys. It's not just the women and kids.

Actually Cindy, my tree-huggin' wife says that cloth pads are much more comfortable than paper/plastic. She's even got us all using cloth toilet paper. I resisted at first, but once I tried it I found that it wasn't any different than paper, maybe even a bit softer.

Grypd · 2004-06-29 16:57:21

Right you are not going to believe this, But

1) Cabbages, These are important for women who breast feed as they provide the main materials for cooling pads and the leaves are a natural means to cool inflamed breasts.

2) Nappies, Martian Nappies will be a mixture of disposibal and terry towel, The insides will be made of natural product that can be made of local vegetarian produce. These to clean we remove from the outside cover which is made of very durable mars made plastic and the innards shredded and put through the Bio waste machinery we use for human excretia and is so much fertiliser. The more durable outsides will be seperated from the inners when used. To clean these it will not need a major cleaning facility. Why its cold on mars really really cold. We put the nappies to be cleaned outside during the martian night, before dawn we then brush off the super frozen material putting it through a small locally made machine then it is put back into the drum which we had it in the night for and left exposed to the vigors of the martian daytime and all that hard Ultraviolet radiation killing off any other germs.
After that the outers will be combined with the new made inner moisture absorbing natural pads and ready for use.

3) Milk, Frankly we are going to export a machine to make artificial human milk and forget the cost this is too important.

4) Baby cream, This is moisturiser and anti irritant in one. Long before the first child is born on mars supplies of this will be had. Why, Martian Fines, small dust particles, will be a constant problem to martian humans they will get everywhere and even worse in a dust storm. Unless we use cream like this liberally we run the risk of the debilitating diseases caused by constant skin irritations, Not to mention driving the humans on mars mad.

5) Baby clothes. We will rely on our agriculture a lot more than people realize also on our ability to make fabrics from mars plastics. We will make clothes suitable for children. It is not hard. Also goats, They are hardy milk producing wooly animals, Well im thinking a new slogan mans best friend the goat. These we will send to mars, and children get first dibs.

And for those who call me a tree hugger for mentioning cabbages it is a TRADITIONAL SCOTTISH way of solving certain womens problems

Palomar · 2004-06-29 17:40:03

Right you are not going to believe this, But
1) Cabbages, These are important for women who breast feed as they provide the main materials for cooling pads and the leaves are a natural means to cool inflamed breasts.

And for those who call me a tree hugger for mentioning cabbages it is a TRADITIONAL SCOTTISH way of solving certain womens problems

*Hi Have not heard of this before, but it sounds like a marvelous idea. Cabbages will undoubtedly be grown in the Mars greenhouses -- so why not?

Nature has her ways. Nothing wrong with Mother Nature's remedies, that's for sure.

--Cindy

Bill White · 2004-06-29 17:55:44

Soap. Any suggestions on making soap?

Toothpaste. What is baking soda, exactly? NaCl works also.

= = =

Edit: google "supercritical carbon dioxide & dry cleaning"

It appears to work wonderfully for clothes.

Unrelated:

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=n … eaning]CO2 "snow" cleaning

= = =

Carbon dioxide is a nontoxic, nonhazardous, nonflammable material, with no ozone depleting potential. CO2 cleaning methods are commonly applied to those contaminants that dissolve in CO2, which include most organic soils. This method of cleaning is generally not applicable to rust, scale, and most inorganic compounds.

http://www.cleantechcentral.com/Knowled … n.asp]Link

Grypd · 2004-06-29 18:02:42

Soap is really only fat with a perfume added in and a few other toiletries to make it more presentable.
Modern mankind uses a lot of chemical processes but it just comes down to using the right plants. The best soap plant is the humble soya bean! It apparently gives the best Hydrogenated fat(cooking oil) which is needed at an economic rate of collection.

We also need a lye or sodium hydroxide, This is created by putting a current through a brine solution(salty water) and the lye is formed as a white solid substance. It also releases chlorine which is needed in a lot of other industrial processes.

RobS · 2004-07-02 13:36:34

Regarding diapers, with our first baby (1998) we used a cloth diaper service because it was environmentally more friendly. All big and many medium or even small cities have such services. I suspect one can modify ordinary washing machines to handle dirty diapers reasonably well, or just use an ordinary washing machine. If the results are sterile diapers that are a bit brown, that's good enough for early Mars.

Regarding baby formula: as mentioned by one of our good Scots, soy is the key. The Chinese have been making tofu for a thousand years. I suspect soy milk is just runny tofu; it's probably fairly easy to make. From soy milk one can make soy cheese and ice cream. To make soy baby formula, you start with soy milk and add vitamins and a few other additives (I don't know what). Probably one could make emergency soy baby formula using soy milk and a carefully designed mix of ground up vitamins (which any Mars base will have). One would want to use the soy baby formula as a supplement to mother's milk, ideally, since mother's milk is unreplaceable (as a friend of mine in the LaLeche League says, mother's milk is alive, and one can't make a living baby formula).

Cabbage leaves: My wife just had radiation treatment for breast cancer and the nurses recommended she wrap her breast with cabbage leaves to reduce inflammation. I don't know whether it helped.

Toothpaste: What's in organic toothpastes? Tom Chappel makes Tom's of Maine Toothpaste. Should be findable on the web.

Paper: I'd import equipment to Mars pretty early to make half decent paper from vegetable waste, like wheat and rice straw.

-- RobS

P.S.: I've been away for a month in Europe, so I wasn't able to write much while there. But now I'm back and will be contributing. Hope to see some of you in Chicago; I'm presenting a second-place essay contest paper and a version of my Mars-24 ideas.

Palomar · 2004-07-02 19:00:09

*RobS:

My best personal wishes to your wife; I hope she recovers fully and completely.

Cabbage leaves recommended to her. How interesting. In all my years within the medical arena I don't recall hearing of such usage. But the medical establishment is -- more and more (albeit slowly) -- coming to recognize "homeopathic" type treatments and etc. Some physicians I'm aware of in the Seattle area actually recommend patients to naturopaths and herbalists -- even acupuncturists. That was unheard of even 10 years ago.

Well, I don't mean to get off-topic.

--Cindy

RobS · 2004-07-02 20:04:08

The cabbage leaves were not an official recommendation, but an informal one by the nurses. And so far, thank God, she has recovered fully.

-- RobS

Palomar · 2004-07-02 21:14:01

The cabbage leaves were not an official recommendation, but an informal one by the nurses.

*Yes, understood. But even that surprises me.

I'm glad for her recovery.

--Cindy

Ian Flint · 2004-07-03 14:50:15

Since we're talking about "unusual" remedies, how about leaches? Several years ago I heard that doctors were using leaches again. It wasn't to suck out bad spirits, though, they were using them to suck out extra blood from inflamed tissue after reconstructive surgery.

dicktice · 2004-07-04 11:29:28

Maggots to eat the dead tissue after the leaches suck out the blood, following surgery--pretty sure they wouldn't be used simultaneously though. How about some more neat suggestions regarding helpful critters to be taken along (as embrios or whatever) from Earth. Apacas and Llamas, domesticated for over 5,000 years for their fibres, don't seem to have been mentioned so far--not as smelly as goats, and they don't deficate just anywhere, according to my Googled data.

Timeslicer · 2004-07-05 20:57:56

Apacas and Llamas, domesticated for over 5,000 years for their fibres, don't seem to have been mentioned so far--not as smelly as goats

Don't take anything along that might eat the walls!

Eventually brick buildings would allow such. Stick with fish and turtles to start - small, not too picky about what they eat, but they can't get away and get into places where they might cause trouble.

Shaun Barrett · 2004-07-06 05:53:45

Hi RobS!
Cancer is the scourge of the developed world - we all know that. But it still takes some getting used to when people you know, or are close to, come down with it.
It was disturbing to hear of your wife's recent brush with cancer and I'd like to add my sympathies to those offered by others here. My wife had suspicious breast lumps a few years ago and tissue was removed for a biopsy which, thank God, showed the lumps to be benign.
You must both have been through a very worrying ordeal. What my wife and I went through was bad enough, but that was nothing compared to your experience.
I, too, am delighted that the treatment has been successful. Even though she doesn't know me from a bar of soap(! ), please convey my good wishes to your wife.

C M Edwards · 2004-07-06 15:17:37

Regarding clothing, my calculations show that the most mass-efficient thing to do is bring along enough clothing that you never have to wash anything during transit, then upon arrival have a "laundry month" to wash the half-ton of clothes you had to bring with you in order to fly to Mars.

If you've brought enough clothes to get there, you've brought enough clothes to stay.

Ian Flint · 2004-07-06 15:22:55

Your gonna have to work hard to convince me of that one, Edwards.

C M Edwards · 2004-07-06 20:09:22

Not too difficult.

If you have a big enough pile of clean clothes, you can have a change of clothes every day for six months without needing to wash a single article of clothing. With the (hopeful) exception of underwear, you can wear each article of clothing more than once, which allows you to keep your total clothing amount less than about 100kg for 6 months. For a crew of four, that's about 400kg of clothes for 6 months.

If you intend to wash everything instead, then you obviously intend to wash it for the entire mission, unless you're expecting replacement clothes from somewhere. That means you'll still need at least 20kg clothes for each crewman (clothes wear out in 2.5 years time). Then you'll need a washer, which can be as light as 10kg if you don't ask too much of it. Detergent for 2.5 years is similarly lightweight -- 30kg, including buffers. What kills you is the working fluid. Not all of it can be recovered. Ultimately, losing just 3kg water with every weekly wash (less than 10% losses) will make the mass of the washing system plus working fluid more than just packing extra clothes.

Far better to wait and get your working fluid once you actually get to Mars. Then you start with a 100kg wardrobe instead of 20kg.

BWhite · 2004-07-06 20:12:00

http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/news/2003/ … ry.asp]ISS underwear link.

google is awesome

FrankPoole · 2004-07-06 21:17:21

When my wife and I had our baby we decided to do things the natural way and it worked great. Along the way we learned about infant potty training-started our son at 2 weeks and a year later he lets us know when he has to go. This is really the historical method, as in cultures without plumbing one needs to have kids potty trained FAST. I imagine the same thing will happen on Mars.

DERF · 2004-07-07 06:10:10

This sounds interesting. Can you give details?

Ian Flint · 2004-07-07 07:40:57

Edwards, I like the idea of bringing along plenty of extra clothes, but I don't fancy the idea of letting dirty clothes pile up for six months. I'm sure you could vacuum seal them away so it wouldn't stink, but what about issues like staining. After sitting for six months I bet those armpit stains will come right out.:;):

I don't think it is the best idea for crew moral either. What about that favorite shirt that you got as a parting gift from your wife? You either wear it a total of 10 days or so, or you let that sucker get so disgustingly filthy by wearing it every other day that the rest of the crew throws you out the air lock.

Those were extreme examples, but I hope you get the general point. Six months is just too long. How about a compromise. Bring lots of extra clothes, say 50 kg per person. Wash once a month in transit and as needed on the surface.

Or...just send a bunch of college age bachelors with a minimal amount of clothes and no washing machine. They'll be right at home!

What do they do on the ISS?

C M Edwards · 2004-07-07 08:16:19

Regarding washing clothes:

Some compromise will be needed, true. Not washing will only save weight during the shorter transit times. If you can get working fluid (water or liquid CO2) without a weight penalty, it makes more sense to wash regularly over long term missions.

I believe that on the ISS, they currently use the no-wash approach _and_ dispose of the clothing afterward. Wasteful!

Regarding potty training:

I wasn't aware that children could start potty training before they could even lift their heads. However, it does make a great deal of sense to start as early as possible. I say, if that kid can successfully crawl to the toilet, it's time to begin. :;):

RobS · 2004-07-07 12:37:05

Has anyone seen anything anywhere about whether clothes can be washed in liquid carbon dioxide? If so, that would save water when on Mars. It would also simplify drying clothes (wich otherwise requires a clothes drier and a lot of electricity, or a clothes line and a lot of bother).

That article about ISS not only talks about how they throw away clothes after one use (underwear usually last three or four days, it says!), but how guys with favorite clothes wash them anyway by placing them in a plastic bag with water, shaking them, then I suppose squeezing the water into the toilet and hanging them up to dry.

-- RobS

clark · 2004-07-07 12:55:07

What about ulta-sonic washers? Bubble action (used in Japan)?

The problem with not washing the clothes is you might create an environment for bacterial growth that can have ill effects on crew or ship.

Then there is the secondary problem of "what if" they can't produce the water on Mars? Now they're stuck there with no clean clothes (you've created a problem). Of course, they might run into the same problem if they lose their water in an accident on the way- but we can plan and mitigate for this. No?

I think you have a point in theory, but it just may not be that practical given the overall situation.

What about more stain resistant clothing? Perfume (worked prior to regular bathing)?

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Re: Cloth Diapers - Yes...you heard me right -- Diapers.

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