How much would the first step cost? - Cheapest first step, what can we afford?

Rakial · 2005-07-15 14:19:32

What is the cheapest first step we can make to get closer to Mars? And what does it entail? Lets say we have a beginning capital of 2 mills. What can we afford? If we could send at least some parts or some tools that will be used later down the road even 10 years later. If we could start not with gigantic missions but with something small maybe ???

Rxke · 2005-07-15 17:43:30

That sum won't get you very far... Launching costs being what they are...

SpaceNut · 2005-07-16 20:35:25

Well for the 2 million you could get a cracker jack engineering team together to design the cheapest vehicles to launch with.

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2005-07-16 21:34:13

no way, for any type of cheap price

without research, investments, big money spent and good designs you're only going to get a risky mission that may not arrive on the red planet, or just become a suicide-kamikaze flag planting journey

PurduesUSAFguy · 2005-07-17 01:28:08

As much as I hate to say it, the best way to spend $2mil to further the cause of H2M is likely in the form of advocacy.(sp?...it's late + vodka) Hire a marketing firm to produce some slick commercials, or make campaign contributions to members of the appropriations committee.

Two million might go along way to getting some real money for the cause.

Dook · 2005-07-17 04:04:13

There are enough plausible plans for going to mars cheaply but in my opinion there are two major hurdles. The biggest is a launch vehicle but the next in line is in-situ rocket propellant production.

A mars sample return mission that tests in-situ rocket propellant production would cost more than $2 million though.

Once we are confidant that mars in-situ works, the door opens wider.

Fledi · 2005-07-17 06:05:36

I think the 2 mils is best spent on developing new technologies (propulsion or life support) on Earth. Even such details as lighter, more durable materials or a cheaper/lighter turbopump for the engines can reduce cost to LEO and thereby bring us closer to Mars.
Another area that is even cheaper than this is building habitats in extreme environments and test out new ideas for life support. This approach is just in itself the best advertising one can do because of the stations standing there and the press will visit then.
So these research stations of the Mars Society are one of the best low-cost methods of getting closer to Mars.

Rakial · 2005-07-17 11:25:39

I understand all this; I just think that something must be done to star it. Just like any other business enterprise you can plan all you want research all you want, but it’s all about taking that first step. There is a lot being done for advertising and research, but the first step towards living on Mars is the first flight there saying that some (I don’t know) supplies were delivered for future man mission. Isn’t it the best advertising? Then we’ll see the space race it will generate.

Martian Republic · 2005-07-17 12:15:16

I understand all this; I just think that something must be done to star it. Just like any other business enterprise you can plan all you want research all you want, but it’s all about taking that first step. There is a lot being done for advertising and research, but the first step towards living on Mars is the first flight there saying that some (I don’t know) supplies were delivered for future man mission. Isn’t it the best advertising? Then we’ll see the space race it will generate.

I understand what you want to do and go with that 2 million dollars, but the rest of the people who have answered you are right, two million dollars is nothing for doing what needs to be done. I wish that were not so, but it is. Anything short of Kennedy type Moon mission go to the moon will do, but to Mars and maybe throw in a semi-temporary habitat to boot, will get the job done for us. Just about anything else we come up with, just won't work.

Two million dollars for doing anything serious for getting us to Mars is like having a bottomless boat, it just not going to work for us to do anything serious. You might donate it to the Mars Society or something, but there will still be no guarantees it will do anything serious in the ways of getting something going.

Larry,

srmeaney · 2005-07-17 17:46:10

With two million, start a company and design, patent, and sell a "wratchet driver for Allen Keys". This unique step up from an ordinary hand tool will give you the advantage of a world wide monopoly. For a while...
With the ten million in profits you get from that, you can design, patent and mass produce a "fuel cell that manufactures acetelyne and Ozone from CO2 and H2O".

From the fifty million you make from that, you will be better placed to look at placing one of your fuel cell processing plants as a piggy back payload on some large experiment. Perhaps you can add yours as a sprayer to clean the dust off the solar cells using manufactured the ozone and acetylene- good mars terraforming gasses.

Takes about twenty years of hard work...

GCNRevenger · 2005-07-17 18:52:08

Just out of curiosity... why acetylene and ozone? The former isn't worth all that much, and the latter is unstable.

srmeaney · 2005-07-21 08:55:45

Both are the total mass of CO2 and H2O -100% efficiency in use of product. Ozone is better in specific impulse with Hydrogen than O2- Zubrin may talk the talk, when it comes to Mars Direct, but Efficiency is something else. Acetylene and Ozone can be produced from the Martian Polar Ice and they can be produced cheaply.

Sure Ozone breaks down, On Earth Gravity has a nasty habit of bending molecules. On Mars, Ozone is slightly more stable and has a good Terraforming profile.

Acetylene is useful in smelting metals, and as a Terraforming Gas, is useful in creating the Atmosphere Mars Needs. Electrical storms break it up when Atmosphere is sufficient... It also converts into those basic building blocks of Life, So even if we never Go, Life will be helped along by the Use of Acetylene...even if we are just using it to clean dust off the solar array.

GCNRevenger · 2005-07-21 19:47:17

"On Earth Gravity has a nasty habit of bending molecules. On Mars, Ozone is slightly more stable and has a good Terraforming profile. "

Uh, no it doesn't. Ozone probobly isn't much more stable on Mars either to any great degree then Earth either, there is still quite a bit of UV coming in from the Sun and no oxygen to serve as a kenetic counterbalence.

Ozone is slightly better then plain old LOX, but raw specific impulse isn't as important on Mars since there is so much less gravity and air resistance. The extra difficulty of liquifying and storing Ozone outweighs the bennefit, especially considering how you would have to continuously re-convert and re-purify it as it sits in the tanks. It is more important that equipment sent to Mars, particularly chemical plants, be light weight and compact, and adding Ozone equipment doesnt make sense.

Another thing about storage, that until we start having alot of regular flights or need lots of vehicle fuel, then you are going to have to store that ozone for extended periods. Both NASA DRM and MarsDirect both call for the ERV/MAV oxidizer to be stored for aproximatly three years before being used. Lastly, I am not real happy with it for safety reasons, since tankage, plumbing, pumps and whatnot for it must be specially designed to resist attack from liquid Ozone.

And Acetylene, it probobly is a bit more efficent in terms of energy when burned for the amount of Hydrogen it contains, but if you have a ready supply of Martian water, then that really isn't a problem. Acetylene won't ever be very practical as a terraforming chemical that way, since these organic molecules you are talking about being formed by lightning are just going to get shredded by the strong UV light and peroxide-laced soil.

We won't need it for general purpose metal smelting either, since we won't be making that much steel on Mars... the metal of choice will more likly be Magnesium alloy, which probobly melts easier then Iron.

Blow off solar pannels... you mean you would waste precious hydrogen-bearing gas, which you went to such trouble to make, as a general purpose compressed gas??? Nonsense! You would use compressed carbon dioxide of course!

srmeaney · 2005-07-21 21:07:40

I dont know Rev,

Sounds too easy...especially if it frosts over the solar array.

and yes, I would use Acetelyne to clean the solar array on a Mars bot. If we were pursuing a philosophy of Terraform and science simultaneously, we would be justified in releasing O+O2 as we went and just vented the C2H2 on a regular basis to keep the solar arrays at optimal. The worst that could happen is we terraform Mars...

We won't need it for general purpose metal smelting either, since we won't be making that much steel on Mars... the metal of choice will more likly be Magnesium alloy, which probobly melts easier then Iron.

On the contrary, With iron, Carbon from polar ice and silicates (if they are minable) Steel is something we can manufacture on Mars.

Just with a commitment to the Energy needed. I didnt think it could be done, but as we can manufacture steels, even in a gas-plasma smelting process using C2H2 and a megawatt reactor it is something that is achievable.

Martin_Tristar · 2005-07-21 21:38:59

With a beginnning capital of US$2 Million ( it would be difference for EURO $2 million ), I would invest into a educational College focused on Space and the Space Colonization Skills needed in the world of the future and develop skills sets that are required on top of the existing earth skills sets needed for engineering, construction, and health and living in space and then get other corporates to also share in the college future, It MUST survivie by self-funding through courses and students.

srmeaney · 2005-07-21 22:04:13

Good Idea. You start the School and the Space Commonwealth will throw in a fifty Million Billion research Budget for the next hundred years.

Rxke · 2005-07-22 02:23:18

Rakial,

It might be possible to send *something* up for that price, after all, if that payload was piggy-packed on a NASA (or maybe ESA) mission to the surface.
Going the whole mile by yourself is clearly out of the question.

NASA used to have the GAS (GetAway Special) payloads in the 80's on the Shuttle, where one could send stuff up for 'peanuts' (I only remember the prices were seriously reduces, so schools could sen up experiments) in special cannisters, since the Shuttle often had place to spare in its payloadbay...

Mars is another ballpark, of course. No shuttles with big payloadbays, but severely weight restricted landers... Still, it might be possible to coerce NASA/JPL/... to keep a little place handy for someone to send up a symbolic item. Like a specially packaged chocolate bar, say. (EDIT: uncounsciously, I was indeed thinking about a... Mars bar!)

It would be symbolic, but could trigger an avalanche of interest... Symbols are powerful.

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2005-07-22 08:22:44

first steps are not for cheap, think about it...
did China build a great Wall in a day ?

srmeaney · 2005-07-22 16:03:04

Two million could also be spent on a running a world wide lottery-the winner goes to Mars-a billion tickets at a hundred dollars each.

Stormrage · 2005-07-23 05:02:52

With 2 million you can start up a business. Make enough money and get powerful. Then start to reasearch ways to get an efficent propulsion that has a high thrust.

Martin_Tristar · 2005-07-23 07:59:53

Good Idea. You start the School and the Space Commonwealth will throw in a fifty Million Billion research Budget for the next hundred years.

I will take that as a compliment, but if it wasn't , then we need a new level of skills for normal occupations and we need to add the necessary skills to the existing diplomas, trade certificates, and advance them into a new understanding of space environment and expand human society into it without us fearing the unknown.

GCNRevenger · 2005-07-23 08:09:58

With 2 million you can start up a business. Make enough money and get powerful. Then start to reasearch ways to get an efficent propulsion that has a high thrust.

Well Stormrage, the trouble with that is that chemical engines are near their theoretical maximum possible efficency with the best practical fuels today, and they just aren't going to get much better without a revolutionary superfuel.

As far as "other" engines go, solid core nuclear engines are limited by their melting point (~3000K) and aren't going to get any more efficent either... so if you need an engine with superior thrust and specific impulse, its going to be something pretttty darn exotic... a gasseous-core nuclear reactor probobly. Even $50M won't get you that far for such a thing.

Martian Tristar: Um. What?

srmeaney · 2005-08-12 17:38:30

Oh look, a space propulsion engine the size of a small moon.

I wonder if its cheaper to fold spacetime and build two doors...one on earth and the other on mars.

Stormrage · 2005-08-13 10:34:12

With 2 million you can start up a business. Make enough money and get powerful. Then start to reasearch ways to get an efficent propulsion that has a high thrust.
Well Stormrage, the trouble with that is that chemical engines are near their theoretical maximum possible efficency with the best practical fuels today, and they just aren't going to get much better without a revolutionary superfuel.
As far as "other" engines go, solid core nuclear engines are limited by their melting point (~3000K) and aren't going to get any more efficent either... so if you need an engine with superior thrust and specific impulse, its going to be something pretttty darn exotic... a gasseous-core nuclear reactor probobly. Even $50M won't get you that far for such a thing.
Martian Tristar: Um. What?

What about scaling down Ion Engine's so you can fit alot in one ship. So that combined thrust actually makes something usefull.

TestID00035 · 2005-08-13 20:20:24

OK, let's say you are going to send Two people to the moon to stay. How much in material ( weight ) will they need to survive on the moon or mars for the first year?

Once you get that they you can figure out the size of the rockets needed.

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Re: How much would the first step cost? - Cheapest first step, what can we afford?

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