New Mars Forums

So what if;
-Send a person transporter to Mars, composed of;
     -Lander without;
          -Parachute.
          -Heat Shield.
          -Canted Engines.
     -But including;
          -A booster capable entering the atmosphere of Mars and landing if emergency requires.
          -Extra strap on tanks.

In my mind the ideal action would be that the booster with external tanks would;
     -Use the fuel in the external tanks to put speed and trajectory to a situation where the booster could enter the
      atmosphere;
          -The tanks would be ejected prior to atmospheric entry.
          -The booster with the lander on top of it would do the atmospheric entry, and would help get the lander situated
           on the correct path.
          -After the atmospheric entry was achieved, the lander would separate, and complete the landing on it's own.
          -Ideally the booster would push to Mars orbit, and be parked there, but it could be disposed of to crash.
          -The lander not burdened by parachute, heat shield, or canted engines would land at a location with supplies already
           in position on the ground.

Several abort modes might be available;
           -If a lander problem was discovered prior to atmospheric entry, then the booster could abort itself and the lander to
            orbit.
           -If a lander problem was discovered during entry, then I would hope they could try to land the whole stack using the
            booster.
                -I would think it would be tipsy with no landing pad, so I don't like that and also it might not be possible to use the
                 lander as habitat.
                -In such a situation, I suppose you could hope to repair the lander, and either hop it off of the booster and onto
                 the ground or abort to orbit.

In orbit should be a supply ship which used SEP, and gravity assists, and magnetic aerocapture, to achieve the orbit of Mars.  Of course it would be robotic.  It would have landed supplies on the ground which the person lander would intend to land near enough to.

And that brings up another possible abort situation where, if during descent it was discovered that landing in the proper location was not possible, then an abort to orbit using the booster or the lander only should be entertained to the level of what can be possible.

I would think that this could also satisfy the desire of some to visit multiple sites.  The lander I presume with direct and not canted engines and with positioned supplies might be able to hop through the atmosphere to multiple locations for checking on the best possibilities.

Of course it it not prohibited to have more than one (Except by cost).

The above notion might also satisfy the problem of the size of a lander which some here have been puzzling about quite a bit.

Anyway I was happy to read about the raptor engine which may be developed.

Go ahead and let me know what the flaws are in the above.  I would rather know than not know.  But politeness does not hurt.  Keep in mind that if a nerve only ever delivers pain, sometimes the body will eliminate it.

Fun is much better than pain.

It's odd, but North America seems to have virtually the ideal setup.

Texas to launch for fuel efficiency, fly over the gulf?  Land in Florida?  Then can the inter coastal canal system allow movement of the boosters back to Texas?

Then again launch from Florida, and fly back may have a fuel penalty, but I think that will be addressed in time.

I recall reading that Elon Musk seemed to say that the hardware was much more valuable to recover than the cost of fuel.

I also see the notion that if these boosters have a life cycle and that gets measured, then at some point they could be sacrificed to lift heavier loads to orbit.

Florida and Texas are linked to the whole North American (NAFTA) infrastructure, so cost of machine items should be cheaper than for some place such as French Guyana.  Trucks, Canals, Trains, and Planes to get stuff to a focus point.  Pretty much the best deal on the planet I think.

I buy into everything you say GW, but I have found this:
http://spacenews.com/spacex-leases-cape … -landings/

So I would say that the intentions are very plain, and I am sure every part of our space industry including defense wants them to make it work.

The barge thing is a calibration process I think.  Extracting boosters from such a barge would be very costly I think.

As you have said a reversal to launch site would be energy costly, I expect they intend to launch from a more western location when the process is calibrated and proven.

It seems to me that California, New Mexico, and Texas would be good launching sites, Is that west enough?

It is really exciting.  Like the dawn of the space age I think.

I am sure part of the calculation is to first prove that the boosters can be targeted to a site where they can crash without incurring massive damage costs, and then of course to actually be able to recover the majority of them in a state for reuse.

Not really any more risky than landing a space shuttle.

But maybe I don't understand can these boosters do one orbit of Earth?  In that case they can launch from Florida, and land in Florida.  Maybe some time in the future other boosters would do it that way.  A sub-orbital once around the Earth.

I was really pleased when Tom pointed out that the Falcon Heavy would use 3 ea. Falcon 9's.  That is not what I expected at all.  It means the heavy lift is likely not all that far off, if they manage to land a Falcon 9 some time.

I think I would bother to go see a landing, if that is allowed in the future.

I guess I will wait for the crew running it to tell what is what.  It does look like the craters have faded in a lot of places, but still it was or is a very slow process.

This could be an introduction to the outer solar system?  Sort of maybe.

With apologies in advance (I am aware of my lack of qualifications in this manner).  I would be interested in:
-How they plan to synthesize their chemicals.
-If Photo Organisms that could be grown in bags of water at the freezing point could be crafted to synthesize those chemicals.
A lot of good things came from observing nature.

I pretty much a ditto on that from both of you.

I would choose Venus last of the terrestrial planets, with the exception of some of it's potential orbital properties.  That is perhaps something can be harvested from the tail.  Also maybe because of that orbital habitats.

I would think that;
Mars first;
the Moon will happen in spite of the directive to focus on Mars (And capture a little asteroid);
At that point some rare minerals might be running out so the Asteroids and/or Mercury (Mercury with knowledge from Mars and the Moon);
Finally something with Venus:
-Terraform it with metals, maybe from Mercury or
-Learn to make robots that can take the heat, and build a infrastructure that can deliver goods to the Clouds, then perhaps humans.

So Venus last.

Thanks Quaoar

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploration_of_Mercury

Some stuff on the exploration of, and problems of exploring Mercury.

Stable orbits of Mercury are a problem?  I wonder about "L" locations?  It sort of suggests you put all your stuff on Mercury itself, or you eject materials from the orbit of Mercury to construct facilities that orbit the Sun itself.

Actually it has much more to offer than the Moon.  The only property of the Moon, that would be more favorable to humans would be proximity to Earth.

I think the methods mentioned would have great potential to support a large number of humans at a high standard of living.  Which is really what you want when you hunt for a place to set up shop.

All that's missing is the human transport method, and the proper tool set.

As long as the moderators do not object, I guess I will continue with the economic dialog, hoping to tie it to the topic of this thread eventually.

I see that you have emphasized your local and national Identity.  I see value in the fact that Canada and other non-American (USA) peoples with Anglo/Quebecker/First Nations; Anglo imprints, can be able to do something different than what we do.  That is the original notion of the States anyway, so that various people can try different things, and if it works, to some extent others may wish to try it as well.

Not very likely that we would try it here, as our Feds, not only seek to administer the states, but also have a major activity doing what ever it is various places.  They want that money, and they want that control, and I am not stupid enough to think that their wishes can be ignored.  Not at this time anyway.

There are some very exciting sciences that are being improved, because some of the activity can be moved to such locations where our somewhat irrational process cannot snuff them out easily.

I am all for America, (Since I am one, or so far I believe).  But we are in a cultural winter, with culture wars, and there is a lot of nuttyness going around.  It should be over by 2025, but until then, I think that their are too many nit-wits in positions of power who could damage such things for irrational reasons.

And of course I also look forward to what other places can contribute.  Europe, China, Russia, etc.

As for importing minerals from Mercury to support solar power here, I guess I had not thought of that.  OK then, fine, good stuff.

However, you can expect the Hydrocarbon industry to resist as long as they can. That will continue until the cartel people own the renewable energy methods, and can then impose a barrier between you and that, so that they can charge you for it.

The game is to find out what you need/want, take it away from you, and then sell it back to you.

I think that if the greenhouse effect is true, or if their is some other feature such as release of Methane from a source, the Earth could heat up, and it might be reasonable to consider if a large collection of habitats made from the materials of Mercury could be of use.  I can say that if indeed it becomes possible to move large amounts of population from Earth to hollow solar orbiting habitats, that would then reduce the use of resources on Earth.

As for shading the Earth, I guess that would have to be a lot of habitats.  But really whats wrong with that.  If an economy that could build one were to come into being, and it built them without trying to tap the treasuries of nations of Earth, then why couldn't it make a million or more of them? 

The only problem which comes with this might be that various entities that wish to sell things to humans on Earth, and wish to collect revenues from them might have a declining tax base.  But then if the Earth is deteriorating in the manner that the Global Warming fanatics insist it will, then there will be a lot of unfortunate people who would not be able to generate wealth, so giving them a way out of poverty might be a reasonable plan.

And then I suppose the people that want to sell you things, and tax you will be out there anyway, so at that point that general group will not be so much in favor of keeping the human race as their money generating captives on Earth.

A further development will be life span extension.  I actually believe that they are going to pull it off.  I think it will be sooner than we think.  In that case I am not so worried about overpopulation from it (I think that will be OK), but rather I think it will be good to give the human population an adventure, and resources to build advancement of the human race.  I expect a materialistic wave in culture anyway.

And apparently you might approve, what else will be expected is a narrowing of the wealth difference between the economic classes in the USA at least.  That would not occur because I might say it would, it is expected by those who believe in cycles (The fourth turning).

Anyway, I think that Mercury can be considered after Mars.  After that if people really want to try to turn Venus into another Earth, then metals from Mercury could aid in that.  I am not necessarily in favor of terraforming Venus in that way, but I am not a ruler of such things.

Well, if I were to live in a townhouse, I would have to pay an association fee.  This is money to be paid into a common purse.

That money can be spent well or poorly depending on the administration.

I don't see how collective actions can be done by a collection of people, unless there is a common purse, and people put in charge of administering the spending of the money.  Then you get into the issue, of what is my fair share to pay into the common purse?

Anyway, on a technical end, I would like to propose a method of construction, which might work well for the shadowed craters of Mercury.
I am just looking for feedback.

Igloo construction involves a method of stacking snow blocks into a dome structure.

I am wondering if such blocks could be made from metals.  That is hollow metal blocks, and I presume a method to stack them into domes, and to weld the metal of course and use other means to join them into a common structure, and to create a vacuum barrier.

On Mercury you would already have the magnetic field, and the hollow of the crater on your side where radiation was concerned.

On the outside of the metal igloo, you could attach mineral wool or fiberglass insulation, to provide thermal stability.  But of course this would also add a little radiation protection.

Blocks of metal or stone could be added appropriately to add radiation protection.

Finally, if the domes were trustworthy, and large enough, perhaps stone houses could be built inside them to give a final radiation protection part of the time.

Anyway, I am thinking that a large 3D printer, or perhaps automation could build several types of these metal blocks (Mass production if automation, sufficient production if 3D printer).

So essentially you get your robot/automation/3D printer crew to preform a very repetitive task, and build many of these blocks.

Then by object manipulation directed by human minds or the equivalent or better, construct these igloo structures, stacking one block at a time.  Welding them together as needed and appropriate.

Your thinking is sound.  However, I simply don't get involved in anti tax politics.  I figure it is easier.

Your plan does not consider that there is "Farmer" class, that regards us as farm animals, and they are not going to go away.  It is part of a predatory ecology.

Wood was once a critical war material (You could forge weapons by burning it, make ships, etc).  Peasants could not own trees.  If they cut one down they would suffer a maiming the first time, death the second time.

After that the cartels owned the coal.  Then the Oil.

Edison and Ford had a plan to build a rural based economy with electric cars and windmills.  It required a battery which Edison created.  When it was tested (The battery) it was purposely not charged up, and a vast news campaign was put in place to say it did not work.
Edison's labs mysteriously burned down.  Ford withdrew from the deal.  He must have gotten the hint.

You used to be able to take electric street cars from Minnesota to the east coast.  That all got torn up and replaced with internal combustion engine busses.

Here in America we pioneered high speed electric trains.  At the point where it was about to pay off, it was scrapped and a man was allowed to salvage the copper and sell it off.  The trains could generate power when going down a mountain.

The point is they want us to burn the fuels that they own, and want to sell us.  Period.

They like a free ride (Just for them).

Oil prices plunged?  Get rid of that alternative energy.

They also like centralized control.  Hence their attempts to turn the internet into television.

Do I care a lot?  Not really.  I have done OK.  I just want to make sure that you don't spend your life tilting at windmills.

The social architecture is a real thing, just like mountains.

So, I am currently infatuated with Mercury, and you see it as a pathway to "Gamma Crucis".

That's fine.  Interstellar pathways are secondary to my purposes, but it is always good to have a "And then what?".  It helps the now to be structured in a pattern which might be favorable to a speculated future.  Avoids Cul-de-sac situations. 

And then I would make the point that gravitation for Mars and Mercury is roughly similar.  Therefore many lessons learned for Mars will be applicable to Mercury.

To further support the idea, the methods of SpaceX to land boosters on their tail ends, should be most suitable to Mercury.  A lesser gravitation, and no real atmospheric breaking will make it different, but I am guessing that it would work well for Mercury.

In my previous post I mentioned manufacturing real estate.  Of course this is an appeal to the human desire for property and domain.  And it also calls to the instinct to nest and procreate.  So, here I am attempting to manipulate our stone age interior architecture, which happens to actually be important, if you want a species that perpetuates it's kind.  I wouldn't mind swinging on a star and carrying moonbeams home in a jar, and what's wrong with being better off than you are?

So, humans manipulate humans (And pets, and farm animals), and they manipulate objects.  Above I have addressed a method to manipulate humans to cause them to see benefit, wealth, and purpose potential for Mercury.

Now the Object manipulation.

A rough estimate would be that if I had the material to build an object to manipulate a stream of energy, I might get 16 times more energy at Mercury than I would at Mars, in a given time period.  This creates a bias, where I might prefer to do my manipulations of objects in the area of Mercury rather than Mars, since I might get more potential.

(Obviously Mars will come first though.  Lessons learned from Mars will benefit a later effort for Mercury).

As far as the materials available at each location, they are approximately the same varieties, but of course Mercury is much more tilted towards metals.  We typically incorporate a lot of metals into our machines, but of course Mars could do more with plastics which is also very important.  But the environment of Mercury on average will be much less friendly to plastics than metals.

If all of Mercury were the same, where a long period of time under intense heat from the sun is followed by a long period of frigid dark, then I would not be so optimistic.  However as with the Moon, but even better polar craters will offer protection from the heat, and materials other than metals.  It should be possible to "Pipe" in energy from sunlit portions of Mercury into those locations, and those locations should be great places to seek shelter relative to the rest of Mercury.

I presume that an electromagnetic launch system will be possible but not necessarily easy.  But it might be noted that cold shadowed locations might be a good place for the needed magnets to operate.  Mastering that and being able to launch materials, I presume that Mercury has the 5 "L" locations, where perhaps assembly of "Real Estate" could occur.  Those being finished, they could be pushed out into a solar orbit.  I have presumed that it would be possible to build them in such a fashion that they would provide good dwelling space for humans, and that would be desired.

A fun question is "How deep could you dig the holes at the poles before they would collapse?".  I don't know.  Could you dig them deep enough that an atmosphere could be in them?  Mercury already has a variable Exosphere, and of course a magnetic field.  I don't think such polar atmospheres are much more than a whim, even if it could be done, but some people are much more comfortable with a conventional concept of a sky above, and running water, Etc.  So, I mentioned it for the entertainment value, and also to manipulate you as well. 

Protect the Earth from overheating, build lots of real estate, and build cities at the poles of Mercury, and the perhaps eventually to support interstellar travel.  What's not to like?