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BWhite

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From: Chicago, Illinois

Registered: 2004-06-16

Posts: 2,635

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

http://web.mit.edu/egralla/www/research … 8.pdf]This is clever, IMHO. The paper talks about Earth orbit satellites but what about the Moon?

Use the biggest medium heavy launcher available and send a single payload in one piece to L1. There, open the paylaod fairing to release as many micro-sats as can be fit inside (size and mass).

Then direct each micro-sat to a different low lunar orbit for mapping and imaging missions.

How many micro-sats might ONE Proton or Delta IVH deploy to lunar orbit for recon purposes?

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Give someone a sufficient [b][i]why[/i][/b] and they can endure just about any [b][i]how[/i][/b]

Dook

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From: USA

Registered: 2004-01-09

Posts: 1,409

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Why?

BWhite

Member

From: Chicago, Illinois

Registered: 2004-06-16

Posts: 2,635

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Make maps.

After all, PGMs are the only short term economically viable reason for going to the moon. Lunar PGMs - - if they exist - - will be found in astroblemes, craters left by Ni-Fe asteroid strikes.

A detailed high resolution lunar map would allow researchers to narrow down the best places to look.

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Give someone a sufficient [b][i]why[/i][/b] and they can endure just about any [b][i]how[/i][/b]

BWhite

Member

From: Chicago, Illinois

Registered: 2004-06-16

Posts: 2,635

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Map making and surveying is a necessary precursor to ownership. Despite my apparent leftie tendencies, I believe significant private property ownership on the moon would be a very good thing.

It all depends on how those rights are divvied up.  :;):

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Give someone a sufficient [b][i]why[/i][/b] and they can endure just about any [b][i]how[/i][/b]

Mad Grad Student

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From: Phoenix, Arizona, North Americ

Registered: 2003-11-09

Posts: 498

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Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Will PGMs really be valuable enough to support lunar mining? Keep in mind that it's awfully expensive to ship large amounts of material between Earth and the Moon, and rather infrastructure-intensive. Even if you highly automate operations it will be extremely expensive to start the first permanent base on lunar regolith.

I'm all for colonizing the Moon (if possible), but I'm skeptical if there's such a short-term solution to the bugetary problems.

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A mind is like a parachute- it works best when open.

Grypd

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From: Scotland, Europe

Registered: 2004-06-07

Posts: 1,879

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

If PGMs are able to be found then there return to Earth should if it does not make a profit help waylay the cost of actual operations and to pay for development. This means money for other things like Mars missions. And it may be that it is best to sell the platinum at reasonable rather than normal high prices as this would spur the hydrogen economy and the benefits it will produce.

One problem we have with the Moon is we dont actually know that much about it or have even mapped it properly. In the equator regions we have an error of about 5 to 10 metres but for the poles which are very interesting to us right now the error is up to a 1km. Landing something in that is impossible so we have to map.

And if our mapping fids sources of PGMs then it is ll to the best is it not at least we have a target.

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Chan eil mi aig a bheil ùidh ann an gleidheadh an status quo; Tha mi airson cur às e.

GCNRevenger

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From: Earth

Registered: 2003-10-14

Posts: 6,056

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

If you are wanting to build many thousands of fuel cells a year that require multiple grams of Pt each, then it is quite possible that the current supply will not be sufficent to make the cells inexpensive enough to sell to your customers. The current price of Pt on the market is not yet high enough to justify Lunar mining, but if there were a substantial increase in demand then it could.

Mapping the Moon is a good idea, but it is probobly better to put a single broad-spectrum imager in Lunar polar orbit rather then bother with the mission complexity of dozens of little satelites with short lifespans, slow transmission rates, and too-small cameras. The size of your lens determines your resolution to a signifigant degree you know.

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[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

BWhite

Member

From: Chicago, Illinois

Registered: 2004-06-16

Posts: 2,635

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Mapping the Moon is a good idea, but it is probobly better to put a single broad-spectrum imager in Lunar polar orbit rather then bother with the mission complexity of dozens of little satelites with short lifespans, slow transmission rates, and too-small cameras. The size of your lens determines your resolution to a signifigant degree you know.

Okay, now that is a good point.   :;):

One big camera that covers the Moon over time, gotcha, that is better.

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Give someone a sufficient [b][i]why[/i][/b] and they can endure just about any [b][i]how[/i][/b]

dicktice

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From: Nova Scotia, Canada

Registered: 2002-11-01

Posts: 1,764

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

That's all we need: A whole bunch of what would amount to artificial meteoroids, in low Lunar orbit, to dodge on our way down to the Moon's surface and back in crewed spacecraft. Polar orbiting multispectral, stereo camera probe, operating for a month or more would cover the surface in overlapping strips, as a result of a very modest launcher programme.

GCNRevenger

Member

From: Earth

Registered: 2003-10-14

Posts: 6,056

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Orbit is a big place dicktice, considering that low Lunar orbit (LLO) isn't as stable as around Earth, its unlikly that old dead satelites will ever collect around the Moon.

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[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

dicktice

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From: Nova Scotia, Canada

Registered: 2002-11-01

Posts: 1,764

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Very unlikely, also, that they will ever decay and crash on their own--except as biproducts of collisions.

GCNRevenger

Member

From: Earth

Registered: 2003-10-14

Posts: 6,056

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Dicktice, did I not just say that their orbit wasn't stable? That means, over time, they will spontainiously fall out of the sky.

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[i]"The power of accurate observation is often called cynicism by those that do not have it." - George Bernard Shaw[/i]

[i]The glass is at 50% of capacity[/i]

RobS

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From: South Bend, IN

Registered: 2002-01-15

Posts: 1,701

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Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

I gather what happens is that the Earth's gravity perturbs the orbits and makes them elliptical, so something that starts out in a circular orbit 100 km above the moon soon ends up in an elliptical orbit that drops closer and closer to the surface of the moon until. . . boom.

The moon is indeed large. the equator is 6,000 miles/10,000 kilometers around (of course Mars is double that and Earth double Mars). Its surface area, 12 million square miles / 30 million square kilometers, is four times that of the US and ten times that of western Europe; it's about the size of Africa.

                  -- RobS

SpaceNut

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From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,017

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

Along the same idea Micro Spacecraft To Explore Planets well at least a black box concept.

What else can a micro spacecraft do for us in terms of space exploration; they are Lightweight, low-cost micro spacecraft would start by testing miniature sensor systems capable of gathering temperature, pressure and other data. They can also test heat shields that will someday protect human astronauts. Micro spacecraft could also serve as landing scouts, sent ahead of craft containing human astronauts. They could provide general reconnaissance and landing beacons for upcoming Mars missions.

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,017

Re: How to blanket the Moon - with recon-sats

It would seem that the idea of small to nano sized satelites are in though
SpaceDev Awarded Nanosat Hybrid Propulsion Contract
Yup go to have tiny engines to power those small one's.