The problem of Nitrogen on the Mun

[FreeThinker]

6 hours ago, passinglurker said:

Actually in the stock solar system it can be made to make sense. The outer solar system is a lot smaller and emptier than our own. also a frosty objects like minmus are found in the inner solar system as well. It's possible that the kerbol system formed in such a way that nitrogen was not pushed out to the far edge and so nitrogen ores are much more prevalent through out based on the simple evidence of how the kerbol system is put together.

Well I have no problem if the player is able to find significant Nitrogen Ore on other Moons and Planets, it's just that Mun looks very similar to our own Moon and should have a similar geological  history and therefore  have similar composition, meaning it should very little Nitrogen and Carbon. Minimus on the otherhand seems much more likely to have Nitrogen as it appears it have had a completely differnt geological history where it once had an Nitogen atmosphere, but after lossing it's magnetic core it was blown away by SolarWind..

Edited July 1, 2016 by FreeThinker

[FreeThinker]

6 hours ago, passinglurker said:

Either way I don't see stock giving that deep of an education. If you want to popularize a more in depth isru system among the common user then you need to find a way to cut the part bloat of having converters for every planet and tanks for every element on the periodic table. (Maybe a part with a "big pharma" style mini game inside? I dunno)

Yes, well that why I introduced Switchable Universal Gas, Liquid and Storage tanks in KSPI which can hold any raw resource and unerversal URSU conversion part to convert them into usefull  rocket fuels ,propellant and nuclear fuels

[kerbiloid]

2 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

Minimus on the otherhand seems much more likely to have Nitrogen as it appears it have had a completely differnt geological history where it once had an Nitogen atmosphere, but after lossing it's magnetic core it was blown away by SolarWind..

As Minmus probably contains much ice (I can't imagine such slippery stones), maybe can still contains some ammonia under surface?

[FreeThinker]

25 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

As Minmus probably contains much ice (I can't imagine such slippery stones), maybe can still contains some ammonia under surface?

Yes, it clear MinMus dried up lakes contains a lot of frozen Salt Water  which is great for Hydrogen and Nitrates an excelent as a source for Nitrogen.

Edited July 1, 2016 by FreeThinker

[passinglurker]

5 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

Well I have no problem if the player is able to find significant Nitrogen Ore on other Moons and Planets, it's just that Mun looks very similar to our own Moon and should have a similar geological  history and therefore  have similar composition, meaning it should very little Nitrogen and Carbon.

No that inconsistency isn't right you can't stubbornly hold one analogous celestial body to a realistic standard and then play fast and loose with the rest.

Minmus's very presence suggests a different geological history may have occurred, and that is assuming the current theories of our moons geological history even hold up.

And finally it's a game if you take ore from the mun and no where else no one will learn anything they will just think the game is bugged.

[FreeThinker]

1 hour ago, passinglurker said:

 

And finally it's a game if you take ore from the mun and no where else no one will learn anything they will just think the game is bugged.

Moho would also qualify as a well cooked planet and therefore should have the same limitation as the moon. 

[passinglurker]

8 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

Yes, well that why I introduced Switchable Universal Gas, Liquid and Storage tanks in KSPI which can hold any raw resource and unerversal URSU conversion part to convert them into usefull  rocket fuels ,propellant and nuclear fuels

that isn't sufficient you are just shifting the problem from a cluttered part catalog to a looooong click through menu 

[shynung]

17 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

But what other Fuels that use neither Nitrogen or Carbon like like Diborane ,  Lithium Hydrate  or  Beryllium Hydride which could be created from local resources. Especial lithium Hydrate as a fuel is interesting as there is a surprising amount of lithium in the moon dirt and it could also be used as a thermal nuclear propellant

John D. Clark, author of Ignition, once tested boron-based fuels, specifically diborane and pentaborane, and concluded that those are more trouble than they are worth. So much so that he wrote an entire chapter describing it.

Long story short, combustion performance wasn't encouraging. Solid glassy deposits (B2O3) appeared on motor nozzles and throats.

[FreeThinker]

7 minutes ago, shynung said:

John D. Clark, author of Ignition, once tested boron-based fuels, specifically diborane and pentaborane, and concluded that those are more trouble than they are worth. So much so that he wrote an entire chapter describing it.

Long story short, combustion performance wasn't encouraging. Solid glassy deposits (B2O3) appeared on motor nozzles and throats.

Well in a gas core reactor, that shouldn't be a problem

[DaMachinator]

You could also just use special HTP monopropellant engines. If the engines themselves are manufactured in-situ, they will require imported platinum or other metal catalysts. Only certain metals work for this, btw.

 

Make the engine performance depend on combustion chamber temperature, with a base thrust and efficiency.

Make a special mode that causes the engine to heat itself considerably faster than it dissipates heat to its surroundings.

Thus, when the special mode is active, the combustion chamber heats up.

Since the combustion chamber is hotter, the engine produces more thrust (probably only a little) and is more efficient.

However, if you try to run it indefinitely this way with lots of radiators, the combustion chamber will cool down because of the radiators.

Since the combustion chamber is cooling down, the performance drops to the base levels.

Edited July 2, 2016 by DaMachinator

[todofwar]

On 6/29/2016 at 8:52 AM, kerbiloid said:

Nitrogen is not exhausted from lythosphere, it's a boiled up cryosphere. So, no reasons to search its deposits in a crust or mantle.

Venus, certainly had large amounts of Nitro — as the Earth does.
But it has dissipated due to the heat, like water (a volcanic steam) also has, being splitted by UV into Oxy and Hydro.
Nitro and Oxy have almost the same molecular mass, so they both are gone.

Venus has five times more nitrogen than Earth actually, it just has that much CO2 in it's atmosphere so the nitrogen makes up about 3%. Nitrogen and oxygen don't have escape velocity, and don't become split by UV. Hell, oxygen gets heavier, becomes ozone. N2 is very stable, in fact chemists use it as an inert atmosphere to study highly reactive compounds. 

On 7/1/2016 at 0:57 PM, FreeThinker said:

Well in a gas core reactor, that shouldn't be a problem

They will still deposit somewhere, life deposition finds a way 

[PB666]

Not sure how this thread got pinned. 

[shynung]

15 hours ago, todofwar said:

They will still deposit somewhere, life deposition finds a way 

It should be okay if the boron doesn't encounter oxygen. Diborane is a gas at room temperature

[passinglurker]

On 7/3/2016 at 6:51 AM, PB666 said:

Not sure how this thread got pinned. 

probably to kill it. No one pays attention to pinned threads  /jk

[Vanamonde]

On 7/3/2016 at 5:51 AM, PB666 said:

Not sure how this thread got pinned. 

Threads of the month get pinned for their months. 

[Nibb31]

I think his question was why this silly thread got promoted to "thread of the month". For example, the Juno thread seemed more worthy... 

[PB666]

Yep. 

[specialopsdave]

Who even said that the fuels needed to be nitrogen-based? If I remember correctly, the Moon has a little bit of water, which can be used to make liquid Hydrogen as LiquidFuel, LOX (liquid Oxygen) as Oxidizer and HTP (High-Test (hydrogen) Peroxide) as monopropellant.

[PB666]

On 7/17/2016 at 6:37 AM, specialopsdave said:

Who even said that the fuels needed to be nitrogen-based? If I remember correctly, the Moon has a little bit of water, which can be used to make liquid Hydrogen as LiquidFuel, LOX (liquid Oxygen) as Oxidizer and HTP (High-Test (hydrogen) Peroxide) as monopropellant.

Not enough to be useful, aluminum solid propellant is going to be the biggest fuel componet. That basically places it in the programmed flight ascent and descent with OxN fuels basically to touch up on those flights.

[FreeThinker]

On 19-7-2016 at 0:03 AM, PB666 said:

Not enough to be useful, aluminum solid propellant is going to be the biggest fuel componet. That basically places it in the programmed flight ascent and descent with OxN fuels basically to touch up on those flights.

Aluminium is basicly the ticket for effective Lunar mining or spaceship construction. To get large amount of Hydrogen, it would probably be better to find a jucy ice asteriod, and convert it to hydrogen, or mine the water from mars from polar or subterrain ground layers.

Edited July 22, 2016 by FreeThinker

[DaMachinator]

4 hours ago, FreeThinker said:

Aluminium is basicly the ticket for effective Lunar mining of spaceship construction. To get significant amount of water, it would probably be better to find a jucy ice asteriod, and convert it to hydrogen, or mine the water from mars from polar or subterrain ground layers.

You could also use unconventional propulsion - mass drivers, nuclear thermal engines (which as far as I know can use any fuel that expands sigificantly at high temperatures compared to it's storage temperature), pulsed detonation engines, nuclear pulse propulsion, various forms of electric and hybrid electric engines - all kinds of old and new concepts come to mind.

Many electric and hybrid-electric engines, however, require exotic propellants or enhance the efficiency of conventional propellants, either not solving the problem or substituting it for a similar one.

 

Also, what are the objections to constructing spacecraft out of advanced composite materials rather than aluminum? Glass-reinforced plastic, carbon fiber, various other pure carbon materials, and tungsten carbide come to mind.

Edited July 22, 2016 by DaMachinator

[PB666]

On 7/22/2016 at 11:13 AM, DaMachinator said:

You could also use unconventional propulsion - mass drivers, nuclear thermal engines (which as far as I know can use any fuel that expands sigificantly at high temperatures compared to it's storage temperature), pulsed detonation engines, nuclear pulse propulsion, various forms of electric and hybrid electric engines - all kinds of old and new concepts come to mind.

Many electric and hybrid-electric engines, however, require exotic propellants or enhance the efficiency of conventional propellants, either not solving the problem or substituting it for a similar one.

 

Also, what are the objections to constructing spacecraft out of advanced composite materials rather than aluminum? Glass-reinforced plastic, carbon fiber, various other pure carbon materials, and tungsten carbide come to mind.

Rail launching system. Shinkonsen on steroids.

[DaMachinator]

4 hours ago, PB666 said:

Rail launching system. Shinkonsen on steroids.

This still requires propellant to circularize...