Blue Origin Thread (merged)

[shynung]

@kunok

10 hours ago, kunok said:

0 is pure speculation, I don't think is realistic at all and makes everything else very dubious

1 Our comsats (most of them, there are smart ones) are already the most dumb thing that there is in telecommunications. They are already basically a big analog relay, full of transponders, made by valves (Traveling-Wave Tubes are the amplifiers here) with only basics codification. They are already big, dumb, comsats. Ariane 5 has lots of problems to get a single launch comsat. We don't need at all a 400 ton comsat, what good it would do? A 10tn comsat maybe, a 20 ton maybe, that's covered by the falcon heavy for example. Bigger satellites also implies less satellites, we will have the same communication needs. And we are using less and less the sat communications

2 is absurd

3 no need for that big booster for that.

4 no need for that. who will pay for a moonbase and all the need developing effort?, it has the same problems of mars colony. The space elevator is just silly in a body without an atmosphere.

5 who will pay and develop this? there is not that big telescope in the ground

6 this keep coming and coming again, microchips are very very expensive by mass, but the base material isn't that expensive, and is the only part that beneficts of the space manufacturing.

 

ITS is musk dream, doesn't need an economical plan, after all is his money not ours. If ever gets done and has a little price it would have uses, but don't take that as an economic viability plan.

 

Here comes the rant: Taking scy-fy authors as a reference of engineering systems is plain wrong. They usually look only if the system is physically possible in a simplified model not if its feasible from a engineering point or even is viable at all, or the time and people we would need to get something developed, and that in all that time that development need to be paid.

Point 0 comes from the fact that the ITS booster is meant to be fully reusable. That means operating that thing is akin to operating a cargo airliner; the costs involved are mostly maintenance and fuel (and engineer salaries). I'm not saying we'll see a huge price drop, but there may be a reduction in cost/kg compared to what we have today.

Also, Kessler syndrome is no joke. Sure, most of the stuff in LEO deorbits themselves after some time, but anything higher up stays there for good. Reducing it by not leaving empty stages in Earth orbit is probably a good idea.

The rest, I'm inclined to agree with you. Until we see someone putting their money forward to fund stuff like Big-S telescopes or space microchip factories, we won't be seeing it for a while.

On the space manufacturing aspect, I can offer one point: the costs of moving the materials up there are cheaper than down here. A smallish solar-electric spacecraft might be able to haul NE asteroids to the space factory waiting in LEO/MEO for much cheaper per kg than mining the same materials down here and transporting them to the factory. It's the cost of getting up there that's expensive.

[cfds]

3 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

The colonists were provided with tolerable climate conditions and food?

Sure.  That's why THOUSANDS of them starved to death or died of exposure early on.

And the colonists would die the day the ITS left, despite being supplied with hundreds of tons of equipment sent to Mars in earlier launches? (since his presentation, Musk has been very clear on this point- the early launches will carry very few colonists and lots of cargo to set up an initial base)  By the same logic the astronauts on the ISS would die the same day they arrived as well...

Well, THOUSANDS of people starved to death or died of exposure where these colonists came from, too. That was actually one of the reasons why they wanted to found colonies in the first place...

And people are telling you for ages that a "mars colony" was pretty much like the ISS:
- It is entirely dependent on resupply from earth
- There is no tangible RoI for the tax payers of the countries involved beyond, all they get is "a presence in space"

The only difference is that a Mars colony would cost the tax payers the one or other order of magnitude more.
 

[Nibb31]

ROI for private investors can only be about economical. The ROI for government spending can be economical or political interest. There is no evidence of any colonization plan that provides any kind of ROI, either economical or political. Sure, it can create jobs, but so does military spending or any infrastructure building program, and those things provide direct benefits.

You keep on saying that governments should chip in to pay for colonization, and at the same time, you claim that it will end in hundreds (or thousands) of deaths. Maybe it wasn't a big deal in the 17th century, but in today's environment, the PR and legal repercussions would be huge, and would effectively put an end to the whole effort. Having people die in the process is simply not an option in today's world.

And if you really want to use the analogy of colonization of the Americas, look how it turned out for European governments. It inevitably ended with colonial wars and independance, with those governments losing everything they built and paid for.

So remind me how any of that profits the taxpayer again.

 

Edited October 31, 2016 by Nibb31

[Green Baron]

The ITS does not exist, not even a full scale engine (i think ?). The plans for a colony is in a an early state of marketing, which these days means something like "Let's see how the impact will be". I have the feeling that it's less sophisticated as it was in the 60s and 70s of the last century. Send robots, build submarsian plants, live in flexible habitats, ... for now this is just stuff for a comic strip or yet another movie. Many (all ?) vital factors to run an autarkic society in the size of a medium city in a place where everything except the ground it stands on has to be crafted artificial are completely left out or even ignored.

Musk is a visionary like many others. The difference is he is a billionaire and has decided to devote his time and money to the mars project. I appreciate that. We need these type of people. In the long run they bring us forward. But they usually don't have a tight connection to reality and leave this to the engineers. It takes some time until the rest of the world is able to follow, that can in the case of Galileo be hundreds of years. Followers of visionaries sometimes tend to stop thinking on their own ;-), a common habit in us post-modern humans :-)

Until there is no reliable version of a ship the caliber of an ITS (even the "small scale prototype" F9 is still grounded and far from being rated for human transport) all of the discussion is just temperate air. Based on the experience with the development of such systems in the past i am pretty sure that an ITS ready to transport 100 women&men will not grow from the soil of a launch pad in the next 5-10 years, so i suppose we all can be pretty relaxed about a marsian colony.

I personally won't be the first one on board anyway ...

 

[Nibb31]

5 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

That's not true.  Plenty of plans for Mars basecamps have been drawn up before (by organizations such as NASA) that SpaceX can draw on.

Seriously, how do you get off saying these things?  Your claims, like those of many of the other SpaceX cynics here, are pants-on-fire false, to use a term from fact-checking sites...

You are confusing general concepts and engineering designs. There are artists impressions galore, and a handful of trade studies. There is zero R&D effort. Study reports and powerpoints are cheap. It's in engineering where the major effort lies and where it gets really expensive, and there are zero organisations working on the problems of colonization.

Instead of calling others liars, why don't you show us some evidence of a working Mars basecamp that is ready to pack up and go.

Quote

The colonists were provided with tolerable climate conditions and food?

Sure.  That's why THOUSANDS of them starved to death or died of exposure early on.

One of the reasons why the analogy doesn't work. Thousands of people dying, although the actual living conditions were much easier then than those of Mars colonists today, is hardly an example that we want to compare with or follow.

Quote

And the colonists would die the day the ITS left, despite being supplied with hundreds of tons of equipment sent to Mars in earlier launches? (since his presentation, Musk has been very clear on this point- the early launches will carry very few colonists and lots of cargo to set up an initial base)  By the same logic the astronauts on the ISS would die the same day they arrived as well...

No, because there were actually decades of planning and billions of dollars spent on designing and building the ISS before people were sent. Who is going to spend a proportional number of billions for hundreds of people to live on Mars ? Hint: Musk isn't.

Quote

You clearly know nothing about what you're talking about, and are talking from uninformed gut-feelings rather than facts.  You're spreading nothing but falsehoods and misinformation, and haven't bothered to fact-check any of your claims before posting them (which I routinely do for my own claims).  Your behavior is rude, detrimental to the conversation, and uninformative.  I do not appreciate it and would like to respectfully like to express my profound distaste for your false statements and scare-tactics, and those of others like you in this discussion.

The exact same thing can be said for you. There is zero evidence coming from your side of the argument.

Quote

That doesn't mean it CAN'T be done.  People can survive on the International Space Station with enough resupply and there are literally no resources there except solar power.  

You see? Another false statement. The ISS works because it has a continuous supply line to bring in fully disposable supplies. They don't even have a washing machine for clothes and towels. Only the air and water is partially recycled, and the system still needs topping up. It is far from requiring "no resources".

Quote

On Mars, at least, you have a planet to shield you from radiation and provide gravity, and abundant mineral resources to work with...  The Mars environment is UNQUESTIONABLY less hostile than the International Space Station.  

No it isn't. Even if it's freezing outside, your garden shed is less hostile than a tent in the desert of Gobi because it receives power and water from your house and you can easily leave your shed and return home.

Cosmic radiation is stronger on Mars than it is on the ISS, which is inside the Earth's magnetosphere.

Quote

Nobody questions that early outposts on Mars would be heavily dependent on supplies from Earth many of which would be sent AHEAD of the majority of colonists).  But, with time, a Mars colony would gain the ability to produce more and more goods and equipment of its own, and eventually become self-sufficient. 

How much would that cost? What sort of investment in R&D, equipment, and transportation would that need? Who is going to pay for it?

Quote

 This is NOT up for a debate- it's a FACT, a virtual guarantee if the colony survives long enough and receives enough support.  The only question is not if, but when.  Given outside support and new migrants, would it take a Mars outpost 50 years or 500 to become fully capable of supporting and growing itself?

Under what business model is that support provided? What is going to attract migrants? What does Mars offer in terms of a better life than Earth does.

 

Edited October 31, 2016 by Nibb31

[kunok]

12 hours ago, StrandedonEarth said:

And that is why gov't agencies partner with private enterprise. NASA and its predecessor NACA were created to develop, test, prove and demonstrate new technologies, for example the NACA cowling. SpaceX and other space startups are using NASA's technologies and experience to help develop their vehicles. I have no doubt that SpaceX and Bigelow will lean heavily on NASA's experience with the life support systems that have been tested on the ISS for years now.

When I said that we currently don't have is as the humanity itself. NASA doesn't have so there isn't tech transference here.

9 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

That's not true.  Plenty of plans for Mars basecamps have been drawn up before (by organizations such as NASA) that SpaceX can draw on.

Do seriously I need to tell you the difference between a drawing, a sketch, a powerpoint and a real design? There is no real design. I'm the first loving to get paid to work in a real design, but there isn't a program for that.

Even having a design, then you need to be able to manufacture (that something so many times forgotten, not only in space industry). There is also nothing of that

9 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

Sure.  That's why THOUSANDS of them starved to death or died of exposure early on.

Because they didn't get settled fast enough to survive the winter? They didn't arrive when there where good conditions? They were prepared enough?  Mars is already worse than the worst earth winter from the first second.

9 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

And the colonists would die the day the ITS left, despite being supplied with hundreds of tons of equipment sent to Mars in earlier launches? (since his presentation, Musk has been very clear on this point- the early launches will carry very few colonists and lots of cargo to set up an initial base)  By the same logic the astronauts on the ISS would die the same day they arrived as well...

That equipment doesn't exist outside a powerpoint or a viability report, that's the full point you are missing. And nobody is developing it.

The ISS is equipment develop by lots and lots of years. The first modules were a "MIR2" that taken the develops and from the MIR that is also based in the develops of previous soviet stations, the USA modules comes from the skylab and the experiments done with the shuttle. Most of this equipment won't work in gravity and would need a serious redesign. That's decades of research and design.

And yet they need regular supplies, and lots of spare parts, lots of regular repairs,  not selfsufficent at all. For a more than 400ton space station that is only being able to hold 6 humans.

You are probably the most rude and disrespectful person in this section of the forums, at least to me... C'mon I may sound rude sometimes but is because the language barrier, I don't really know how rude I sound.

8 hours ago, shynung said:

Point 0 comes from the fact that the ITS booster is meant to be fully reusable. That means operating that thing is akin to operating a cargo airliner; the costs involved are mostly maintenance and fuel (and engineer salaries). I'm not saying we'll see a huge price drop, but there may be a reduction in cost/kg compared to what we have today.

The problem is that you also need to count the developing cost, the building cost (not only the ITS also a very big launchapad and related facilities), and then the fixed costs, that is the hugest part of the equation. This initial cost is distributed between all the elements made. Doing only one ITS? It would be very very expensive. To get that prices it would need lots and lots of clients, yet nobody asked for such big rocket. SLS doesn't have cargo to make it fly regularly that would drop it's costs.

There are better ways of preventing kesler sindrome, like deorbiting or putting in graveyard orbits useless things like spend upper stages or old satellites, and the most important one, not launching missiles to satellites for absurd military demonstration.

[shynung]

13 minutes ago, kunok said:

The problem is that you also need to count the developing cost, the building cost (not only the ITS also a very big launchapad and related facilities), and then the fixed costs, that is the hugest part of the equation. This initial cost is distributed between all the elements made. Doing only one ITS? It would be very very expensive. To get that prices it would need lots and lots of clients, yet nobody asked for such big rocket. SLS doesn't have cargo to make it fly regularly that would drop it's costs.

Costs relating to dev, infrastructure, and fixed costs are not exclusive to ITS alone; every other launch service company has to deal with it as well.

What's interesting is the plan that the entire booster will be fully reusable. If the maintenance/refitting costs per launch are small enough compared to building costs, we could see an improvement in price per kg launched. Otherwise, it'll end up about as expensive as the Space Shuttle Orbiter.

Of course, as you said, there's also the problem of finding the payload suitable for this. Bundling several satellites in one big launch might be feasible, but then the sats need to go to each of their own destination orbits.

23 minutes ago, kunok said:

There are better ways of preventing kesler sindrome, like deorbiting or putting in graveyard orbits useless things like spend upper stages or old satellites, and the most important one, not launching missiles to satellites for absurd military demonstration.

Sure, but those old upper stages don't usually deorbit themselves. There's also small parts broken off other spacecrafts, dead sats that are somehow still in an important orbit (MMOD hit, for example), and parts that are intentionally ejected by spacecrafts during operation (yo-yo de-spin ballast). These are still dangerous, and will be until someone takes the time to deorbit them by cubesats. Yes, we can simply avoid them, but cleaning them up is not an entirely worthless endeavor.

[tater]

19 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

OK, now I *KNOW* you have no idea what you're talking about.  Haven't you ever heard of the Corporation Tax? (also known as the "Corporate Income Tax" or "Corporate Taxes")

Corporations *DO* pay taxes on their profits.  DIRECTLY.  And then theur employees in turn pay Income Taxes as well.  So the government gets paid TWICE for any investment that generates economic activity.

*sigh*

Where does the money that pays the corporate income tax come from? Do the corporations print their own money? No, they sell something, and a % of those sales pay their taxes. If their taxes increase---they raise their prices. ALL taxes paid by businesses are in fact paid by consumers. All. No exceptions.

[tater]

Once again @Nibb31 is spot-on.

A good idea for something that is more than artist renderings regarding NASA and Mars is to read the DRA/DRMs (Design Reference Architecture/Mission). They are, every one of them, "flag planting" missions. Go to Mars, do stuff for a while, return to Earth. Exactly zero of them are "colonization," or in fact even bases to be expanded upon. They are the Mars version of Apollo.

Musk, et al can decide to work towards a permanent human presence on Mars, that's awesome. NASA could at some point even pay for the service of sending their people there. The government will not be doing anything more than that with regards to colonization. Unless the US could claim martian territory as the property of the US, why would we want the taxpayers to do this, anyway (which due to current international law, they cannot)?

It's way off topic to argue that somehow colonization is anything more than the pipe dream of SpaceX as a company. And like I said, it's great they want to light there money on fire in such a way. Woot! Maybe I'll get a Tesla someday to support them, just because.

Edited October 31, 2016 by tater

[Exploro]

On 10/29/2016 at 6:33 AM, StrandedonEarth said:

...They've learned an expensive lesson about not experimenting with loading procedures with a customer's payload on top.

Are you insinuating SpaceX was using a Helium loading procedure that significantly deviated from that used in all previous launches?

Edited November 1, 2016 by Exploro

[PakledHostage]

I can't help but think of two things when I read the last few pages of this thread:

The now deserted mining town of Nanisivik on Baffin Island in Canada's arctic (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanisivik) and the Penguins in the film Madagascar...

Nanisivik is dozens of degrees warmer, year 'round than the warmest places on Mars and you can also breath the air there and go outside without a pressure suit, yet nobody wants to live there.

I imagine that most settlers on Mars, hours after they get there, will be the same as Madagascar's penguins when they finally reach Antarctica.

[Mitchz95]

3 hours ago, PakledHostage said:

I imagine that most settlers on Mars, hours after they get there, will be the same as Madagascar's penguins when they finally reach Antarctica.

Well, I suspect the colonists would already know what to expect. They're there to build a colony, with all the danger and hard work that entails.

[Northstar1989]

7 hours ago, PakledHostage said:

I can't help but think of two things when I read the last few pages of this thread:

The now deserted mining town of Nanisivik on Baffin Island in Canada's arctic (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanisivik) and the Penguins in the film Madagascar...

Nanisivik is dozens of degrees warmer, year 'round than the warmest places on Mars and you can also breath the air there and go outside without a pressure suit, yet nobody wants to live there.

I imagine that most settlers on Mars, hours after they get there, will be the same as Madagascar's penguins when they finally reach Antarctica.

How many times do I have to say this- Mars is not the Artic (or Antartic) Circle!

Although sunstantially more dangerous than Earth's polar regions, due to the reliance on life support systems and pressurized habitats, Mars is actually EASIER to keep warm on than the poles, and doesn't have constant blizzards to bury your habitats and solar panels so that you can't grow fresh produce in greenhouses or with growth lamps... (the lack of fresh food is one of the MAJOR reasons life on Earth's poles is unappealing.  The other main reason is how difficult it is to keep warm there...)

Mars is much easier to keep warm at than the poles because the atmosphere is so much thinner.  99% of your thermal losses at Earth's poles come from conduction and convection, not radiative losses.

On Mars, it's trivial to insulate habitats from the ground by raising them up an inch or two on tiny stilts.  When you do this, you essentially create a layer of vacuum insulation (some of the best insulation physically possible) between your habitat and the ground, because the air us so thin that condyction/convection from it are negligible.  Compensating for the remaining radiative losses is MUCH easuer than trying to keep a habirat warm at Earth's poles...

Absolute temperature has almost zero meaning for thermal management of a human habitat.  The rates of conduction and convection are far more important than those of radiation.   Mars is much more thermally forgiving than Earth's poles for actively heated systems due to its incredibly thin atmosphere.  Your and other Mars cynics' constant failure to recognize this and egregiously inaccurate comparison to the poles shows how much you really don't understand what you're talking about...

Life on a Mars outpost would actually in many ways be more comfortable than life on the poles.  Walks in spacesuits (which are designed to maintain a constant comfortable temperature) are much warmer and more pleasant than walks in parkas (which can't keep your face warm, or warm the air you breathe)   The easier thermal management and lack of constant heavy/opaque snow deposits mean you can build glass/plastic dones for natural sunlight- and grow fresh food in greenhouses.  The habitats would be high-tech and modern in design rather than crude metal boxes with no windows like people live in at polar outposts...

All in all, life in a high-tech Mars colony would be much more dangerous, but a much more pleasant place to live than Earth's poles.  AND, the early colonists would have an entire planet to explore, and the support and admiration of all mankind to encourage them, content in the knowledge they were carving out makind's future beyond Earth.  Polar miners have no such comfort.

 

Regards,

Northstar

Edited November 1, 2016 by Northstar1989

[Green Baron]

@Northstar1989: Sir, this is science and spaceflight. With a remarkable resolution you keep throwing in claims. If you cannot give us a reliable source for a single one of your assertions (lets take this one: "99% of the loss is convection, not radiation") then you will become the first person on my ignore list. I give you a hint: the claim is a contradiction in itself.

Pls., sit back, do a little research on your claims, and stop underestimating the people here.

I do not mean any backseatmoderation, but i find it necessary to point out the fact that most of your writings are personal opinions and not backed up by science.

Edit: *plonk*

Edited November 1, 2016 by Green Baron

[Flayer]

It just baffles me that there are people on this forum arguing - more or less - against the colonization of Mars. Isn't it obvious that's what we have to do to start on our quest of loveing our way through the galaxy?

[Northstar1989]

8 hours ago, PakledHostage said:

The now deserted mining town of Nanisivik on Baffin Island in Canada's arctic (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanisivik)

Also, the town of Nanisivik remained continuously-occupied until 2002, a year after the closure of the lead-zinc mine that supported it.  Even so, residents initially petitioned the government to redevelop the town as a skills-training center for the region  (OTHER towns in the province DO remain occupied), and only left when the petition was denied AND heavy lead contamination was found in the hones- caysing them to be demolished by zealous government health and safety beaureaucrats.  Pressure from environmentalist groups (who wanted to see the town abanfobed and returned to nature) also apparently strongly played into the whole situation- with their being heavily responsible for delays in later redeveloping the tiny town (population of 77 when inhabited) into a naval refueling station, and possibly even being the cause of the government refusal to build a training center there...

So, as usual for you cynics, you don't know the facts.  People actually WANTED to stay- they only left when their livelihoods did.  That's economics (a tiny town with no industrial base and along no trade routes can't survive for long) more than anything.  You either don't know the facts, or choose to skew them.  Either way, the facts contradict your assertions.

 

Regards,

Northstar

23 minutes ago, Green Baron said:

@Northstar1989: Sir, this is science and spaceflight. With a remarkable resolution you keep throwing in claims. If you cannot give us a reliable source for a single one of your assertions (lets take this one: "99% of the loss is convection, not radiation") then you will become the first person on my ignore list. I give you a hint: the claim is a contradiction in itself.

Pls., sit back, do a little research on your claims, and stop underestimating the people here.

I do not mean any backseatmoderation, but i find it necessary to point out the fact that most of your writings are personal opinions and not backed up by science.

 

My claims aren't backed by science?  It's YOURS that aren't.  If my claims were actually false, you would have disproved them instead of making pointless threats to ignore me.

Ignore me.  Please do.  I'll be much happier not having to deal with your constants perversions of facts and then equally incredulous claims that my claims (often supported by facts pulled directly from real world research studies) are inaccurate and that you (an individual who has made no claims to a science or engineering backgroun) know better than enginerrs and scientists, including myself.

My claims are based on facts, yours are not.  My statement on the relative importance of convective vs. radiative cooling, for instance?  Comes directly from my physics training as a scientist, as well as having actually spent a period of time grading state science exams as a job where we had several questions on the relative importance if convection vs. radiation.  This exam was for middle schoolers- but you would have failed it, since you apparently don't know that convection is much more powerful than radiation in situations like the ones we were talking about...

Edited November 1, 2016 by Northstar1989

[Green Baron]

9 minutes ago, Flayer said:

It just baffles me that there are people on this forum arguing - more or less - against the colonization of Mars. Isn't it obvious that's what we have to do to start on our quest of loveing our way through the galaxy?

Hi,

maybe, but we should be aware that it's just a fantasy&fiction or vision. Because of the visions of one single person people think that a colony will become reality in half a generation or so. But too many open questions still stand against that. As long as no crew has actually been there, spent some time and returned in a healthy condition the colony remains fiction.

imho

[Nibb31]

1 hour ago, Flayer said:

It just baffles me that there are people on this forum arguing - more or less - against the colonization of Mars. Isn't it obvious that's what we have to do to start on our quest of loveing our way through the galaxy?

I don't think that anyone is against colonization of Mars. It's just that there is no justification for colonizing Mars, or even for "loveing our way through the galaxy".

Science fiction is cool and all, but so is Lord of the Rings. When it comes to the real world, you need some sort of justification for such massive investments.

1 hour ago, Northstar1989 said:

Also, the town of Nanisivik remained continuously-occupied until 2002, a year after the closure of the lead-zinc mine that supported it.  Even so, residents initially petitioned the government to redevelop the town as a skills-training center for the region  (OTHER towns in the province DO remain occupied), and only left when the petition was denied AND heavy lead contamination was found in the hones- caysing them to be demolished by zealous government health and safety beaureaucrats.  Pressure from environmentalist groups (who wanted to see the town abanfobed and returned to nature) also apparently strongly played into the whole situation- with their being heavily responsible for delays in later redeveloping the tiny town (population of 77 when inhabited) into a naval refueling station, and possibly even being the cause of the government refusal to build a training center there...

So it failed because the economics and politics didn't pan out. Case in point.

Quote

So, as usual for you cynics, you don't know the facts.  People actually WANTED to stay- they only left when their livelihoods did.  That's economics (a tiny town with no industrial base and along no trade routes can't survive for long) more than anything.  You either don't know the facts, or choose to skew them.  Either way, the facts contradict your assertions.

Facts contradict nothing. It's an illustration of why an actual business model is required and how colonization is doomed if it isn't backed by economics.

Quote

My claims aren't backed by science?  It's YOURS that aren't.  If my claims were actually false, you would have disproved them instead of making pointless threats to ignore me.

Your claims are usually a mix of conjecture, wishful thinking, and biased opinion. You have been asked plenty of times to back up your assertions with evidence, but you just switch subjects or move the goalposts. To claim that you have a scientific background is baffling and pretty much all of your ad hominem attacks apply to you without any rewording.

 

Edited November 1, 2016 by Nibb31

[Tullius]

2 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

How many times do I have to say this- Mars is not the Artic (or Antartic) Circle!

Although sunstantially more dangerous than Earth's polar regions, due to the reliance on life support systems and pressurized habitats, Mars is actually EASIER to keep warm on than the poles, and doesn't have constant blizzards to bury your habitats and solar panels so that you can't grow fresh produce in greenhouses or with growth lamps... (the lack of fresh food is one of the MAJOR reasons life on Earth's poles is unappealing.  The other main reason is how difficult it is to keep warm there...)

Mars is much easier to keep warm at than the poles because the atmosphere is so much thinner.  99% of your thermal losses at Earth's poles come from conduction and convection, not radiative losses.

On Mars, it's trivial to insulate habitats from the ground by raising them up an inch or two on tiny stilts.  When you do this, you essentially create a layer of vacuum insulation (some of the best insulation physically possible) between your habitat and the ground, because the air us so thin that condyction/convection from it are negligible.  Compensating for the remaining radiative losses is MUCH easuer than trying to keep a habirat warm at Earth's poles...

Absolute temperature has almost zero meaning for thermal management of a human habitat.  The rates of conduction and convection are far more important than those of radiation.   Mars is much more thermally forgiving than Earth's poles for actively heated systems due to its incredibly thin atmosphere.  Your and other Mars cynics' constant failure to recognize this and egregiously inaccurate comparison to the poles shows how much you really don't understand what you're talking about...

Life on a Mars outpost would actually in many ways be more comfortable than life on the poles.  Walks in spacesuits (which are designed to maintain a constant comfortable temperature) are much warmer and more pleasant than walks in parkas (which can't keep your face warm, or warm the air you breathe)   The easier thermal management and lack of constant heavy/opaque snow deposits mean you can build glass/plastic dones for natural sunlight- and grow fresh food in greenhouses.  The habitats would be high-tech and modern in design rather than crude metal boxes with no windows like people live in at polar outposts...

All in all, life in a high-tech Mars colony would be much more dangerous, but a much more pleasant place to live than Earth's poles.  AND, the early colonists would have an entire planet to explore, and the support and admiration of all mankind to encourage them, content in the knowledge they were carving out makind's future beyond Earth.  Polar miners have no such comfort.

 

Regards,

Northstar

The problem is not to build a permanent Mars station, but the amount of support it would need from Earth.

ISS with its crew of 6 needs around 5 Progress flights in addition to the cargo transported by 4 crewed Soyuz and some western flights per year to keep supplied. Okay, a not so insignificant part of that cargo is for scientific purposes, which you don't need to the same extent for a Mars expedition.

But still, if ITS does a 2 year mission with 12 people to Mars, it probably needs at least the equivalent of 10 Progress transports of supplies for them. Which is not too bad, considering it is a mission to Mars.

But if we want to keep up a colony with 12 people on Mars, and supply them like the ISS, i.e. including some science experiments for the crew, that would mean we'd have to launch the equivalent of 20 Progress flights per launch window to Mars. Add to that the habitat modules and other modules to extend the station, maybe also a flight for crew rotation, we need to launch a few huge missions to Mars per launch window i.e. every 2 years. Who would pay for all of that?

But now you say, why don't we make them self-sufficient from the start? Lets just recall some experiments on that matter, we did on Earth: Biosphere 2 failed horribly, and the maximal duration of the Russian BIOS-3 experiment was 180 days. So our current record in experiments on self-sustaining ecological systems is pretty bad. If you really want the next test to happen on Mars, you just might end up like Komarov on Soyuz 1 that flew despite 2 failed attempts.

So in short, you need someone to pay a bill that is an order of magnitude larger than that of the ISS.

Edited November 1, 2016 by Tullius

[kunok]

2 hours ago, Northstar1989 said:

My statement on the relative importance of convective vs. radiative cooling, for instance?

That statement just means that the same camp module in the arctic needs more insulator than in mars, so what? Still magnitude orders easier than putting the same module in mars. It doesn't prove anything. You can have a physics background but an engineering one?. Radiation loses are probably not the biggest ones but they aren't a 1% for sure, you learn that in a engineering degree doing the maths. And that's not the real problem with radiation, one tip: radiation might be less relevant in the losses but is very relevant in the thermal gains from the sun light, and you need to insulate also the excess heat gained. Or drop it outside and now that insulation is a problem.

PD: And that's not considering that a mars module need to be a pressure vessel and the arctic one no.

Edited November 1, 2016 by kunok

[PB666]

On 10/27/2016 at 2:56 PM, Northstar1989 said:

Lunar gravity isn't high enough for normal human health.  Liquids settle too slowly on the Moon,  we already know that.  There's a BIG difference between lunar gravity (0.16 g), and Mars gravity (0.38 g).  Mars gravity is more than 2x as strong!  In fact Mars gravity is probably about the *bare minimum* necessary for (relatively) reasonable human health over a lifetime spent off-planet (i.e. I doubt lunar colonies will ever be a thing- the gravity is just too low).

Don't get me wrong, Mars gravity is likely to cause some health problems.  A higher risk of kidney stones and kidney failure, severe constipation, and osteoporosis mainly.  But the increase in incidence of these diseases shouldn't be nearly bad enough to make colonization unfeasible, though they'll probably replace obesity, heart disease/stroke (the two are actually closely related, and bad cholesterol is a huge risk factor for both as it leads to clot-formation), and diabetes as the main public health menaces on Mars... (because food will be very limited on Mars- so people won't be able to literally eat themselves to death like on Earth).

Early Mars colonists will probably be limited to a mostly-vegetarian, vegetable and cereal-rich diet.  The main sources of animal protein will probably be silkworms and snails... (I know they don't sound appealing, but the Chinese/French eat them!) And when they eventually bring over the first mammals, they will be used entirely for milk production (as it's more calorie-efficient than meat-production).

 

Regards,

Northstar

But unlike space the moon offers a huge inertial sink. It also offers a potentially cavernous interior. So it is possible to put an artificial gravity machine so that astronauts could spend a certain mount of time each day in an earth like gravity. In addition the moons potentially cavernous interior offers a place to shield oneself from cosmic radiation. Three of the biggest problems are therefore removable on the moon with a little effort. I still think asteroids are a better choice, but the moon is not a dead end for colonization practice.

Its is because of the challenges of exoplanetary colonization that we need the moon to learn the craft, thats kind of the entire point, because whatever long term problems you have on the moon, they will be a magnitude more difficult to 'manage' on mars.  No-one in their right mind expects this to be easy, if it was why go their first.

 

[Flayer]

2 hours ago, Nibb31 said:

I don't think that anyone is against colonization of Mars. It's just that there is no justification for colonizing Mars, or even for "loveing our way through the galaxy"

 

What on Earth do you mean by "no justification for colonizing Mars"? As long as people will continue to want to expand their knowledge and understanding of the universe, as long as people want to push the edge and so forth, we will get there eventually. There is no need for any further justification beyond that. At least, not for me personally, and I can only assume there are millions of people like me in that regard (even if you might not be one of them). Worrying about investments just seems silly unless you're actively engaged in that field (eg. the MSE that was founded in 2098). If there's a will, people are going to acquire the funds necessary to pay for the way.

We will be on Mars before the century is over. And - eventually - we will make love there. And there will be Martians. And this trend will continue across our solar system and beyond. It might take centuries for all of this to come to fruition, but dear god "no justification" is just the weakest excuse I've ever seen. We exist. Mars exists. That's all the justification necessary for us to get there.

 

On 10/29/2016 at 8:26 PM, Nibb31 said:

Pretty much all of the vital equipment is similar in that regard. Designing and running machines in a near vacuum, extreme cold, environment with low maintenance, is going to require a huge engineering effort. You can't just buy an off-the-shelf Caterpillar or A/C unit and adapt it to Mars conditions. The problem is that nobody has any plans to invest an R&D effort into those things, including habitation pressure vessels. Without life support, mining equipment, ISRU generators, habs, and so on, a colony is non-starter.

Also, that toxic dust and will get everywhere.

 

People are working on at least one of these things: there's an oxygen generator on the 2020 rover to Mars. There's probably other research and development being done as well, we just might not be aware of it.

 

Edited November 1, 2016 by Flayer
I hate this forum software.

[PB666]

On 10/29/2016 at 1:26 PM, Nibb31 said:

Pretty much all of the vital equipment is similar in that regard. Designing and running machines in a near vacuum, extreme cold, environment with low maintenance, is going to require a huge engineering effort. You can't just buy an off-the-shelf Caterpillar or A/C unit and adapt it to Mars conditions. The problem is that nobody has any plans to invest an R&D effort into those things, including habitation pressure vessels. Without life support, mining equipment, ISRU generators, habs, and so on, a colony is non-starter.

Also, that toxic dust and will get everywhere.

 

Just to point out that if you bury your on-site storage tanks underground and use trickle heaters around the tank you can keep them at a temperature for an appreciable amount of time. Its the tanks that you need to go in space that will need to be high pressure, but you can store those empty or partially full, removing at least some of the stress.

On 10/29/2016 at 3:38 PM, Northstar1989 said:

As Musk has stated many times, a Mars colony would act as a forcing function for cheaper space travel and access to LEO.

Once humans are flying to Mars every year, things like the SKYLON program (the UK's plan for a fully reusable spaceplane, using cutting-edge hydrogen-oxygen hybrid jet/rocket technology), Mass Driver launch systems, Microwave Beamed Power (initially as a power-source for ultra high-ISP one-way Mars injections, like for cargo missions to supplement the ITS structure), Propulsive Fluid Accumulators (which could be powered by nuclear reactors,or Microwave Beamed Power), reusable nuclear space-tugs, asteroid-mining, and perhaps even fusion reactors for space propulsion or futuristic materials for a Space Elevator will all become much more worthwhile endeavors...

And, all this economic activity is CERTAIN to have an impact on your life.  The biggest problem with economies in developed nations right now is that they aren't really the subject of any substantial capital investments that grow their economies- most new factories are built in places like China.  Space Exploration, on the other hand, requires a highly skilled workforce and is far, far less likely to be outsourced to China...

 

Regards,

Northstar

The only way humans fly to mars every year is when we have a massive improvement in propulsion systems (i mean 10x higher ISP and vastly greater energy production per fuel mass). And yet mostly what musk is doing is conservative technologies creating slightly more efficient applications. SSMEs afterall were 460 ISP (tradeoff liquid H2 . . . ) His ISP max are int the 350 range. Nuclear is not that much better, the best ION drives have 10 fold better power but 1000 fold worse power production rate on the generators (Solar panels).

The technology is not ripe. I think if you had a mission, pretend this plastic doll is human, see if you can get it to mars and back, that would be mission number 1. My guess that doll would be back in LEO 5 years after leaving LEO. The next ship leaves 18 months later after the first. With good planning and alot of luck, proper staging of fuels its more or less a 3 year turn around. So this learning process is something you do after you know how to colonize an atmosphereless rock.

 

[Green Baron]

33 minutes ago, PB666 said:

*snip*

The technology is not ripe. I think if you had a mission, pretend this plastic doll is human, see if you can get it to mars and back, that would be mission number 1. My guess that doll would be back in LEO 5 years after leaving LEO. The next ship leaves 18 months later after the first. With good planning and alot of luck, proper staging of fuels its more or less a 3 year turn around. So this learning process is something you do after you know how to colonize an atmosphereless rock.

 

It's not only the lacking technology to run an autarky for an undefined period. Keeping people healthy and alive requires more than greenhouse and artificial food. That malnutrition is one of the reasons why costs of health care systems in the rich countries explode.

Another problem is radiation. That field is almost without any data. Sending people into the center of the ship between the stored stuff sounds like "pull a leather-bag over your head" ... helpless. But i would expect that more research on radiation shielding can be done once it is better understood what kind of radiation does what kind of damage.

Low g: very well trained atsronauts come down in a bad shape from months in weightlessness. Bones have lost calcium, muscles atrophied and arteries stiffened. They need a ground crew to get them out of the vessels, a g-suit in the first weeks to support blood pressure and a several months long rehabilitation training. It's not even understood what happens to human health after more than a few months, only very few people have been in space for a year or more.

I mean, the colony-dreams are a nice playground but i think SpaceX is playing too fast forward. The transportation thing might be the easiest part ...

 

[Nibb31]

4 hours ago, Flayer said:

What on Earth do you mean by "no justification for colonizing Mars"? As long as people will continue to want to expand their knowledge and understanding of the universe, as long as people want to push the edge and so forth, we will get there eventually. There is no need for any further justification beyond that.

When you are spending billions of taxpayer/stockholder money, you bet you need a justification.

4 hours ago, Flayer said:

At least, not for me personally, and I can only assume there are millions of people like me in that regard (even if you might not be one of them). Worrying about investments just seems silly unless you're actively engaged in that field (eg. the MSE that was founded in 2098). If there's a will, people are going to acquire the funds necessary to pay for the way.

But there isn't a will. Mars colonization doesn't even register on the list of voter preoccupations. It isn't part of anyone's political platform. Most people on the street don't even know about the ISS or believe in the moon hoax.

You might think it's important, but "Flayer wants a Mars colony" isn't going to get Congress to start throwing money at NASA.

4 hours ago, Flayer said:

We will be on Mars before the century is over. And - eventually - we will make love there. And there will be Martians. And this trend will continue across our solar system and beyond. It might take centuries for all of this to come to fruition, but dear god "no justification" is just the weakest excuse I've ever seen. We exist. Mars exists. That's all the justification necessary for us to get there.

I have no doubt people will plant a flag on Mars before the end of the century, and maybe set up a permanent government-funded science outpost with crew rotations every two years. But colonization makes absolutely no sense.