Q&A Pratice for Lunar Base Design (Is this phrase right?)

[zxzx]

Here's the thing:

I am the leading designer of a team of undergraduate architecture students and we are currently on a competition about Innovative Moon Base.

Approximately 3 months ago I created a topic wanted ideas( Which is not so appropriate now that I think of it).

(LINK: 

 

)

I figured out the overall design a month after that thread, but I couldn't say it does many help to our design scheme, because at that point I havn't have many clues about what we should focus on.

We completed our work and submited last month. Several days earlier we got reply that we are in the finalists of 18 teams. We need to give a live presentation and Q&A to the juries about 2 weeks later.

This is our first time for everything and I thought it might be good to do have a Q&A practice, which can also deepen our own understanding of our project.

Here's our work of 3(or 2?) months:

2

The description  inside the drawings might be hard to read, here's the simplified verson of some of the texts:

(

Schem Description

This scheme provided a paradigm design of lunar base, considering construction method, cost, and In-situ resource utilization. The system including:    a. A modular, expandable habitat with deployable structure, consisting of rigid bone and flexible enclousure, along with multi-purpose flexible active reflector supporting structure. Enclousure enhanced with lunar-regolith bags;    b. A multi-docking-ports node module;    c. and a solar power tower deployed on-site with solar collector deployed in nearby ridge top.

Site description
Marks on the map display the location of sunlight resource, waterice resource, and gentle routes to these location. Also hillshade(provide radiation protection), and Earth visiblity.

The yellow triangle icon are solar collectors located on ridge tops which are illumiate by the sun most of the time. The collectors provide high density sunbeam to its service zone(covering across the map), transmited solar energy to the active reflector on the building and then to the solar power tower.

The site represented in the red box has direct visibility to Earth and is shaded from radiation and sunlight by the south pole ridge half of the lunar day. The site's slope is between 0°to 5°.

The Launching&landing area close to the site and is lower than it. The regolith on the area is sinstered by pre-deploy solar collectors, which reduce the risk of debris ejection while operating, with relatively small transportation cost.

The Habitat's Deployable Structure

The habitat module's structure is folded to minimize volume while transport. Figure on lower right show the bone structure(blue) and reflector supporting structure(yellow) unfolding. After structure deploy,The Airlock/Node(carrying initial payload) will be installed to provide acess to the habitat.

The Solar Power Tower

The Solar Power Tower when receiving high density sunbeam from the solar collectors, can provide heated steam and electricity to the site, and also serve as a visual navigation beacon. The cryo tank inside can be reused as hydrogen storage after landing, and engines can be reused.

Regolith Hyperadobe Enclosure Wall

The lunar regolith  on the landing area is rammed/sinstered by solar collectors deploy nearby before the habitat deploy. Then robot build semicircle regolith wall around the deployed habitat with regolith and bags fill with regolith using method similar to hyperadobe architecture on Earth, providing radiation protection during the lunar day.

Water Sacks sew onto the flexible enclousure

The water sacks are sewing onto the flexible enclousure. In the case of Micometeoroids impact causing enclousure breach, the water would quickly suck out from the sack, to the cold vacuum and freeze, provide a temporary seal.

)   ps: The whole system is rather complex and I am currently trying to organized it. 

 

I would appreciate questions about the design from you, and do my best to answer them.

[Spacescifi]

1 hour ago, zxzx said:

Here's the thing:

I am the leading designer of a team of undergraduate architecture students and we are currently on a competition about Innovative Moon Base.

Approximately 3 months ago I created a topic wanted ideas( Which is not so appropriate now that I think of it).

(LINK: 

 

)

I figured out the overall design a month after that thread, but I couldn't say it does many help to our design scheme, because at that point I havn't have many clues about what we should focus on.

We completed our work and submited last month. Several days earlier we got reply that we are in the finalists of 18 teams. We need to give a live presentation and Q&A to the juries about 2 weeks later.

This is our first time for everything and I thought it might be good to do have a Q&A practice, which can also deepen our own understanding of our project.

Here's our work of 3(or 2?) months:

2

The description  inside the drawings might be hard to read, here's the simplified verson of some of the texts:

(

Schem Description

This scheme provided a paradigm design of lunar base, considering construction method, cost, and In-situ resource utilization. The system including:    a. A modular, expandable habitat with deployable structure, consisting of rigid bone and flexible enclousure, along with multi-purpose flexible active reflector supporting structure. Enclousure enhanced with lunar-regolith bags;    b. A multi-docking-ports node module;    c. and a solar power tower deployed on-site with solar collector deployed in nearby ridge top.

Site description
Marks on the map display the location of sunlight resource, waterice resource, and gentle routes to these location. Also hillshade(provide radiation protection), and Earth visiblity.

The yellow triangle icon are solar collectors located on ridge tops which are illumiate by the sun most of the time. The collectors provide high density sunbeam to its service zone(covering across the map), transmited solar energy to the active reflector on the building and then to the solar power tower.

The site represented in the red box has direct visibility to Earth and is shaded from radiation and sunlight by the south pole ridge half of the lunar day. The site's slope is between 0°to 5°.

The Launching&landing area close to the site and is lower than it. The regolith on the area is sinstered by pre-deploy solar collectors, which reduce the risk of debris ejection while operating, with relatively small transportation cost.

The Habitat's Deployable Structure

The habitat module's structure is folded to minimize volume while transport. Figure on lower right show the bone structure(blue) and reflector supporting structure(yellow) unfolding. After structure deploy,The Airlock/Node(carrying initial payload) will be installed to provide acess to the habitat.

The Solar Power Tower

The Solar Power Tower when receiving high density sunbeam from the solar collectors, can provide heated steam and electricity to the site, and also serve as a visual navigation beacon. The cryo tank inside can be reused as hydrogen storage after landing, and engines can be reused.

Regolith Hyperadobe Enclosure Wall

The lunar regolith  on the landing area is rammed/sinstered by solar collectors deploy nearby before the habitat deploy. Then robot build semicircle regolith wall around the deployed habitat with regolith and bags fill with regolith using method similar to hyperadobe architecture on Earth, providing radiation protection during the lunar day.

Water Sacks sew onto the flexible enclousure

The water sacks are sewing onto the flexible enclousure. In the case of Micometeoroids impact causing enclousure breach, the water would quickly suck out from the sack, to the cold vacuum and freeze, provide a temporary seal.

)   ps: The whole system is rather complex and I am currently trying to organized it. 

 

I would appreciate questions about the design from you, and do my best to answer them.

 

The last sentence about water being sucked out into vacuum and freezing seems rather suspect... that is literally what hollywood has shown.

Space is cold hollywood says.

 

But consider that space is a vacuum. The most efficient way to transfer heat is via conduction (heat transfer from solid/liquid to solid/liquid) or convection (heat transfer via gas to solid/liquid).

Radiation is less efficient at transferring heat compared to convection and conduction.

 

What will happen when water hits vacuum is that it will boil because there is no air pressure to keep it intact (and temperature won't matter so long as the water is liquid already to begin with).

 

So the bit about water freezing to seal a breach is a no-go that would never be approved by space engineers concerned about people surviving.

I am not trying to be mean, just honest. Science and life are amazing, but they are also both unforgiving and will make anyone pay with their life for ignorance.

Which is why the greatest powers humanity ever has had or ever will ((in my opinion) are knowledge and the will to use it

Edited May 15 by Spacescifi

[mikegarrison]

Water does freeze in vacuum.

What happens is that it evaporates (due to the extremely low pressure), which causes it to drop in temperature due to the phase change.

The issue with a leak is whether the ice would plug the leak or not. If the ice does not plug the leak, then this boiling/freezing thing would just continue as all the water fountained out into space. But if the ice plugs the leak, it should be pretty stable.

[Spacescifi]

42 minutes ago, mikegarrison said:

Water does freeze in vacuum.

What happens is that it evaporates (due to the extremely low pressure), which causes it to drop in temperature due to the phase change.

The issue with a leak is whether the ice would plug the leak or not. If the ice does not plug the leak, then this boiling/freezing thing would just continue as all the water fountained out into space. But if the ice plugs the leak, it should be pretty stable.

Water can freeze in vacuum, but doing so is dependent on mass and temperature.

Whether the ice plugs the leak or not depends on the ratio between evaporation and ice, in other words, how much water is lost to the void and how much actually turns to ice to seal the breach.

 

Whether or not urine from astronauts shooting into outer space (as they have been shown to do) completely evaporates before it freezes I don't know.... but I think so given it's warm as anyone elses.

I suppose if the design wanted to ensure freezing then he could ensure it already was as cold as possible while still liquid, that way more of it freezes when it begins to evaporate.

[mikegarrison]

I decided to remove this post.

Edited May 15 by mikegarrison

[Spacescifi]

1 hour ago, mikegarrison said:

I decided to remove this post.

Never got it. You can direct private message me if you want. Or not. It's up to you.

[zxzx]

7 hours ago, Spacescifi said:

 

The last sentence about water being sucked out into vacuum and freezing seems rather suspect... that is literally what hollywood has shown.

Space is cold hollywood says.

 

But consider that space is a vacuum. The most efficient way to transfer heat is via conduction (heat transfer from solid/liquid to solid/liquid) or convection (heat transfer via gas to solid/liquid).

Radiation is less efficient at transferring heat compared to convection and conduction.

 

What will happen when water hits vacuum is that it will boil because there is no air pressure to keep it intact (and temperature won't matter so long as the water is liquid already to begin with).

 

So the bit about water freezing to seal a breach is a no-go that would never be approved by space engineers concerned about people surviving.

I am not trying to be mean, just honest. Science and life are amazing, but they are also both unforgiving and will make anyone pay with their life for ignorance.

Which is why the greatest powers humanity ever has had or ever will ((in my opinion) are knowledge and the will to use it

That's a good one. This in fact is the vulnerable part of this design. I am counting on the water can be suck out to vacuum and freeze like some sci-fi movie do.

I don't know if it will work as a leak sealment, maybe it work for a small breach(a finger width) which might cover most micrometeors impacts?

Although the temporary seal function might be a no-go, it still provide radiations protection in some degree and liquid storage for the habitat.

ps:

The center of the habitat has no such precaution because radiation in that direction is no as strong as others and meteors are not usally hit vertically.

Although the radiation is far beyond to reduce to Earth level by these simple water sack, but we don't need to. We only need to provide different levels(combinations) of radiation protection in différent direction to meet the mission request.

Also, when some of the water sacks are design to be empty, it leave space to install other equipments.

[zxzx]

11 hours ago, mikegarrison said:

Water does freeze in vacuum.

What happens is that it evaporates (due to the extremely low pressure), which causes it to drop in temperature due to the phase change.

The issue with a leak is whether the ice would plug the leak or not. If the ice does not plug the leak, then this boiling/freezing thing would just continue as all the water fountained out into space. But if the ice plugs the leak, it should be pretty stable.

I think I find a patch. What if, says, when the penetration occur, it also making the middle layer of the flexible enclosure exposure to the erupting water flow, a special material in that layer can absorb  water and expend it's volume times larger, mend the breach and slow the water so it can freeze and seal the rest of the hole.

Edited May 16 by zxzx

[darthgently]

8 hours ago, zxzx said:

I think I find a patch. What if, says, when the penetration occur, it also making the middle layer of the flexible enclosure exposure to the erupting water flow, a special material in that layer can absorb  water and expend it's volume times larger, mend the breach and slow the water so it can freeze and seal the rest of the hole.

Give the contract to a diaper company.  They are pros at leaks

[zxzx]

1 hour ago, darthgently said:

Give the contract to a diaper company.  They are pros at leaks

LoL, thank you, I might actually mention it to the juries: "We can see the reference of this particular kind of material from diaper, save the astronaut in case of a leaking event."