Space Post - More about water on the moon

[Neil]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11598813 "In about a tonne of material... you're talking 11-12 gallons of water that you could extract"

[Publius]

Not too shabby!

[Neil]

More news suggesting loads of the stuff there! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13545848

[brer]

If we can ever find the will to colonize space, this will be a very great help. A space elevator from earth to get us into a geostationary orbit at an economical price, and another for colonization and bringing materials into and out of orbit and we could do it. Nanocarbon is getting cheaper and cheaper by the year as are the technologies for working it. IIRC, one of the orbiters back in the 90's, I think it was nicknamed Susannah, found enough water in a few of the craters to fufill our needs for colonization for a good while.

[Neil]

If we can ever find the will to colonize space, this will be a very great help. A space elevator from earth to get us into a geostationary orbit at an economical price, and another for colonization and bringing materials into and out of orbit and we could do it. Nanocarbon is getting cheaper and cheaper by the year as are the technologies for working it. IIRC, one of the orbiters back in the 90's, I think it was nicknamed Susannah, found enough water in a few of the craters to fufill our needs for colonization for a good while. A space elevator is a long way off (unfortunately)

[Publius]

IIRC, one of the orbiters back in the 90's, I think it was nicknamed Susannah, found enough water in a few of the craters to fufill our needs for colonization for a good while. Yeah, and crater ice is far more likely to be useful than this newly discovered water, which is locked in cooled lunar magma. Probably need to process a fair bit of rock to get a reasonable amount of water from that.

[brer]

If you think about how a lunar colony would work, the amounts found locked in the lunar material would be more than sufficient. By necessity, a lunar colony would recycle everything. While initially the colonists would likely seek to just get the water, they would later capture enough from industrial processes to get by. I really do not think a space elevator is really that far away in the future. I remember when the first new allotropes of carbon were discovered back in the eighties. Bucky balls and carbon chains. In the late eighties/early nineties, some researcher theorized about a lattice of carbon forming a tube. With research, it was found in nature and could be synthesized. Manufacturing enough to string a tennis racket at the time would have cost several million dollars. In the early 2000's, another researcher found a way to make the stuff in quantity and in long enough fibers by simply passing a carbon rich gas through a flame ring. This brought the cost of the material down to reasonable levels. Bucky tubes are insanely strong. A cord of it woven thinner than a human hair is strong enough to support a medium sized vehicle. They are strong enough to work. What is keeping us from making a space elevator is not that the technology is too far away, but rather that we do not have the will to do it. I would like to think that a charismatic black president while serving his second term would try to inspire the nation to do this much as Kennedy inspired the nation to reach for the moon.

[rongravy]

I would like to think that a charismatic black president while serving his second term would try to inspire the nation to do this much as Kennedy inspired the nation to reach for the moon. The same guy that tried to shut NASA down, hardly?That's about as fucking far fetched as him being re elected. Shit...

[Neil]

I really do not think a space elevator is really that far away in the future. I remember when the first new allotropes of carbon were discovered back in the eighties. Bucky balls and carbon chains. We need 38,000km of exotic material?! Which is an incredible request! We also need the space technology to put a large mass in geostationary orbit. Something again we really can't do now or in the near future. And can you imagine what someone like Al Qaeda would want to do with such a structure?

[brer]

We need 38,000km of exotic material?! Which is an incredible request! We also need the space technology to put a large mass in geostationary orbit. Something again we really can't do now or in the near future. You don't have to put the whole mass in orbit at once. Create finished spools of braided nano-carbon a thousandth of an inch thick and as long as managable. Every time you go into orbit bring a few of the spools. Automated weaving machines have been around a while. When you have enough spools, use automated machinery to start weaving the main braid in orbit. Small braids are woven into bigger braids, the bigger braids are woven into even bigger braids, and those are woven into the final braid. Roll the whole thing up as it's made. By most estimates, the final piece of braided fullerene will need to be about 2 inches wide, 50.8mm for you folks over the big blue, and a few thousands of an inch thick. It will be taper at the ends. The coolest trick is hanging it. Effectively, all that they need to do is start reeling it out towards earth and play around with their own orbit as they do it. The space station/orbital industrial station will try to seek a higher orbit as the braid descends all though the power of gravity and orbital mechanics. Anchor the bottom end at your equatorial facility. As far as Al Quaeda goes, if they fly a plane into it, they would likely end up with two planes with one wing apiece. Even if they managed to cut it, it would not be catastrophic. The earth side of the braid would basically waft gently down to the ground and the space station would need to dump some mass until they can extend their end of it and re-anchor it to the ground. The first one will be the expensive one. After that, the cost to get into orbit starts getting cheap enough that there will likely be several of the elevators. I remember watching the moon landings as a child. I read the names of all the astronauts and space chimps in the weekly reader, an educational newspaper for children, and dreamed of space. I'm starting to get older now and I am starting to see a space elevator as my only chance of making it into orbit and maybe walking on the moon. I think it can be done now. It is more of a matter of engineering and will at this point than a lack of technology in my opinion.

[Neil]

You don't have to put the whole mass in orbit at once. Create finished spools of braided nano-carbon a thousandth of an inch thick and as long as managable. Every time you go into orbit bring a few of the spools. Automated weaving machines have been around a while. When you have enough spools, use automated machinery to start weaving the main braid in orbit. Small braids are woven into bigger braids, the bigger braids are woven into even bigger braids, and those are woven into the final braid. Roll the whole thing up as it's made. By most estimates, the final piece of braided fullerene will need to be about 2 inches wide, 50.8mm for you folks over the big blue, and a few thousands of an inch thick. It will be taper at the ends. The coolest trick is hanging it. Effectively, all that they need to do is start reeling it out towards earth and play around with their own orbit as they do it. The space station/orbital industrial station will try to seek a higher orbit as the braid descends all though the power of gravity and orbital mechanics. Anchor the bottom end at your equatorial facility. As far as Al Quaeda goes, if they fly a plane into it, they would likely end up with two planes with one wing apiece. Even if they managed to cut it, it would not be catastrophic. The earth side of the braid would basically waft gently down to the ground and the space station would need to dump some mass until they can extend their end of it and re-anchor it to the ground. The first one will be the expensive one. After that, the cost to get into orbit starts getting cheap enough that there will likely be several of the elevators. I remember watching the moon landings as a child. I read the names of all the astronauts and space chimps in the weekly reader, an educational newspaper for children, and dreamed of space. I'm starting to get older now and I am starting to see a space elevator as my only chance of making it into orbit and maybe walking on the moon. I think it can be done now. It is more of a matter of engineering and will at this point than a lack of technology in my opinion. It can't be done now. The technology to produce the material, on-mass, to that lengths, just doesn't exist as far as I know...

[brer]

I was a sailor once upon a time. I handled big heavy lines made of nylon. In some ports, I worked with manila and hemp line. A full spring line is well over a hundred and fifty foot long. Yet the fibers that make it up are significantly shorter. If you ever see a hundred and fifty foot tall hemp plant, say something, I know some people that would be interested. A cotton undershirt is made up of relatively short fibers considering that the fabric that makes up each panel is knit out of what is one very long yarn. That wool sweater your grandmother made for you is effectively made of individual fibers of less than 8 inches in length. Yet if you unraveled it, you may come out with a few kilometers of yarn. The individual fullerene fibers do not need to be 38,000 kilometers long nor do the individual braids. The lengths that are produced now are easily long enough considering how many times that they will need to be woven and braided together to get the strength needed to hold it's own weight and that of any cargo.

[Eyebiter]

A space elevator is a long way off (unfortunately) Not as far off as you might think. At this point it's a race for someone to develop an inexpensive method of manufacturing carbon nanotubes in bulk. Once that technology is developed then the space elevator will soon follow. "Whoever builds the first elevator will have a virtual monopoly on all future ones" http://money.cnn.com/magazines/busin...0588/index.htm

[brer]

I am sorry to have dragged the thread off track with the space elevator thing. Space is one of my big weaknesses. I'm a big astro groupie. Anything space related just drags me in. I used to have a shuttle tile when I was a kid. I had an eight inch schmidt-cassegrain a few years ago. I built a process controller and cast about 40 pounds of borosilicate glass into an 18 inch telescope mirror that is still being parabolized. I write zombie fiction as a hobby, but I also write science fiction. Yes, I am an extreme nerd. I think that our future is in the sky and we need to reach for it. Sometimes I get a little overenthusiastic about the possibilities of actually having a chance to get into orbit.