Astronomy and space exploration
- Thread starter eloic
- Start date
I didnt watch the video but looked at the pdf, I cant see where they mention 250 ppl (which Im dubious about, sure its possible, but IIRC the largest ppl put into space was 7 on the shuttle, or perhaps it was 9)
Also the only price I saw mentioned per person was the cost of a median house in the USA, which is $188.9k (NZ median house price=$US366k FFS twice the cost here is a joke)
also the current cost to launch spacex's falcon 9 is > $50 million (falcon 9 cant hold anywhere near 250 ppl) so you're claiming a larger ship launch for less than 10x the price,
i.e. a LOT more for a LOT less, I'm just not seeing it
cheapchips
Veteran
Falcon at $50m is the non reusable price. When they start to fly the block 5 variant from next year they will start to achieve genuine reusability and costs will come down.
It's probably worth watching the video too, as the Mars proposal hinges entirely on reuse of a very large rocket.
The cost of a small house is to Mars. This would require 6 launches of the booster, 5 of the tanker and 1 of the spaceship.
The cost the rocket + spaceship is almost half a billion but, when its reusable, the amortised cost per launch creates the launch cost I'm stating.
100 people per Mars flight, possibly moving to 250 is in the presentation I think, if not the video.
The spaceship is certainly big enough to hold that many.
@Davros g force isn't really anything extraordinary for launch or landing. It's an interesting point as to what the minimum health requirement would be though.
It's probably worth watching the video too, as the Mars proposal hinges entirely on reuse of a very large rocket.
The cost of a small house is to Mars. This would require 6 launches of the booster, 5 of the tanker and 1 of the spaceship.
The cost the rocket + spaceship is almost half a billion but, when its reusable, the amortised cost per launch creates the launch cost I'm stating.
100 people per Mars flight, possibly moving to 250 is in the presentation I think, if not the video.
The spaceship is certainly big enough to hold that many.
@Davros g force isn't really anything extraordinary for launch or landing. It's an interesting point as to what the minimum health requirement would be though.
which is at least a 1 year trip
how big is this ship going to be? 1 years supply of food for 100 people, 1 years supply of water for 100 people ect...
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cheapchips
Veteran
It's a 3-4 month trip. Reuse enables in orbit refueling, which in turn allows you to hoof it to Mars.
It's a big rocket. It will be 10 meters taller than the Saturn 5 and 12m at the base. The payload/passenger bit is around 10 stories.
This is all in Musk's video btw. Well worth a watch. The only bit that's not in it the implications for LEO launches, but that wasn't the point of the presentation.
It's a big rocket. It will be 10 meters taller than the Saturn 5 and 12m at the base. The payload/passenger bit is around 10 stories.
This is all in Musk's video btw. Well worth a watch. The only bit that's not in it the implications for LEO launches, but that wasn't the point of the presentation.
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Each way ?
cheapchips
Veteran
Yep. After two years since it has to happen when the Earth and Mars are closest. Fuel for the return leg is refined on Mars, which is why they went with liquid methane.
The first flight would probably be autonomous to build the Mars propellant plant. Earlier missions would be less people as they would be building more infrastructure, including the first green houses etc. Musk didn't flesh this part of the colonisation plan out. The presentation was how to set out how the transportation could be done for acceptable cost with a modern big rocket. SpaceX just want to be a railroad, the same as Blue Origin want to be white vans to the Moon.
The idea is that you'll spend two years getting lots of spaceships in orbit and at each alignment you have a big convey to Mars. After 50 years you'll have a million people on Mars. Humanity backup complete!
The first flight would probably be autonomous to build the Mars propellant plant. Earlier missions would be less people as they would be building more infrastructure, including the first green houses etc. Musk didn't flesh this part of the colonisation plan out. The presentation was how to set out how the transportation could be done for acceptable cost with a modern big rocket. SpaceX just want to be a railroad, the same as Blue Origin want to be white vans to the Moon.
The idea is that you'll spend two years getting lots of spaceships in orbit and at each alignment you have a big convey to Mars. After 50 years you'll have a million people on Mars. Humanity backup complete!
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We should be colonizing the moon before we go to mars.
we all know the moon lander
the top half off this was enuf to lift 2 ppl into orbit!
Try that ship on earth and see how high you get,
, we could easily launch stuff into orbit from the moon even without a rocket.
Use the moon as a base to further our exploration of the solar system, the Chinese are smart they know moon is a far better first base than mars
we all know the moon lander
the top half off this was enuf to lift 2 ppl into orbit!
Try that ship on earth and see how high you get,
, we could easily launch stuff into orbit from the moon even without a rocket.Use the moon as a base to further our exploration of the solar system, the Chinese are smart they know moon is a far better first base than mars
cheapchips
Veteran
Not really. He came up with the idea but didn't have time to pursue it with running 3.5 other companies. Various other groups are exploring building them though. I think Hyperloop One is particularly dodgy?
He's hardly full of crap when it comes to rocketry (or electric cars). SpaceX have a full order book for the next three years, have the world's cheapest heavy orbital launch by about half, the most advanced engine with the Merlin and are the only organisation to recover and re-fly a first stage booster. A second reused one landed on an autonomous drone ship in the Atlantic a couple of hours ago.
They'll fly another 4? reused cores this year. With new cores they should be launching every two weeks until the end of the year.
The new version of the Falcon 9 at the end of the year will have various tweaks improve reuse. Hypersonic grid fins that don't ablate on reentry and legs that don't need replacing after a hard landing. It will reduce the refurb time to 24hrs labour. Logistics don't mean you can relaunch in 24hrs, but it will essentially refuel and go.
Conscious I've been rabbitting on for a couple of days now. Hope it's interesting. It's not all me being a SpaceX fanboy! Assuming nothing blows up, we are on the cusp of rockets becoming proper vehicles, instead of throw away novelties. I think that's pretty exciting.
Blazkowicz
Legend
We should be colonizing the moon before we go to mars.
we all know the moon lander
the top half off this was enuf to lift 2 ppl into orbit!
Try that ship on earth and see how high you get,
Use the moon as a base to further our exploration of the solar system, the Chinese are smart they know moon is a far better first base than mars
There are arguments for and against this. Zero atmosphere is even worse than thin atmosphere, radiation is worse except for quick human transit times, lunar night is a big problem - so there are concepts about only colonizing the south pole region where you can have things in small permanently lit areas and other things in permanently dark craters (with some sort of power cable between both)
Also, energy cost of going to Moon or Mars aren't very different, a bad oversimplification would be that you coast till the end but to go to Mars you wait longer. Moon landing can only be rocket powered : perhaps you can only really land small payloads then. Maybe that would be a reason : to go to the moon you need to ship a rocket that will land on it (like that moon lander) and the bigger the ship you wish to land, the bigger the rocket or rockets on that ship must be.
Landing on Mars in a pain in the arse as well but can and does use the atmosphere. Or perhaps it lends itself a lot better to space opera visions because there's far more "desireable" land and there's a sky.
Sorry, but I think both targets are horrendous. Why not colonize a wasteland on Earth. For example, there's an "unwanted" triangle (trapezoid in fact) that belongs to either Egypt or Sudan. Either country would rather let the other have it, so as to claim another nearby wasteland that includes a Red Sea coast line at least.
cheapchips
Veteran
If it's about more land I agree, but that isn't really the argument. One way or another, Earth isn't going to be habitable for humans forever. We need to learn to survive without Earth's environment or humanity stops here. We can't assume we'll have the industrial capacity to give a shot down the line. We need to do it now while we're still dodging ELEs.
You'd hope that the knock on of learning live on Mars, the Moon and elsewhere in the Solar System give would help with tackling sustainability and population growth on Earth.
Mars has an atmosphere 1% of eaths I think so ~10millibars (btw I literally ;P just finished watching 'The Last Days on Mars' now would you have massive duststorms on mars with voluminous buffering winds, I have no idea but at 1% I think they took some poetic license, but perhaps I'm wrong)
moon landing vs mars landing? well ppl have managed to land rockets on the moon multiple times decades ago no issues (except maybe if the europeans get involved, or is that only mars that they have issues
)Dude personally why I think moon is better, is cause its a better launchpad, we can shoot mined hydrogen/oxygen or whatever (even that rare-ish earth gas helium) up into orbit from the moon easily (you cant do the same in mars, sure its easier than earth but no where the same level of simplicity as the moon) and then cause we have a good foothold to base ourselves from then we can go to europa, or encildeus or even dare I say mars, OTOH Now if you go to mars it will be like back in the late 60s/early 70s we will go we are here mission accomplished now lets sit on our laurels for a few decades, sure you can explore mars but thats it for a few decades until someone says lets go elsewhere
I just heard this week ESA is planning on launching a spacetelescope to look at other planets 1.5AU out or something, IIRC it was multiple small telescopes dangling behind a satelite, image combined or something.
Now if we were on the moon you could do that but much much better there, you couldnt on mars though, cause it has a friggen atmosphere (only 1% granted but still thats a major PITA) its like the new large telescope they are planning to build in hawaii or canary islands (btw still no decision in the court, but news soon) the small mirrors have to have individual motors to counterbalence the effects of earths atmosphere but its still gonna be crap (thats why the hubble spacetelescope takes such good photos and its a small telescope compared to what we have on earth) now imagine an earth sized telescope on the moon! holy fuck!
dude bay theres a lot of the livable earth that noone lives in, eg the tundra, no need to go to sudan/egypt (though for a similar area instead of that area i'ld personally try for the more amenable outback oz) but that ignores why I want us to set up a base on the moon, not to protect humanity or whatever but because it expands us as humanity, I am curious. In 6 weeks Im going to see the gorillas in rwanda, it will be magical (I hope) in august the USA has a total eclipse I think, now my fellow americans trust me its worth going and seeing a total eclipse its a moment when you feel humble and awestruck, maybe even moved to tears (whoever has read this post until now, do it spend 2 weeks salary to experience a total eclipse you will not be disappointed) . I want to see new stuff, when I die in 2070(*) I dont want us to have only gone to mars, but we have the iphone mellow (aka iphone 45) ............ I want real advancement
(*)provided AI doesnt kill us
Yes and its a stupid idea, and if he would have spent 10 minutes thinking about it he would realise that.
More hints of Martian hot springs may hold promise for Mars 2020 mission
One potential landing site appears to have ridges that hint at past hydrothermal activity
Northeast Syrtis Major (shown) is a candidate landing site for the Mars 2020 mission. The bedrock in the region is more than 4 billion years old. Certain ridges there may be the result of ancient hot springs, a new study of similar features elsewhere on Mars suggests.
Ancient hot springs may have bubbled up at a spot just south of the Martian equator. Left-behind mineral deposits described in a new study are not the first evidence of such features on Mars. But if confirmed, the discovery could affect where NASA’s Mars 2020 mission rover lands to start its hunt for signs of life.
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/more-hints-martian-hot-springs-may-hold-promise-mars-2020-mission
Good morning, lunatics!
Those living in the US, you are lucky! Are you planning to watch the solar eclipse?
Those living in the US, you are lucky! Are you planning to watch the solar eclipse?
25 facts you should know about the August 21, 2017, total solar eclipse
http://cs.astronomy.com/asy/b/astro...t-the-august-21-2017-total-solar-eclipse.aspx
Many of those "rocket experts" also believed that trying to return and reuse a 1st stage rocket is a stupid idea (some, such as the Russians, even went on record saying it).