/sfg/ Spaceflight General

[Anonymous No.11153140]

Beamed Power Edition

Old Thread: >>11146344

[Anonymous No.11153158]

>>11153140
What would the first gen extra-solar colony ships look like?
A big o'neill cylinder with a sloped prow and engineering in the rear? Would it be one big ship or a tight fleet of population, manufacturing and mobile spacestation ships?

[Anonymous No.11153182]

>>11153158
It would probably be one ship that contains everything for a new start. Having multiple ships would just increase the amount of frontal area to cover from the interstellar dust (assuming that they're moving at an appreciable fraction of the speed of light). Maybe have "staged" launches where the "backup" ship with no people but all the same tools can be sent ahead of the primary ship. That way the colonists can be comfortably over-equipped and that the star system can be mapped out in detail before the colonists get there.

[Anonymous No.11153195]

>>11153158
Probably combination of bussard ramjet/magbeam and nuclear pulse rocket engine to reach 10% of light speed. Significant shielding with peeble like habitats/storage/industrial modules on string of superstructure before ending in another big section that is the main engine.
Small genetically modified crew in suspension-around 10, maybe 20 individuals.
Colonists would be raised on site in either a drone constructed O'Neil colony for their arrival(a scout probe/construction ship would be sent first) from frozen embryos or from artificial wombs from frozen sperm carried by ship.
Alien biospheres are unlikely to be settled-but can be orbited by habitats and subject to expeditions/study. Advance alien biosphere is worth more as research field that is undisturbed.

Something like pic related.

[Anonymous No.11153204]

>>11153195
Furthermore the ship wouldn't be abandoned at the arrival system but converted to orbital habitat itself if the colonists are located on ground. Splitting the population would increase their survival chances.

[Anonymous No.11153210]

>>11153195
Bussard Ramjets don't work; the drag effects are larger than the exhaust gained by using the interstellar medium as a propellant.

[Anonymous No.11153215]

>>11153210
fucking.. than the VELOCITY gained by using the ISM as a propellant.

[Anonymous No.11153224]

>>11153210
>Bussard Ramjets don't work; the drag effects are larger than the exhaust gained by using the interstellar medium as a propellant.
Yes, the ramjet is for helping in slowing down

[Anonymous No.11153229]

>>11153224
Probably not worth the structural mass used to incorporate it.

[Anonymous No.11153236]

>>11153195
>frozen embryos or from artificial wombs from frozen sperm carried by ship.
If the AI can be worked out, then that's probably the best early option for interstellar colonization that isn't a slowboat.

[Anonymous No.11153252]

>>11153236
>If the AI can be worked out
I think this is too risky, the long term psychological and cultural consequences would be too dangerous.
>interstellar colonization that isn't a slowboat.
Most interstellar colonization in the perspective of next couple centuries will be slow, and eventually unnecessary. Once you have a ship capable of crossing the stars-you no longer need colonies. Might as well live in the void.
However I can envision cultural and religious groups seeking to start anew far away from local cluster of colonized star systems.
You can expect people trying to establish colonies next to alien biospheres for research and simple curiosity.
But we will be stuck with 10% light speed in the foreseable future.
Also you can't go faster than 25% without some serious risk of explosive impacts that no known material can survive for long.

[Anonymous No.11153259]

When are we going to colonize the space?

[Anonymous No.11153277]

>>11153259
Once access to space gets significantly cheaper. Pretty much every problem with space colonization (or even just space settlement for a temporary base) can be solved by cheaper access to space. Most the issues are caused by the fact that launchers are relatively expensive per mass of payload and can't carry very large payloads. This restricts the development of many technologies for space travel.

The first country to make space much cheaper and easier to get to will have the opportunity to dominate space.

[Anonymous No.11153286]

>>11153259
2030s-new moon landings(China, USA), India has manned flights in space, man lands on Mars-either USA or private
2040s-expect small moon stations by different counties(USA, China, EU/International), some space hotels, first habitable exoplanets in pictures,China lands on Mars
2050s-small research stations on Mars studying subsurface life
2069-first interstellar probe launched to Centauri System.Habitable planets too far away to be considered a valid target for quick mission(most likely within 10-20 light years).

That's as far as I can figure.
You will see China on the Moon, India in spacea and moon habitats for sure. Mars landing as well in next 20 years.
If exoplanets with biospheres exists we see first clues in 2020s, more details in 30s and first telescopes allowing us to take low resolution images could be in 40s.

[Anonymous No.11153302]

>>11153286
Also potential events that could influence space research and colonization
-discovery of microbial life in Solar System outside of Earth; I would say it is almost granted on Mars due to ejecta from Earth carrying life and vice versa, there is possibility of subsurface life on Mars. Less likely life in clouds of Venus. I think life under Europa is far stretch, more likely Enceledus due to nutrients being availlable more readily(Europa has a bit stale subsurface compared to Enceleladus).
-detection of exoplanet biospheres(we will begin analysing exoplanets atmospheres in 20s which will offer first hints). While perhaps not overthrowing world order-a clear discovery of life outside our Solar System would likely lead to some increase of funding and interest in public
-the same instruments allowing us to detect exoplanet biospheres can also detect megastructures and industrial pollutants-but this is obvious wild card

[Anonymous No.11153316]

>>11153158
>What would the first gen extra-solar colony ships look like?

An artificial tardigrade the size of a rice grain, with tiny thrusters instead of legs.

>interstellar probe built from the atomic level on up, via nanotechnology
>this ship is composed of atomically-reinforced radiation shielding and machine "cells", designed to both compute and "digest" matter to create copies of itself
>its "cells" are infinitely tougher, more flexible and smaller than living cells and can also create organic cells
>interstellar probe is only milligrams in mass
>use enormous EM accelerator to launch several thousand of these (maybe more, maybe less) at nearby star (or stars)
>leaves solar system at an appreciable percentage of light speed
>sacrifices part of its mass to decelerate (again, in the grams, due to its tiny size)
>upon reaching nearby star, first mission is to build a transmitter from a captured asteroid it "eats" and establish data link to "home"
>then build another EM accelerator and more duplicates of itself to launch at more stars (a la Von Neumann)
>it will never be necessary to send more than one successful probe...all it needs to "build" another civilization around the target star (whether its biological, or more likely, virtual...this would be a Matrioshka Brain) is information from the data link to "home"
>galaxy and universe eventually enveloped by this machine "organism", at near light speed, or something faster, it that's at all possible

Should be possible in ~100 years, definitely 1000. Galaxy "conquered" in quarter million years.

[Anonymous No.11153319]

>>11153140
How do I follow what the Chinese are doing in space if I don't know the language? English language resources seem very limited to me.

>>11153259
We'll probably see some form of resource extraction from the Moon/Asteroids before 2060, especially as Rare Earth Metals will start to become even more scarce and demand for them will increase. However if that'll be robotic or manned is hard to say.
Otherwise, if Trump gets reelected I can see a moon landing in 2024 leading to a semi-permanent base on the lunar surface and a station in orbit, maybe with ESA/JAXA/Indian(?)/Russian(?) collaboration. That would probably spur the Chinese into action and maybe into a Mars mission.
And I don't expect LEO stations to disappear anytime soon.

[Anonymous No.11153321]

>>11153316
>interstellar probe built from the atomic level on up, via nanotechnology
There is no way for it to survive radiation

[Anonymous No.11153324]

>>11153319
I think the results of exoplanet research in astronomy will be a game changer for space exploration.
If near, detectable biospheres are found then it will spur the funding and incentive to colonize space.
Of course it all depends if they will be found-this should be known in around 30-40 years time.

[Anonymous No.11153343]

>>11153324
The Trappist-1 system looks pretty suitable.
>Calm star
>Stable
>3 planets with probable liquid surface water
>long lasting star
>Planets are all nearby

[Anonymous No.11153368]

>>11153321

>an artificial construct designed to withstand radiation can't make an interstellar flight
>but a human can

The reason I'm going with "tardigrade sized" is I'm guessing that future engineers would go with the smallest possible mass to launch via EM acceleration. Explain my miscalculation.

[Anonymous No.11153395]

>>11153368
>an artificial construct designed to withstand radiation can't make an interstellar flight
It needs mass that can whitstand radiation, it is simply too small to endure radiation in interstellar space. Would require immense shielding which such small object can't have.

[Anonymous No.11153400]

>>11153286
>Centauri System

I love how vague that is.

Proxima Centauri has an Earth- or SuperEarth-sized planet orbiting it in its habitable zone. This is almost certainly the first extraterrestrial target for human/AI exploration.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxima_Centauri_b

[Anonymous No.11153443]

>>11153140
When can we expect to utilize algae within our bodies to make food/energy for our bodies?

[Anonymous No.11153445]

>>11153395

>mass is the only way to block radiation

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/adem.201400127

[Anonymous No.11153449]

>>11153443
You mean making people solar powered? I'm pretty sure that wouldn't make enough energy to completely replace the need for food. There's a reason why the vast majority of life that can do photosynthesis don't move.

[Anonymous No.11153452]

>>11153449
Not completely, but as a way to cut down daily energy need, even 10% is a great reduction.

[Anonymous No.11153465]

>>11153229
You're pulling that out of your ass anon. The mass needed for the magnetic field to slow the spacecraft down would certainly be far less than the mass of the fuel needed to slow yourself down from relativistic speeds.

[Anonymous No.11153467]

>>11153324
Probably. However I'm not sure if modern governments would be able or willing to commit to such a long term project. Of course, one could just send a manned expedition straight away to a nearby exoplanet that is presumed to have a biosphere, but that planet may be super-hostile to human life, so an initial robotic exploration makes sense. though here you run into time issues as a program of "robotic expedition->comms back to Earth->colony ship" will take close to a lifetime to achieve for anything but Proxima Centauri or Barnards Star, and I don't believe that any modern government would have to political will to carry that out. But hey, many cathedrals took centuries to build but they did get done in the end so perhaps this will be the cathedrals of the modern age.

[Anonymous No.11153472]

>>11153465
Hardly. The equipment is heavy and contributes to the overall inertia of the craft, while the medium they interact with is too thin to provide significant delta-V returns per unit weight.

[Anonymous No.11153474]

>>11153443
>>11153449
>>11153452
https://now.northropgrumman.com/is-human-photosynthesis-possible/

Heh, some people have done some research to this fun little hypothetical what ifs.

>Associate professor Lindsay Turnbull of the University of Oxford determined that if the surface area of an adult woman contained chlorophyll like a leaf, it would produce only 1% of the daily energy requirements for the person to survive.
>To live by photosynthesis alone, the woman would need a green body with the surface the size of a tennis court.
>Scientific research has not yet reached a level where genetic engineers can manipulate the human body enough to make all of these biological requirements possible.

[Anonymous No.11153478]

Why can't someone figure out how to make a drive that pushes/pulls on the fabric of space so we can ditch this rocket equation bullshit.

[Anonymous No.11153509]

>>11153472
>the medium they interact with is too thin to provide significant delta-V returns per unit weight

What is e=mc^2

[Anonymous No.11153523]

>>11153509
Huge number meets smaller number. One atom per cubic meter is lean as fuck.

[Anonymous No.11153564]

>>11153478
Space is ironically very rigid and it takes a lot of energy to bend even the slightest amount. In order to bend space-time in a way that can be utilized, you need the power of black holes. They're the only known phenomenas that can bend space to such an extreme degree so as to allow possible faster than light travel.

[Anonymous No.11153623]

>>11153564
>Need FTL in a pinch?
>Take two black holes
>Pour iron dust around them
>Spinnin iron generates magnets
>Black hole gravity makes them fall together
>Same pole magnets push them away from each other
>Ride between the black holes for infinite FTL travel
Have fun exploring the galaxy

[Anonymous No.11153628]

>>11153623
Needs to be colourised in a troll physics meme

[Anonymous No.11153694]

>>11153623
I don't know about magnets and stuff, but imo, its just that we'd need a new understanding of blackhole, a sort of a revolutionary way of seeing black holes that allows us to manipulate black holes. This is the fundamental aspect of tech that we need to get a "FTL" transport.

Its a direct take on "Alcubierre drive" thats been pushed around, but that requires exotic energy(of which black holes could be one).

[Anonymous No.11153718]

>>11153564
So if space is rigid you need to figure out how to make a drive that sticks something into/onto it and pushes on it.

[Anonymous No.11153719]

>>11153718
>Gravitic paddlewheel

[Anonymous No.11153721]

with FTL being impossible in mind, would it be possible to make a ""warp"" drive that just brought an object up to 99.99999% light speed?
the big fuckery comes from exceeding c, but what if a drive were made that didn't do so at all
20 light years would still take 20 years, external time, with inside taking weeks or days

[Anonymous No.11153732]

>>11153719
Exactly

>>11153721
Even if you could you would need some miraculous shielding technology to not simply be vaporised at those speeds.

[Anonymous No.11153740]

Is film cooling really as simple as having a ring of straight (shower head) injectors that are right on the chamber wall? Or is there some more advanced to their design that I'm missing?

[Anonymous No.11153747]

>>11153740
It's not really any more complicated than that. The trick is integrating it with all the other plumbing elements, and making sure nothing fouls up in the process.

[Anonymous No.11153804]

>>11153732
which is why I said warp drive
magic supertech bubble that just pushes all that shitty space dust out of the way, high powered magnetic field to push away ionized radiation if the bubble doesn't take care of that

[Anonymous No.11153812]

>>11153747
>and making sure nothing fouls up in the process.
Isn't that down to the propellant selection?

[Anonymous No.11153822]

>>11153623
don't do this, this creates deadly X-ray emissions capable of sterilizing everything within an AU

[Anonymous No.11153823]

Why don't the probes for measuring the CMB have EMF shielding to protect them from contamination from Earth potentials? The cone here would reflect any emf into its censors. even if 1 million miles from earth

[Anonymous No.11153829]

>>11153812
I don't mean literal fouling.

[Anonymous No.11153832]

>>11153812
>Victorian era black powder space rocket

[Anonymous No.11153841]

>>11153832
Reminds me of an old discussion about if it's possible to make a solid propellant rocket engine if the solid propellant were ground up into a fine power. I believe the final answer was "no".

[Anonymous No.11153871]

>>11153804
>Magical supertech bubble
>Would it be possible

Good question anon let me consult my encyclopaedia of magical supertech.

[Anonymous No.11153900]

Over/Under on the Grand Solar Minimum we're entering's effects on manned spaceflight?

[Anonymous No.11153901]

>>11153140
Earth is flat

[Anonymous No.11153905]

>>11153901

[Anonymous No.11153935]

>>11153822
Ok I won’t

[Anonymous No.11154014]

>>11153900
I suppose solar minimums slightly increase the chance of kesseler syndrome.

[Anonymous No.11154017]

>>11153718
"sticking something" is the black hole part.

[Anonymous No.11154113]

>>11153140
first we will send something like this to find a planet worth colonizing

[Anonymous No.11154149]

>>11153158
>What would the first gen extra-solar colony ships look like?

An unmanned fusion-powered, laser accelerated ship. Basically a big sphere of a propellant tank, with en engine at its back. Contains basic orbital infrastructure and a receiver. Travels at deeply sublight speed for hundreds of years.

Once it arrives, send mind uploads / transhumanist colonists over at the speed of light, as a laser beam singnal.

[Anonymous No.11154150]

>>11153140
Pence will love molesting this one for sure

[Anonymous No.11154196]

>>11154014
How so?

[Anonymous No.11154294]

>>11153871
I was asking the "does reality say no to fondling the speed of light just as hard as violating it" question
space dust fuck hell is a whole different can of worms

[Anonymous No.11154426]

>china unveils their new nuclear rocket prototype
>it's a nuclear salt water drive
>they launch it from populated areas anyways

[Anonymous No.11154451]

When are we bombarding the moon with iceteroids?

[Anonymous No.11154460]

Sorry, bros, we cannot scrap the SLS. We already spent millions redesigning the Kennedy Space Center to include it everywhere. Look at this shit.

[Anonymous No.11154465]

>>11154426
going nuclear is the only way to feasibly conquer space. The fear of nuclear power in space is driven by politics, not reason.

[Anonymous No.11154483]

>tfw when too Chad for a launch pad

[Anonymous No.11154487]

>>11154483
tfw when too chink for a launch pad*
FTFY

[Anonymous No.11154490]

>>11154487
>launches twice in four days in your path

Nothing personal, Western piggus!

[Anonymous No.11154495]

>>11154465
nuclear IN space, not on earth
unless that shit is closed loop, it's going to oh fuckles anywhere it launches from, and a big ass area around it, with the bonus of being an absolute bitch to clean

if it's in space, then you can do what ever the fuck you want because lmao hundreds of kilometers between everything outside LEO

[Anonymous No.11154498]

>>11153474
And we would have to be buttnaked all the time like a bunch of perverted nudists.

[Anonymous No.11154506]

>>11154495
well that's the idea. You can use chemical rockets with low ISP, high impulse to launch a nuclear stage to orbit with high ISP and decent impulse. Crewing a nuclear ship can be a challenge but nowhere near impossible and it would save countless tons in chemical motors which are absolute shit for space

[Anonymous No.11154537]

>>11153259
Never ever with our current morals. We will see it unethical just as we see preventing birth defects with gene-modding.

[Anonymous No.11154675]

Made this for the shits and giggles

[Anonymous No.11154737]

>>11154196
During solar minimums, the upper atmosphere shrinks slightly, so debris builds up in lower orbits because atmospheric drag is reduced. More debris= more chances for collisions.

[Anonymous No.11154750]

>>11154465
You do not really need nuclear unless you are going beyond Mars orbit. And it is likely that once we are at the stage to go beyond Mars, fusion will be available. So as much as I like nuclear, I dont think it will be needed in space.

[Anonymous No.11154753]

https://youtu.be/dqwpQarrDwk
Here come the normies

[Anonymous No.11154769]

>>11154750
You don't really need a car to go to work or shopping grocieries, yet we do use them most of the time instead of a bike because despite being more complicated to operate and expensive they are also more convenient. Nuclear powered rockets developements were cancelled shortly after Apollo out of fear that NASA would propose using them for Mars. The white house simply didn't want to spend too much on space but the technology was proven to be viable. If such technology exists I think it's nonsense not to make good use of it.

[Anonymous No.11154774]

>>11154753
>normies
Says the normalfag.

[Anonymous No.11154776]

What is the starship's bailout method? Is there none just like the shuttle?

[Anonymous No.11154890]

>>11154776
same method as an airliner

[Anonymous No.11154896]

>>11154776
There isn't any it's a flying coffin that WILL kill people if they are forced to board it for one reason or another.

[Anonymous No.11154903]

>>11154896
Nobody's boarding it while traditional escape system capable capsules exist. If it ever leaves the realm of vaporware it'll be 100% cargo vehicle.

[Anonymous No.11154922]

>>11154903
>it'll be 100% cargo vehicle

I’ve heard this is what the Chinese are doing with their Long March 9 rocket, whilst they’ll be using a different rocket for launching crew.

[Anonymous No.11154924]

>>11154922
*to the Moon

[Anonymous No.11154932]

>>11154922
https://spacenews.com/china-developing-new-launch-vehicle-for-human-spaceflight-future-moon-missions/

[Anonymous No.11154935]

>>11154922

[Anonymous No.11154937]

>>11153316
To what end, after you've seeded a few systems as backup vs. extinction? Just to maximise your computational resources? What's the hurry?

[Anonymous No.11154939]

>>11154896
Airliners kill people, too. Starship killing people does not matter as long as death rate is reasonably low. And it will be, because by the time we are flying Starships full of people, it will have 1000+ launches under it's belt.

[Anonymous No.11154946]

>>11154935
Why does blue origin use a feather for their logo?
Bezos ever explain the reasoning?

[Anonymous No.11154947]

>>11153445
Cosmic rays are not gamma radiation. You needs few tons of mass per square meter of shield those, period.

[Anonymous No.11154953]

>>11154946
What's the meaning of Blue Origin's feather logo?

> “The feather is simple,” Bezos said. “It's just a symbol of the perfection of flight. For thousands of years, we humans have been looking up at the birds, and wondering what it would be like to fly. … ... For the people who are in love with flight, there is no substitute.”

Personally, I like the feather.

[Anonymous No.11154958]

>>11153195
>frozen embryos
How do you bootstrap a civilisation from this?

[Anonymous No.11154961]

>>11154953
That makes sense.
I suppose it's a good break from the over use of eagles.

[Anonymous No.11154966]

>>11154958
AI nannies?

[Anonymous No.11154971]

>>11154953
this quote comes to mind

[Anonymous No.11154978]

>>11153721
>with FTL being impossible in mind, would it be possible to make a ""warp"" drive that just brought an object up to 99.99999% light speed?
Not really, you would vaporize with contact with any small particle of matter.

But really to colonize space we just need 0.1 to 0.2c

Once uploading or extensive cyborgization/genetic engineering become available there will be no need to colonize Eart like planet and colonization will be mostly about protecting the species and exploration.

[Anonymous No.11154984]

>>11153286
>>11153319
Everyone seems to agree that we'll be colonizing space relatively soon.

[Anonymous No.11155010]

>>11154961
>I suppose it's a good break from the over use of eagles.
Don't forget chevrons too. Those seem to be popular in aerospace.

[Anonymous No.11155029]

>>11154984
Yes, everyone's been agreeing that since the 40s.

[Anonymous No.11155034]

>>11155029
That long ago? That's surprising since we're just now going back to the moon after like 50-60 years.

I don't want to apologize and sound like an apologetic asshole but I'm just now getting into space travel seriously, so a lot of this stuff is new to me.

[Anonymous No.11155082]

>>11153467
>However I'm not sure if modern governments would be able or willing to commit to such a long term project. Of course, one could just send a manned expedition straight away to a nearby exoplanet that is presumed to have a biosphere, but that planet may be super-hostile to human life, so an initial robotic exploration makes sense.

I think interstellar probes are even if the the time of the mission will be 50-100 years will still be prestigious enough for countries like China or USA or organizations like EU to engage in.

Keep in mind that an interstellar probe can provide a lot of science during its mission as well-thanks to lensing effect it could carry out astronomical observations as well while on the journey.

But 50 years, even 100 is imaginable to humans and government might like to spend some money on such legacy.

As to manned missions-I think 22nd century at best.

All depends on what we will find through telescopes in next 20-30 years.
If there is a close bioshpere planet-let's say within 15 light years-it would too tempting object to resist.

[Anonymous No.11155106]

https://twitter.com/PortCanaveral/status/1195471801909993472

[Anonymous No.11155108]

>ORBITAL TETHERS!!??!!?
>NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
>YOU CAN'T JUST SLING SPACECRAFTS FROM ANY ORBIT TOWARDS OTHER CELESTIAL BODIES THEIR ORBIIIIITS!!!!
>YOU HAVE TO USE BILLIONS OF TONNES OF FUEL AND OXIDATION TO GET TO MAAAAAAAARRRRSSSS >NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Why are brainlets like this?
>Pic related.

[Anonymous No.11155110]

>>11155108
Bruh, what? No one says that.

[Anonymous No.11155124]

>>11155108
You still need cheap reusable rockets to build and maintain your precious tethers, or space elevators, of any of that sci-fi shit.

[Anonymous No.11155127]

>>11155110
>Doesn't know about old timey scientists throwing wrenches into plans.
I envy you.

[Anonymous No.11155131]

>>11155108
Same problem as with a mass driver.
Everything turns in jelly inside.

[Anonymous No.11155137]

>>11155127
>Doesn't know about old timey scientists throwing wrenches into plans.

[Anonymous No.11155139]

>>11155124
>He doesn't know about SpaceX
You got lost there or?
>Muh "It's just Sci-Fi"
OK grandpa.

[Anonymous No.11155150]

>>11155139
space elevators is still scfi at this point because we cant build the cable yet.
The cable of a space slingshot we can probably build.

[Anonymous No.11155151]

>>11155131
>Going mach 7!?
>YOU'LL TURN I TO JELLO!
OK Boomer.

[Anonymous No.11155153]

>>11155108
Is it government cost+ contract that guarantees jobs sustainable presence in space and continued partnership with our international partners?

No?

Fuck off, traitor.

[Anonymous No.11155155]

>>11155139
>>He doesn't know about SpaceX
>You got lost there or?
TBF, SpaceX has only just brought cheaper reusable launchers to the industry, and even then most of the other major launch providers doubt that it's practical to do right now.

[Anonymous No.11155158]

>>11155139
>>11155151
>grandpa
>boomer
Dont shit up the board.

[Anonymous No.11155162]

>>11155150
Elevators are for later, slings are for now.
It will show as such again much like our history.

[Anonymous No.11155172]

>>11154498
Ideal (without current tech limitations, i.e. 100 years from now) is to sun bathe on mars for 20-30 minutes and reduce food consumption rate to just the essential nutrients. The calorie would be provided by the photosynthesis/glucose creation.

[Anonymous No.11155173]

>>11155153
>UHM YOU WANT ME TO CHANGE MY KNOWLEDGE VIA SCHOOLING TO A MORE PROFITABLE AND SUSTAINABLE FUTURE?
>WHAT ARE YOU!? A TRAITOOOR?
Ok grandpa just sit down and take your meds.

[Anonymous No.11155178]

>>11155108
I've stated my opinion in the other thread, but I guess I'll post it here too.

Slings are just too much of an investment for an industry that's too small to really benefit from it. Rockets are pretty expensive for lots of payloads, but the infrastructure necessary to support them makes them ideal for the low travel rate to space right now.

>inb4 but what about the SLS, that's a pretty expensive project that could've been developing this
SLS isn't primarily a space program project, it's an engineer welfare program. Something like that is much more lucrative than a tether in space that wouldn't be generating any benefit while it's under construction.

[Anonymous No.11155182]

>>11155155
>Reusable rockets are viable.
>Well they do have some uhm, DOUBTS
Doubts to keeping their jobs that is.
See you on mars via Tethering :).

[Anonymous No.11155208]

>>11155178
>Tethering is bad because we can't immediately make a profit on it right now.
>He doesn't know about longterm investments.
>He isn't capable of comprehending the colossal profits to be earned via asteroid belt mining.
Back to the dumb dumb factory with you.
It will pay itself back for Aeons to come.

[Anonymous No.11155210]

>>11155182
There are some legitimate doubts against reusability that doesn't boil down to "muh jerbs".

>refurbishment may not be cheap enough
>the payload generation rate may in the long term make reusable launchers more expensive than expendable ones due to the extra infrastructure required
>it might not even be economically viable due to some unknown factor
>it might not be technologically feasible without sacrificing critical features

I'm in favor of reusable launchers and think that they should be pursued even if they're more expensive initially than expendable launchers because the spaceflight industry is growing, but it's growth will be hampered if expendable launchers stay as the preferred way to access space. However, to other's (especially very technologically conservative launch providers) these are valid reasons to not pursue reusability. Despite the stereotype that spaceflight is at the cutting edge of technology, the opposite trend has been true post-Apollo. That being conservative about new developments and relying on older proven technology has been the key to success.

[Anonymous No.11155217]

What resources do I use if I want to learn more about space travel?

[Anonymous No.11155223]

>>11155217
General concepts along with futuristic ones (although in the context of writing sci-fi)
http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/

For spacecraft in history along with some of their key technologies.
http://www.astronautix.com/

[Anonymous No.11155244]

If water got here through asteroids, why do the other planets not have water too?

[Anonymous No.11155249]

>>11155210
You're right, if it isn't feasible just yet then we should stick to our proven methods.
This is why (side)companies such as SpaceX are so important for developing new technologies, because without them the space Industry would grow stagnant.
After reusability of spacecrafts have become "mainstream" the Tethers will follow because it skips the need for a majority fuel based space travel system.

[Anonymous No.11155259]

>>11155244
You mean on Mercury, Venus, and Mars? Mercury doesn't have an atmosphere so the water just turns into a vapor and got pushed away by the Sun's light to the frost-line (roughly where Jupiter is) where it freezes into ice. Venus has an atmosphere that could keep water liquid, but due to a runaway greenhouse effect the planet's surface got too hot for water to remain liquid and was either blown away by the Sun (like Mercury) or was reacted away into the rocks. Mars had an atmosphere that could've kept liquid water on it's surface, but the planet lost it's magnetic field and thus it's atmosphere, and the same thing that happened to any water on Mercury happened to Mars.

[Anonymous No.11155318]

The Razorback is absolutely something Jeff Bezos would build, just make this little nigga blue and give it a feather

[Anonymous No.11155425]

>>11155318
There is actually a real-life commercial spacecraft (depending on where you live) on that livery, but it’s not one that belongs to Blue Origin (Amazon own the Expanse). It belongs to BO’s biggest competition currently...

[Anonymous No.11155440]

>>11155425
The livery on the Razorback is straight up ripped from Spaceship Two, but Branson's companies make Blue Origin look sleek, fast, and competent.

[Anonymous No.11155483]

>>11155440
>but Branson's companies make Blue Origin look sleek, fast, and competent.

Not really, it’s taken Branson 16 years, 4 casualties, a crash, lots of money and a free taxpayer-funded spaceport to build a relatively dangerous (due to the massive room for human error) rocket-powered plane that arguably can’t reach space (depending on where you live), making it worse than the original SpaceShip One that was built on a shoestring budget in 2003.

[Anonymous No.11155487]

Why does New Horizons need millions of dollars of continuous funding? Can't it basically be operated by one guy checking a computer for an hour, every couple of weeks/months at this point?

The fucking thing was built, launched, fueled and still in great working condition in 2016, were NASA really threatening to just self-destruct it if the new check didn't clear?

[Anonymous No.11155492]

>>11155483
I’d much rather ride on Bezos’ automated and abort capable hydrogen-powered meme machine with it’s massive windows. However, VirginOrbit are pretty cool and Branson makes some nice looking flight suits.

[Anonymous No.11155547]

>>11155208
>>He isn't capable of comprehending the colossal profits to be earned via asteroid belt mining.

Asteroid mining is a meme unless you utilize the resources in space.

[Anonymous No.11155549]

>>11155483
What went wrong with the whole project? It seemed promising.

[Anonymous No.11155550]

>>11155210
Most of those doubts are proven bullshit. The only one that makes sense is lack of payloads leading to reusability hardly being worth it. But then this is more of an indictment of the entire space industry rather than reusability tech.

[Anonymous No.11155559]

>>11155547
>Can't mine space rocks without space infrastructure
Woah

[Anonymous No.11155566]

>>11155550
>Most of those doubts are proven bullshit
Even the concern that refurbishment may be more expensive than making a new rocket?

[Anonymous No.11155583]

>>11155566
Yeah I'm sure SpaceX is taking tens of millions of dollars of losses on each booster.

[Anonymous No.11155595]

>>11155483
...How is that "not really"? SpaceShip Two makes New Shepard look like a brilliant innovation.

[Anonymous No.11155600]

>>11155583
Plenty of indications that is exactly the case.

[Anonymous No.11155602]

>>11155547
Not necessarily-as long as u keep your market disruption minimal, u could make money from bringing down platinum or helium-3.

[Anonymous No.11155605]

>>11155487
NASA building maintenance costs are divided among the programs that use said buildings. If the VAB needs painting, SLS pays for it. Presumably that's a decent chunk of the continuous cosy of New Horizons, just paying their share of maintenance on the Deep Space Network.

[Anonymous No.11155610]

>>11155600
Such as?

>>11155602
Stop typing like a fucking valley girl teenager, "u" need to kill "ur"self.

[Anonymous No.11155611]

>>11155610
Make me, oh wait u cant ololol

[Anonymous No.11155620]

>>11155583
I mean, it could be a possibility that SpaceX could be tanking the small loss of refurbishing boosters instead of making new ones (assuming that refurbishment is more expensive than making new) to maintain the positive public image of reusing boosters. The fact that they haven't released the full cost breakdown of reusing their boosters feeds into that concern.

Then again, there isn't any good reason for SpaceX to start this conspiracy since the Falcon 9 was already an incredibly cheap launcher to begin with.

[Anonymous No.11155623]

>>11154776
Since the entire Starship is itself an upper stage I suppose it could throw itself free of a failing superheavy in the event of such an emergency. The Starship itself though is a complete vehicle and the downside of that is that escape is more difficult in the event of a critical failure. You might be able to build some kind of escape pod into it, wedge-shaped sections of one deck that could be blown free with a combination of demolition wire and SRB's or blowout panels over the segment, something like that. Like most big flying craft though, escape is more difficult compared to smaller craft. It's easy to throw one or two dudes clear of say a fighter jet compared to trying to replicate that with say, a passenger jet, thus passenger jets don't have ejector seats and substitute greater aerodynamic stability, more redundant engines (usually at least), etc.

[Anonymous No.11155625]

>>11154750
Nuclear would be great for a lunar tug.

[Anonymous No.11155626]

>>11153140
I found some russian guy who has been experimenting with magnetic fields creating gravity. i have no idea if it is legit, but its worth taking a look at

https://www.youtube.com/channel/
UCzZxKT3BzBZOVVy8_YzP6Yw/videos

[Anonymous No.11155631]

>>11155600
Citation fucking needed

[Anonymous No.11155634]

>>11155620
Fuck off FUDposter

[Anonymous No.11155641]

>>11155620
>I mean, they COULD be grinding up children for use as rocket, we DUNNO, that means it's POSSIBLE
>also there's literally no good reason to believe this
why even post drivel if you admit it's drivel

[Anonymous No.11155653]

>>11155610
>>11155631

Various reports and statements from industry experts on the financial realities of reusable rocketry. Some from the US some from Europe.

Lack of noticeable interest beyond presentations to follow suit with identical designs and practices by all competitors that should be directly and severely impacted if Spacex' reusable rockets are truly what they are claimed to be.

Reluctance from the US government itself to utilize these so called reusable rockets and their promising capabilities, strong preference for traditional rockets instead.

Granted the complete truth cannot be known unless Spacex publishes their data, but the writing is on the wall.

[Anonymous No.11155662]

>>11155653
>Granted the complete truth cannot be known unless Spacex publishes their data, but the writing is on the wall.

>I don't actually know, but it's totally true
Nice contradictory sentence, shill.

[Anonymous No.11155668]

>>11155602
>helium-3
And who exactly wants your memium-3? We can't even use it in the first-generation fusion reactors that we don't have, never mind that it needs a much higher fusion temperature. And where are you going to get it? Break up tons of regolith for each thimbleful?

[Anonymous No.11155672]

>>11155625
>double the fuel efficiency
>double the fuel consumption with propulsive return
Great tug if you want it pricey.

[Anonymous No.11155674]

>>11155653
>Various reports and statements from industry experts on the financial realities of reusable rocketry. Some from the US some from Europe.
Such as?

>Lack of noticeable interest beyond presentations to follow suit with identical designs and practices by all competitors that should be directly and severely impacted if Spacex' reusable rockets are truly what they are claimed to be.
Because there hasn't been much motivation to do so. Most rocket launchers are heavily subsidized by governments which is infamous for stifling motivation to inovate.

>Reluctance from the US government itself to utilize these so called reusable rockets and their promising capabilities, strong preference for traditional rockets instead
Because for the last 30 or so years the US government has been using a reusable launcher. It was very bad.

[Anonymous No.11155677]

>>11155583
>>11155600
>>11155620
Meanwhile they're talking about constantly dropping Starship launch prices until eventually they send up 50 of them per year, for $2 million per launch.

$2 million for 100 tons to LEO. Fuck me, it's practically space elevator numbers. We could do anything. Everybody in the world should be scrambling for their own Starship clone.

[Anonymous No.11155678]

>>11155641
I mean there’s always a chance, considering SpaceX have never released the costs of refurbishment between each reuse, what’s stopping them? We know they switch engines in and out like the Shuttles did, from footage of reused boosters sitting in the HAB at 39A. Furthermore, they seem pretty desperate to ditch Falcon 9/ Heavy for Starship and the price difference between a reused F9 booster ($50 million) and an expendable one ($60 million) is relatively tiny....

[Anonymous No.11155690]

>>11155677
>Everybody in the world should be scrambling for their own Starship clone.
Probably not exactly that, but they should be seriously pushing for technologies like Starship to reduce access to space prices. Starship may work, but maybe there's another combination of technologies thats even better.

[Anonymous No.11155697]

>>11155677
the secret sauce is Raptor. Even if Bezorple made a 1:1 starship clone, the BO methalox engines wouldn't make it competitive in the slightest.
Starship really only works assuming raptors don't need refurb for at least 50 flights or whatever

[Anonymous No.11155699]

>>11155653
>Lack of noticeable interest beyond presentations to follow suit with identical designs and practices by all competitors that should be directly and severely impacted if Spacex' reusable rockets are truly what they are claimed to be.
Blue Origin is pouring billions of dollars into their own unique reusable launch platform. ESA has made it clear that whatever comes after Ariane 6 will be reusable. The Chinese are further behind but intend to pursue a reusable design after the next few Long March models and are currently beta testing a mini-Falcon 9. The Russians are still launching the same rockets they have since 1965. NASA has made it clear that they intend to continue collecting tens of billions of dollars over coming decades while not actually doing anything whatsoever.

What are you smoking?

[Anonymous No.11155703]

>>11155653
>various reports (none linked)
>a bunch of conjecture
>DA WRITING IS ON DA WALL
nigger where do you think they got the dosh to develop a superheavy lift vehicle if they're losing money

[Anonymous No.11155704]

>>11155697
Aren't the Raptors like ridiculously cheap anyways?

[Anonymous No.11155709]

>>11155697
Nah, you just need an engine that can be reused cheaply. Raptor isn't magic, you could build a hypergolic Starship if you wanted. The cost benefit comes from full reuse.

[Anonymous No.11155710]

>>11155704
For their size and power output they're highly cost effective.

[Anonymous No.11155723]

>>11155674
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/226730434_Reusability_aspects_for_space_transportation_rocket_engines_Programmatic_status_and_outlook

[Anonymous No.11155724]

>>11155699
>What are you smoking?
"My Domestic Aerospace Giant Can't Be a Robber Baron"

[Anonymous No.11155728]

>>11155723
This is literally a shill paper by the Ariane Group and Airbus after Falcon destroyed Ariane's commercial launch business.

[Anonymous No.11155732]

>>11155723
>2011
So, just to be clear, you think speculation from a decade ago is more conclusive proof than actually reusing rockets. You're citing an "industry outlook" paper from before the industry existed in it's current form.

Are you retarded?

>>11155728
>After
No, that's why it's funny, the paper literally predates the first orbital booster landing.

[Anonymous No.11155736]

>>11155710
I know the starting production price for a Raptor is like $2M an engine, but aren't they aiming for something like $250K an engine?

[Anonymous No.11155764]

>SLS block 1 has been delayed to "late 2021" with a very high likelihood that it'll be pushed back further to 2022
The fucking thing has been delayed every year since 2016. And it's not even the "real" SLS, which now in an absolute best case, no mistakes, stars align perfectly scenario will be ready to launch once in the year 2032, and then possibly a second time in 2034. And at the end of all that it'll still be hauling Orion, an overweight undersized piece of shit with no discernible purpose whatsoever

How does ULA even have any defenders left?

[Anonymous No.11155779]

>>11155764
Once it flies you'll all cheer like maniacs and forget all the schedule and money issues.

[Anonymous No.11155783]

>>11155764
>How does ULA even have any defenders left?
Because they are a RELIABLE and AMERICAN company who value SAFETY. Meanwhile SpaceX is a FOREIGN company who make DIRT CHEAP rockets. Can SpaceX say that their rockets are the safest in the world? I thought not. Meanwhile the SLS (pbui) has a PERFECT safety record and will maintain it.

How does SpaceX even have any defenders left?

[Anonymous No.11155788]

>>11155783
Can't kill any astronauts if you never finish your rocket

[Anonymous No.11155860]

>>11155779
Or it'll explode.

[Anonymous No.11155862]

>>11155779
Once Starship fullstack flies, SLS will be seen as a legacy dinosaur. Whoever's the next president will shut it down for being too costly. Yeah, sure congress might revive another SLS clone for moon mission and pay Boeing a trillion dollars to reach "mars" in year 3000, but that's nothing but a jobs program at this point.

[Anonymous No.11155866]

>>11155783
Found the REAL American patriot. God bless your soul!

[Anonymous No.11155930]

>>11153286

I would be a little less optimistic. Reaching Proxima Centauri or any of the two stars in the Alpha Centauri system is still unfeasible with probes. A swarm (i.e. Breakthrough Starshot) might be best, but we're still a ways off from being able to develop appropriate communications technologies for the data that they collect to be useful.

[Anonymous No.11155938]

>>11153400
Proxima b is almost certainly a dead planet. I would have a hard time imagining that it isn't tidally locked and has had its atmosphere blown off. I would think that a more Sol-like system would be visited (Tau Ceti comes to mind).

[Anonymous No.11155963]

>>11155764

[Anonymous No.11156012]

Lol, there’s people in this thread who are actually dumb enough to believe ULA builds the SLS (they build the ICPS, that’s it), if your going to insult something at least get it’s creator right...

[Anonymous No.11156065]

>>11156012
That was a single person, and they're more right than wrong, seeing as Boeing owns half of ULA. I don't have to know who your mother is in order to know that you're a twat...

[Anonymous No.11156077]

>>11155602
There is no market for helium-3 and the market for platinum is pitifully small. You would be unable to turn a profit on either.

[Anonymous No.11156079]

[Anonymous No.11156083]

>>11156065
Seethe harder for me

[Anonymous No.11156092]

>>11156083
Why would I be seething after you embarrassed yourself to the point where that is the only thing you could come up with?

[Anonymous No.11156094]

I don't know much about space, can anyone here tell me

(1) How did space research pay off its investements in the past few decades?
(2) What were the most important discoveries since 2000?
(3) Are there any legit ongoing projects to exploit space resources?

[Anonymous No.11156126]

>>11154978
If you had a non-FTL warp drive, you could probably use it to dramatically decrease the effective cross-section of a ship in the direction of travel.

[Anonymous No.11156131]

>>11155668
Harvest it from saturn. There will be fusion reactors using helium-3 for net gain within 5 years.

[Anonymous No.11156140]

>>11156131
Source

[Anonymous No.11156145]

>>11156131
Mate SPARC is the most promising one and that's a D-T reactor and is still 15 years out.

[Anonymous No.11156154]

>>11156094
I'll focus on 2 because I know that one better than the others. The two most important advances in space since 2000 imo have been studies on long term human space habitation (we can now send astronauts for multi-year trips with no bone loss, and more muscle than they left with) and reusability (yes, Shuttle was partially reusable, but Falcon and Starship are taking this to the next level). Together, these enable us to build larger stations with longer stays in 0g. The most important next step imo is studies on partial gravity – using a spin station of some description to study the long term effects of 0.3g.

[Anonymous No.11156167]

>>11156094
>(3) Are there any legit ongoing projects to exploit space resources?
I'm new to space as well and I feel like I can partially answer this one. To my knowledge, no there isn't, but we're sending people to the moon hopefully by 2024 and a LOT of people want to set up colonies to mine the Moon for its resources.

>>11156154
>(we can now send astronauts for multi-year trips with no bone loss, and more muscle than they left with)
Not him, but really? That's fucking insane.

[Anonymous No.11156176]

>>11156167
The multi year part is bullshit but yes, astronauts are coming back from extended stays on the ISS with no bone loss, all this took was the simple swapping of an excercise machine from a low weight high rep machine to a high weight low rep machine.

[Anonymous No.11156187]

>>11156176
>all this took was the simple swapping of an excercise machine from a low weight high rep machine to a high weight low rep machine.
Damn, really? Is it possible we can remain in space for multi-year trips and stay healthy?

[Anonymous No.11156192]

>>11156187
Possibly but the thing is if you are doing a multi year trip you have a big ship so you might as well spin it and save yourself the zero g bullshit.

[Anonymous No.11156208]

>>11156192
Wouldn't you still have to account for the lower gravity? because it's not like you'd be able to spin hard enough to simulate Earth gravity.

Also, wouldn't you have to figure out how to make the ship stop spinning, for landing and similar purposes?

[Anonymous No.11156286]

>>11156208
If its gonna stay orbital, then spinning perpetually is a good thing. If its landing, then we can always control the spin with reverse spin.

[Anonymous No.11156322]

>>11156208
You can absolutely spin hard enough for 1g, you just need a fairly large cylinder.
https://www.artificial-gravity.com/sw/SpinCalc/
Also, the most likely destination for a long space voyage is Mars, so you want 0.3g to allow the travellers to adapt to Martian gravity. You can do this with an 18m cylinder at 3.8rpm, which is relevant given that Elon says 18m Starship is next.

[Anonymous No.11156339]

>>11156145
ha ha that looked like a virgin/chad meme picture in the thumbnail

[Anonymous No.11156357]

>>11156208
>Wouldn't you still have to account for the lower gravity?
We have almost no low-gravity experience. In space you have to spin something large enough not to make you sick with vertigo, and there's really no way to subtract gravity for long enough to get useful info. So other than rotating space stations, we have to have a lunar or martian base just to begin to get data on how low gravity affects the human body.
It may turn out that even 0.1g is enough, or it may turn out that even 0.4 is bad for you.

[Anonymous No.11156362]

>>11156286
>landing
So, I'm reading that there's been a few rockets that have actually landed already. If we're going to Mars, how are they going to handle lift-off then?

>>11156322
>Starship
Tell me how that shit works and how it's different from other spacecraft.

[Anonymous No.11156384]

>>11156362
>how that shit works
It's a two stage rocket, where the upper stage is also a Shuttle-style crew vehicle. But unlike Shuttle, the tankage is internal. The first stage is a giant fucking N1 sized 31 engine booster, that is supposed to fly back to the launchpad like Falcon. The real party trick is orbital refueling. The Starship / Superheavy stack should be able to put ~100-150t of cargo into LEO, but if you refuel Starship in orbit, it can put 150 tonnes on the surface of Mars.

There's also going to be a cargo / satellite launch version, and a tanker for said refueling.

The advantages over Shuttle are stainless steel construction, the use of methane instead of hydrogen, orbital refueling, 100% reusability, and modern thermal protection a lot more durable than the foam and glue Shuttle used. Stainless steel requires a lot less thermal protection because it has a lot higher thermal tolerance, and it gains strength at cryogenic temperatures.

The end goal is "fuel and go" reusability. Musk wants to be able to land Starship, crane it back on top of Superheavy, refuel the stack, and launch again. This will also enable the biggest meme SpaceX is taking seriously – point to point flight on Earth. New York to Shanghai in 30 minutes by missile.

[Anonymous No.11156390]

>>11156384
The perspective of the bottoms of some of those rockets in the picture looks janky.

[Anonymous No.11156394]

>>11156362
The current state of Starship is a couple prototypes, an engine factory, and two shipyards. I say shipyards because Starship os being built out in the open like a ship. It's stainless steel construction means they can just weld the fuckers together in a field, so that's exactly what they're doing. There's two Starship Yards, one in Boca Chica and one in Florida near the Cape. Pic related is "Mk 1", the first aerodynamic testbed, supposed to fly this year to test the "skydiver" reentry configuration. Instead of gliding or flying, Starship will burn velocity by falling pike a skydiver.

Starship Mk1 is nearly complete and will hopefully fly before the end of the month. Mk2 is in progress in Florida, Mk3 and Mk4 are currently a bunch of steel rings waiting to be stacked. After Mk4 comes the first Superheavy, and that's when the first orbital flight will happen.

>>11156390
Correct, the perspective is jank but I don't have a better picture.

[Anonymous No.11156401]

>>11156384
>he Starship / Superheavy stack should be able to put ~100-150t of cargo into LEO, but if you refuel Starship in orbit, it can put 150 tonnes on the surface of Mars.
>Musk wants to be able to land Starship, crane it back on top of Superheavy, refuel the stack, and launch again. This will also enable the biggest meme SpaceX is taking seriously – point to point flight on Earth. New York to Shanghai in 30 minutes by missile.
Jesus fucking Christ why did I have to be born so late for all this shit

I mean, I'm only in my mid-20's but fuck, I wish I were born in the future for all this crazy shit.

So is this why we're thinking colonization of Mars is achievable in the next 50 years?

[Anonymous No.11156407]

>>11156394
>Tfw actually live in Florida but have only ever been to one rocket launch
I should keep up with all this shit more and make it an effort to watch these things.

[Anonymous No.11156409]

>>11156401
Musk wants to put the first private boots on Mars by 2024. He said that in 2016, and added "that's not a typo" when he said it. As far as we know, he's actually fucking holding that date, the madman. More realistically 2028-2030, but that's still within the decade on a pessimist schedule.

[Anonymous No.11156415]

>>11156401
Also, and it's up to you whether you want to believe Elon "private buyout at $420 blazeit" Musk, but he (and more importantly, Gwynne Shotwell, the unsung hero behind SpaceX, her job is to turn Elon memes into reality) thinks the marginal cost will be below $2 million per launch. The end goal is to make a ticket to Mars cheaper than a standalone house in Vancouver.

[Anonymous No.11156420]

>>11156409
That fucking soon? So this is something that could really happen in the near future?

>>11156415
>The end goal is to make a ticket to Mars cheaper than a standalone house in Vancouver.
Do you think it'll be fairly cheap to go to space by the time I'm an old man?

[Anonymous No.11156435]

>>11156420
Well, they're building the rockets right now, and SpaceX basically dominated the last Mars Society conference with calls for habitat and community designs. They're working with NASA on orbital propellant transfer and plan to fund it by launching tens of thousands of internet satellites, which they've already started doing and expect to offer service sometime next year. As long as everything keeps coming up Musk, you might still be working age (40s / early 50s) when buying a ticket becomes viable.

Or a Starship will explode with 100 people on it and the President will ban space forever. Or we'll all be dead before we can leave this god forsaken rock. Y'know. Reality is probably somewhere in the middle.

The dark horse is Blue Origin – you probably haven't heard of them, but Jeff Bezos (yes, Amazon founder, richest man in the world, etc) is also in the space game. Blue Origin moves slower, and is focused on the Moon, but has the mission statement of moving all our industry off-planet and unironically turning Earth into a nature preserve. It sounds insane, but Jeff Bezos has more money than most small countries.

[Anonymous No.11156443]

>>11156435
>Or a Starship will explode with 100 people on it and the President will ban space forever.
You know, it was a joke when it was first proposed that the US could just ban spaceflight all together.

[Anonymous No.11156451]

>>11156435
>As long as everything keeps coming up Musk, you might still be working age (40s / early 50s) when buying a ticket becomes viable.
Fucking sweet.

>Or a Starship will explode with 100 people on it and the President will ban space forever.
This is something that I'm afraid of. I've spoken to people before who seriously think we have no business going out into space (despite that it would be incredibly beneficial to the survival of the human race), who'll probably get up in arms and all emotional if a starship crashes and explodes while trying to land on Mars or some shit.

>The dark horse is Blue Origin – you probably haven't heard of them, but Jeff Bezos (yes, Amazon founder, richest man in the world, etc) is also in the space game.
I've been doing my research the past few days and yes, I've heard of Blue Origin.

>has the mission statement of moving all our industry off-planet and unironically turning Earth into a nature preserve. It sounds insane, but Jeff Bezos has more money than most small countries.
That's pretty dang crazy. I've always wondered what exactly would we do with Earth once most of its natural resources have been depleted and we've started going out and settling into space. I don't see this planet ever just becoming a nature preserve though but I do think it might become irrelevant in the far future.

[Anonymous No.11156452]

>>11156443
Thankfully, America isn't the only game in town. We don't know much about the Chinese program, because they're a closed door communist dictatorship, but the head of their space program recently came out with two exciting claims.
1. Within the next few decades, all Chinese rockets should be reusable
2. They want to declare a Special Economic Zone on the Moon.
Special Economic Zones are basically crack cocaine for capitalism. It's a plot of land where the rules don't apply and nobody pays tax. China uses them to build their economy. Shenzhen is a Special Economic Zone, and went from an empty field to a world city in about 30 years. Cheap travel to the Moon and SEZ privileges might be enough to make lunar businesses viable. Probably starting with research, but there's a lot of interesting possibilities. Plus, there's no environment on the Moon, so you can vent CFCs and radioactive waste all day.

[Anonymous No.11156462]

>>11156452
Damn, I didn't know the Chinese could be so based

[Anonymous No.11156465]

>>11156451
Also, much like Elon's long term end goal is colonization and potentially terraforming (or paraterraforming) Mars, Jeff Bezo's stated end goal is O'Neill cylinders. A spinning space station with an internal area about the size of Luxembourg. Pic related. We technically have the technology for such a thing, but it's not feasible to build them on Earth. It would however be feasible to build them on the Moon.

[Anonymous No.11156469]

>>11156451
You should absolutely watch The Expanse. It's set ~300 years in the future, with an independent Martian Congressional Republic and torch drives everywhere.

[Anonymous No.11156480]

>>11156465
>Also, much like Elon's long term end goal is colonization and potentially terraforming (or paraterraforming) Mars,
What's paraterraforming?

>Jeff Bezo's stated end goal is O'Neill cylinders.
Always loved these sorts of things since Gundam. Seeing one in Interstellar was cool as fuck too.

>We technically have the technology for such a thing, but it's not feasible to build them on Earth. It would however be feasible to build them on the Moon.
No shit? I always thought it was just something that were just a concept, nothing that would be seriously considered until we were at least out towards the Asteroid Belt.

>>11156469
Yeah, it's on my watch-list. I might get to it real soon. Honestly if it weren't for movies like Interstellar, The Martian, and Gravity, I might not have as much interest in space travel.

[Anonymous No.11156483]

>>11156145
Huge follower of ARC/SPARC/CFS, I hope they get it working. Been pretty quiet in 2019 on progress, I guess they are making a single full sized magnet for testing and continuing from there.

Tokamak Energy has good progress, but nothing amazing until the next two reactors.

First Light Fusion is a meme, but taking it seriously.

General Fusion is ultra hyper meme.

[Anonymous No.11156520]

>>11156480
Paraterraforming is covering part of all of Mars with Earth-like dome cities. It's much easier than trying to build an atmosphere, water cycle, etc.

[Anonymous No.11156522]

>>11156520
*part or all

[Anonymous No.11156525]

>>11156520
>>11156522
Ahh.

Couldn't they just do both? Inflict a long-term plan to terraform the entire planet (which of course would take centuries), while in the meantime, setting up Earth-like domes to facilitate human activity.

[Anonymous No.11156531]

>>11156525
It's an open question whether terraforming Mars is possible, and it will probably include yeeting comets at Mars for hundreds of years. Paraterraforming can start from the first colony.

[Anonymous No.11156544]

>>11154776
I vote for a really big parachute.

[Anonymous No.11156547]

>>11156531
>It's an open question whether terraforming Mars is possible, and it will probably include yeeting comets at Mars for hundreds of years. Paraterraforming can start from the first colony.
Fair enough. Couldn't we start terraforming by melting the CO2's in the polar ice caps, increasing the planet's green house effect while also magnetizing the same poles? And couldn't we introduce green algae which would increase breathable oxygen in the air as well?

[Anonymous No.11156564]

>>11156547
Magnetizing Mars is not an option, you need Dyson sphere levels of energy to restart a planetary core. The solution is a magnet at L1.

[Anonymous No.11156566]

>>11156564
>The solution is a magnet at L1.
Well couldn't that work too?

[Anonymous No.11156579]

NASA’s Inspector General revealed this week that the agency had given Boeing an extra $287.2 million for its work on the commercial crew program, designed to reduce America’s reliance on Russia for trips to the station.
>NASA is paying Boeing $90 million per seat to fly astronauts to the orbiting research lab, a cost that is 39% more than the $55 million that SpaceX will bill NASA for the same trip aboard its Crew Dragon capsule, according to the IG report released Thursday.
>The Boeing price is also about $10 million more per seat than what Russia currently charges.
I'm not even an American taxpayer yet I feel violated.

[Anonymous No.11156591]

>>11156579
That's what being a trusted contractor get you. Also, the report revealed that Boeing threatened to leave the program which what got NASA to give them more money.

Makes me wonder what would've happened if NASA called on Boeing's bluff and let them leave.

[Anonymous No.11156662]

>>11156591
They should have picked Sierra Nevada over Boeing.

[Anonymous No.11156685]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AauMjr5MKTE

[Anonymous No.11156858]

Turns out we have a real ordained focus now!

[Anonymous No.11156864]

>>11156465
And holy shit, the eventual colony pop of Sol is in the order of Qunitillions of people. That's on the order of civilizations at least tens if not hundreds of thie size of the little fiddly bits in the Star Wars galaxy, but in ONE FUCKING SOLAR SYTSTM

[Anonymous No.11156936]

>>11154776
Jump out.

[Anonymous No.11156950]

>>11156864
Isn't this how Gundam starts?

[Anonymous No.11157057]

>>11156079

[Anonymous No.11157130]

>>11153158
I think this is an extremely tough question to answer. Because you dont have aerodynamics to worry about in space designs of spacecrafts tend to be functional and a ton of unique shapes are made. Look at Starlink sats vs. Tintin. Those two look massively different.

[Anonymous No.11157137]

>>11156465
rotating cylinders are not stable, Bernal spheres would work better but some kind of space habitat is indeed more likely then colonizing dead planets

[Anonymous No.11157140]

mars soon
t.lon musk

[Anonymous No.11157144]

>>11156579
At least its 100% Made In the US of A.

[Anonymous No.11157176]

>>11156591
>let then leave
>call it a break of contract
>ask for all funds back
>drop military contracts due to attempted extortion
>laugh when Boeing begs the government for a handout to support their dying business

[Anonymous No.11157208]

>>11157176
>Boeing lobbies some politicians
>Nasa administration given an early retirement
>new leadership that is "more agreeable"
>contracts and funding reinstated
>business as usual

[Anonymous No.11157214]

>>11157208
That is a reality check I didn't need.

[Anonymous No.11157252]

>>11157176
Last time bridestine talked about falcon heavy to the moon the phone lines in nasa and his house were set on fire by deeply worried statesmen.
Committing treason by throwing a loyal defense contractor under the bus like this in an hour of need is a good way to end his career in gitmo or equivalent.

[Anonymous No.11157257]

>>11156401
>We
No only delusional american fanbois sucking corporate cock of their capitalist overlords.

If you want realistic timelines on space science look elsewhere.

[Anonymous No.11157348]

>>11157257
Why don't you post a realistic space colonization timeline instead of sperging out about capitalism? While you're at it, you should also estimate how long it would take NASA to land humans on Mars without any private industry, my estrogen abusing comrade.

[Anonymous No.11157358]

>>11156077
Perhaps the market size is so small because Platinum is so expensive

[Anonymous No.11157392]

>>11157358
It has almost no industrial applications. It's expensive because almost nobody wants it so nobody bothers mining it.

[Anonymous No.11157436]

>>11156480
>I always thought it was something that was just a concept.
Well, a lot of things we can do right now are just concepts, the real challenge of any large space habitat (O'neill cylinder, Bernal sphere, etc) is the economic expenditure of the thing, not the technological challenges. Cities are gargantuan megastructures in-and-of themselves, but to build an entirely new one is something most governments would balk at. The material properties of things like steel, kevlar, titanium, etc are more than sufficient to construct enormous space habitats.

[Anonymous No.11157498]

that november 6th starship hop was really cool

[Anonymous No.11157516]

From the Blue Origin L2 section, regarding progress on New Glenn:

>Blue is manufacturing test barrel sections for the New Glenn first stage at this time, and they have made a number of them so far.
The issue is making the barrel sections the same outside diameter, and that turns out not to be as easy as it sounds.
This is a drawn-out learning process.

>They expect to have the structure of the test first stage completed by next spring, at the same time the test cell is ready to receive it for testing.

>The first flight quality first stage, is expected to be completed late next summer, as the launch pad is expected to be completed about this time next year.

>First test flight will likely end up being NET Spring 2021.

[Anonymous No.11157518]

>>11156140
Helion Energy. Their ARPA-E program went well. They are building a full size demo reactor as we speak.

[Anonymous No.11157541]

Hayabusa 2 is leaving Ryugu today. This is the last chance to see pictures of Ryugu:
http://www.hayabusa2.jaxa.jp/en/galleries/onc/nav20191113/

[Anonymous No.11157549]

>>11157516
Interesting that New Glenn is still well on track for 2021

[Anonymous No.11157560]

>>11157549
This is a bit surprising to everyone, considering the last information we got was that they were just setting up welding equipment. Non-L2 people are gonna be really surprised when they role out the first-stage test article onto the test stand in pic related, in the near future.

[Anonymous No.11157565]

>>11157549
>>11157560
It's how Blue Origin operate, they stay quiet until they are actually flying.
The thing that would really suprise me is if they get LEO without a failure and redesign, that would be a historical first.

[Anonymous No.11157598]

>>11154426
COME ON AND SLAM

[Anonymous No.11157600]

>>11157516
>First test flight will likely end up being NET Spring 2021.
am excite

[Anonymous No.11157694]

>>11156465
Why a cylinder?

[Anonymous No.11157706]

>>11157694
Why ask basic questions about shit you can look up?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O'Neill_cylinder

[Anonymous No.11157712]

>>11157706
No, I want you to answer me. Why a cylinder?

[Anonymous No.11157714]

>>11157712
Not him, but it's because if you spin it then everything on the inside of the cylinder is pulled outwards giving a sense of gravity to anyone inside.
You could have just learned this by following the link.

[Anonymous No.11157715]

>>11157712
ok zoomer

[Anonymous No.11157717]

>>11156322
>You can absolutely spin hard enough for 1g, you just need a fairly large cylinder.

You dont even need a cylinder, just two ships connected by a tether.

[Anonymous No.11157718]

>>11157717
Sure, until you need to make course corrections.

[Anonymous No.11157720]

>>11157714
Isn't a spherical structure better off in that regard? You could also more easilly build it in stable orbit around an object, would get more space and you could go the matriorshka route(not that you couldn't with cyllinders). That's why I'm asking why cyllidenrs when spheres exist.

[Anonymous No.11157722]

>>11157717
Two starships like that would make an awesome space hotel. Would pay for a 4 week space holiday. Orbiting the moon or some shit. Drinking fine whisky at a comfy 1G, looking out at the stars from my bedroom.

[Anonymous No.11157723]

>>11157718
Nothing hard about that so long as you aren't small brain.

[Anonymous No.11157726]

>>11157723
Feel free to enlighten us by making it work in Kerbal, oh great one.

[Anonymous No.11157727]

>>11157137
>rotating cylinders are not stable

They are if they are short.

[Anonymous No.11157728]

>>11157722
>a comfy 1G
IMO space hotel companies would probably go for 0.9g or even 0.7g to make the hotel feel more comfortable by reducing stresses on the body from gravity while still being enough to prevent significant bone loss.

[Anonymous No.11157732]

>>11157720
I might be a mistaken brainlet, but I thought people on the inside of a spinning sphere would only feel 'full' gravity at the equator with the effect weakening as you go to either pole, and THAT'S why cylinders were more popular for this sort of thing.

[Anonymous No.11157733]

>>11157137
>rotating cylinders are not stable,
How?

[Anonymous No.11157742]

>>11157733
A fairly exhaustive answer can be found here
https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/90432/stabilizing-a-mckendree-cylinder-habitat

[Anonymous No.11157749]

>>11157732
I looked it up, apparently it's a problem people would have with the simulated gravity being stronger on their feet and lighter on their head which is why >>11157137 was suggested as the better alternative.

[Anonymous No.11157751]

>>11157732
>>11157749
Forgot to mention that this problem only occurs near the poles of the sphere.

[Anonymous No.11157756]

>>11157718
Just how often do you believe they would need to make a course correction on the way to Mars? If is infeasible to do this while spinning, they could just use their thrusters to reverse the spin, make the correction, and then start spinning again.

[Anonymous No.11157762]

>>11157436
>, the real challenge of any large space habitat (O'neill cylinder, Bernal sphere, etc) is the economic expenditure of the thing, not the technological challenges.
>The material properties of things like steel, kevlar, titanium, etc are more than sufficient to construct enormous space habitats.
Well, aren't there more resources of whatever we need in our asteroid belt than the same amount of what we have on Earth 3000x over? Which is a little crazy to me, but I shouldn't be so surprised, since space is fucking vast (I've only just looked at the numbers recently).

Seems to me it's a risk/reward kind of thing, with the rewards greatly outweighing the risks. We just need to not fuck up getting our asses to the Moon, Mars, and the asteroid belt, set up permanent colonies and space habitats, and start mining that shit, and we should have more than enough resources to not only replenish our needs on Earth but to go out further into space. Seems like it's a self-sustaining thing.

[Anonymous No.11157830]

>>11157392
>platinum has almost no industrial applications

[Anonymous No.11157850]

>>11157392
>It has almost no industrial applications. It's expensive because almost nobody wants it so nobody bothers mining it.
You not only show lack of knowledge but also lack of common sense. Impressive.

[Anonymous No.11157944]

>>11157712
consider a ring

now what if we make it longer

[Anonymous No.11157949]

>>11157726
>need to make course corrections
>stop spinning
>make course corrections
there would be a period of 0g and some thruster jostling, but that would take a few hours out of a several month trip

[Anonymous No.11157950]

>>11155483
>4 casualties
I know of the co-pilot who pushed the self-destruct button and I know of the technician who exposed that noone at the company knew basic chemistry. Who were the other 2?

[Anonymous No.11157954]

>>11157949
and this is assuming they dont find a way to do it while its spinning anyways.

[Anonymous No.11157958]

>>11155318
>next season
>OH BOY THE NEW GLENN! NOW THAT WAS A REAL ROCKET! JEFF BEZOS MOST IMPORTANT MAN BEFORE EPSTEIN!

[Anonymous No.11157971]

>>11157958
except we already know the plot of season 4 because the books exist and amazon has the authors writing the show

[Anonymous No.11157996]

>tincan about to be pressure tested
>no streams

[Anonymous No.11158005]

>>11157996
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DvBWI3Txqo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkPyUUOT1dg

[Anonymous No.11158010]

>>11157958
how are there not tons of expanse related jokes about how Epstein did in fact kill himself?

[Anonymous No.11158012]

>>11158005
Make pics now anons if its there after the test it might be smoother.

[Anonymous No.11158020]

>>11158012
>Starship Mk1 post-tanking tests, circa November 18th 2019

[Anonymous No.11158022]

>>11158020

[Anonymous No.11158032]

Road closure in 15 minutes.

[Anonymous No.11158045]

Also some progress at Cocoa

https://twitter.com/julia_bergeron/status/1196495171468374019

[Anonymous No.11158067]

>>11157727
What do you think about a multi-part station where several rings rotate in different directions? Like they are rotating around the same axis, just every other ring rotates opposite of the others.

[Anonymous No.11158085]

>>11158067
Sounds like overcomplicated gimmick. Just make the whole station rotate and no need for any rotating joints or seals.

[Anonymous No.11158088]

>>11158085
It is for stability though. You don't want your space station suddenly flipping.

[Anonymous No.11158108]

>>11158088
Just make it rotate on a short axis then, no need for such complicated solutions

[Anonymous No.11158110]

long NSF article on SLS

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2019/11/first-sls-core-stage-final-testing-shipment/

[Anonymous No.11158111]

>>11157996
source on what's happening today? anything interesting to watch?

[Anonymous No.11158123]

>>11158110
>“Obviously it’s just a much better environment for us,” he noted. “As you can imagine if you were here this week, 110 is pretty darn cold.”
>Although it has some air conditioning and ceiling fans, Building 110 is not environmentally controlled as a whole, and the high-temperature controls aren’t as effective when the Michoud area is under an overnight freeze warning as it was once last week. Williams said some of the final work may move from Area 47/48 to Building 110.

virgin SLS contractor vs. CHAD Starship Welder.jpg

[Anonymous No.11158124]

>>11158110
“The 5000 word Sloss Special”
Also..
>SLS core delivery date: 23rd of December

>>11158111
Just venting, their doing leak and fuelling tests.

[Anonymous No.11158130]

>>11158108
>>11158085
>complicated
Answer the question, shithead. Oh right, you doin't know anything about it. lol Fuck off then.

[Anonymous No.11158131]

>>11156579
Boeing bites back.

[Anonymous No.11158141]

>>11158131
>by people with actual experience in the domain
top tier shitposting

[Anonymous No.11158142]

>>11158131
>Boeing will fly the equivalent of a fifth passenger in cargo for NASA, so the per-seat pricing be considered based on dive seats rather than four.
Isn't the cargo capacity what SpaceX can do to? So their prices should be adjusted accordingly?

[Anonymous No.11158149]

>>11158131
>the virgin splashdown vs the chad airbag lithobrake

[Anonymous No.11158150]

>>11157392
Of the 218 tonnes of platinum sold in 2014, 98 tonnes were used for vehicle emissions control devices (45%), 74.7 tonnes for jewelry (34%), 20.0 tonnes for chemical production and petroleum refining (9.2%), and 5.85 tonnes for electrical applications such as hard disk drives (2.7%). The remaining 28.9 tonnes went to various other minor applications, such as medicine and biomedicine, glassmaking equipment, investment, electrodes, anticancer drugs, oxygen sensors, spark plugs and turbine engines.

> Almost no industrial applications

[Anonymous No.11158166]

>>11158142
SpaceX didn't get the chance to ask that from NASA cause Elon is a shit businessman. He doesn't know how to wring money out of NASA and just keeps to the prices stated in the contract! Heck, SpaceX even invested their own money into Crew Dragon and didn't ask NASA to compensate them.

[Anonymous No.11158181]

>>11158166
Commercial cargo 2 pricing indicates he's learning at least.

[Anonymous No.11158188]

>>11158131
Can't Crew Dragon squeeze in seven astronauts if you want?

[Anonymous No.11158189]

>>11158131
>>11158166
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/11/18/boeing-faced-only-limited-safety-review-nasa-while-spacex-got-full-examination/

>When NASA confirmed last year that it would conduct a safety review of SpaceX and Boeing, the two companies it had hired to fly astronauts to the International Space Station, a top agency official said it would be “pretty invasive,” involving hundreds of interviews with employees at every level of the companies at multiple locations.

>Such an in-depth probe of the corporate cultures would be time consuming and expensive, requiring modifications to the contracts awarded to the companies. Ultimately, NASA agreed to pay SpaceX $5 million for its review, and it proceeded.

>Boeing, however, said such a review would require an additional payment of about $25 million, according to a person familiar with the negotiations. NASA balked at the cost and decided that a far more limited paper audit would suffice, along with a few interviews of key personnel, according to four agency and industry officials familiar with the matter.

>NASA officials were more concerned about SpaceX, a relative newcomer founded by Musk in 2002, than they were about Boeing, which had worked alongside NASA since the dawn of the Space Age and had been a key partner of the federal government for even longer. “Boeing didn’t do anything to trigger a deeper dive,” said one official not authorized to speak publicly about internal deliberations.

SOMEBODY STOP THIS COMPANY OF MADLADS!

[Anonymous No.11158191]

>>11158189
lol

[Anonymous No.11158193]

>>11158189
USA USA USA

[Anonymous No.11158204]

>>11158131
>Boeing bites back.
You mean Boeing eats more shit and is incapable of doing basic math.
>so the-seat pricing should be consider based on five seats rather than four
Okay. 55x5=275. 90x5=450. So if Dragon had an extra seat, Boeing would still be 175 million more expensive per flight. For that price, SpaceX could bring over 100,000 kg to the ISS, far more than whatever cargo could fit in Starliner.

This only makes them look worse, along with their attempt to throw shade at SpaceX. Fuck this company, the world would be better off if they never existed.

[Anonymous No.11158219]

>>11158189
Third worlder here. Reminds me how a place I worked in (food industry) was closed after incessant, sometimes daily, sanitation inspections despite our competitor next door literally having rotting carcasses in and outside. In fact few times they blamed us for that and claimed the smell might attract insects. Boss did pay us more than what was accepted norm in the industry and it was quite nice place to work in so that might explain things. Glad to see the united states is changing into something resembling the average country on Earth.

[Anonymous No.11158225]

>>11158189
>Boeing are accused of bribing powerful politicians millions and smuggling underage sex slaves to them in return for political favours.
>The federal government decides to investigate these serious allegations.
>Boeing agreed to comply with the investigation, quoting the federal government $1.8 billion to complete the investigation.
>The federal government thinks this is a little high and decides to go for a minor investigation instead for only $800 million, where they have enough money to ask Boeing executives if they did anything bad or not.
>The executives say they totally did nothing wrong and the investigation concludes clearing Boeing of all charges.

[Anonymous No.11158236]

>>11158204
Could Dragon have an extra seat just as easy as Starliner?

[Anonymous No.11158238]

>>11158204
Absolutely traitorous post.

[Anonymous No.11158241]

>>11158219
What country?

[Anonymous No.11158278]

>>11158189
RUD to Boeing executives

[Anonymous No.11158282]

>>11158241
Ex-soviet heavenhole.
I did end up moving westward and what power I have through voting I use against suspected authoritarians and the left but most of my ex countrymen and other immigrants seem quite keen to recreate heaven if given the slightest chance. Maybe that's the natural state of human society. I hope I'm wrong.

[Anonymous No.11158289]

>>11158236
At one point Crew Dragon 2 had seven seats. I'm not sure, but I'm assuming NASA imposes the limit on how many they can take or they need more room for cargo, but it would make more sense to launch a separate SpaceX Commercial Resupply mission than to use Starliner. SpaceX charges around 150 million for a CRS mission.

[Anonymous No.11158296]

>>11158278
>U

[Anonymous No.11158307]

>>11158289
It must feel pretty demoralising working at boeing. Reading these bullshitty press releases.

[Anonymous No.11158322]

>>11158225
Source?

[Anonymous No.11158323]

>jettisoning debris shields
It's District 9 all over again

[Anonymous No.11158335]

>>11158322
it's just a joke.

Or maybe it's a story that just hasn't happened yet..

[Anonymous No.11158336]

>>11158307
Considering their going to be launching Starliner OFT and delivering the first SLS core-stage in December, it wouldn’t bother me that much if I was in their place. I’d probably just be more motivated to get stuff done...

[Anonymous No.11158343]

>>11158150
>98 tonnes were used for vehicle emissions control devices (45%),
Of course by the time you could find some Pt on an asteroid and bring it back, EVs will have taken over and catalytic converters would be in decline.

[Anonymous No.11158356]

>>11158307
I'm not sure if they care. As much as they would like to beat other companies as a point of pride, for most of their employees, it's just a cushy job for them. I imagine that the more passionate employees went to over new space companies where they can get more done without the red tape and corruption.

Meanwhile at SpaceX, the pay isn't that great and they'll work you to death. This has the advantage of retaining employees that actually want to be there instead of those who want to get paid for doing nothing, but they still have the problem of people who just want to get it on their resume before jumping ship to another company after a year.

[Anonymous No.11158417]

https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/new-companies-join-growing-ranks-of-nasa-partners-for-artemis-program


NEW COMPANIES JOIN GROWING RANKS OF NASA PARTNERS FOR ARTEMIS PROGRAM:

>NASA has added five American companies to the pool of vendors that will be eligible to bid on proposals to provide deliveries to the surface of the Moon through the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative.

>The selected companies are:

Blue Origin
Ceres Robotics
Sierra Nevada Corporation
SpaceX
Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems Inc

>In July, NASA announced an opportunity for American companies to propose lunar landers that can deliver heavier payloads to the surface of the Moon. These five companies, together with nine companies selected in November 2018, now are eligible to bid on launch and delivery services to the lunar surface. NASA already has awarded contracts to two vendors to send as many as 14 science payloads to the Moon in 2021 and expects to issue additional payload delivery orders.

>Future payloads could include rovers, power sources, science experiments – including the agency’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) – and technology demonstrations to be infused into the Artemis program. NASA expects to issue a regular series of task order proposal requests to expand the scope of agency payloads requiring transportation services to the lunar surface ahead of human exploration.

>The CLPS contracts are indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contracts with a combined maximum contract value of $2.6 billion through November 2028. The agency will look at a number of factors when comparing the bids from all vendors, such as technical feasibility, price and schedule.

[Anonymous No.11158432]

>>11158343
I'm not an economist, but I'd imagine if it were dirt cheap there'd be all kinds of novel applications discovered. Sometimes that seems to be the way in the chemicals business from what I've read, i.e. 'we've got this massive stack of unusable by-product x from production of in-demand commodity y, how tf can we turn x into something we can sell'

[Anonymous No.11158443]

>>11153316
Then the AI bugs out some thousands of years after we sent it flying and we get "oops! All nanobots!" Nightmare scenario

[Anonymous No.11158523]

>>11158417
So SpaceX bid a "lander" proposal that can pretty much carry all other four competing landers?

[Anonymous No.11158532]

>>11158188
Yes, but it's a moot point. NASA doesn't have enough active astronauts like they used to during thr shuttle days. And not enough space on the ISS anyway to house them for an expedition.

[Anonymous No.11158536]

>>11158523
Probably not, considering the door on the render doesn’t look big enough.

[Anonymous No.11158539]

>>11155124
tethers can be used to boost a rocket going suborbital to orbit. Oh and on Earth tethers can be reboosted without using propellant by reacting against Earth's magnetic field.

[Anonymous No.11158546]

>>11158536
Just tape the ones that don't fit inside on the top.

[Anonymous No.11158553]

Lol, Blue Origin won their protest against the Airforce over the NSSF Phase 2 RFP, despite never launching an orbital rocket....

[Anonymous No.11158562]

>>11158536
And as per the CLPS call, Starship on the moon by 2022. Shotwell time, not Elon time.

[Anonymous No.11158572]

>>11158562
>Shotwell time, not Elon time.

There’s no difference these days, she’s just parroting his timelines. It’s quite a recent and unwelcome change.

[Anonymous No.11158579]

>>11158417
Reality is a strange thing sometimes.

[Anonymous No.11158583]

>>11158562
>>11158572
The smartest reply to the question about dates was Blue Origin’s: “We’ll launch when we’re ready”. You can’t be judged for missing deadlines, when you don’t publicly disclose them!

[Anonymous No.11158588]

>>11158553
Jeff is damn skilled at giving bribes

[Anonymous No.11158670]

Some very pretty recovery hardware on the upgraded Electron first-stage.

[Anonymous No.11158689]

>>11158417
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rxd8gT5oZHU


>SpaceX Starship
>Blue Origin Blue Moon
>Ceres Robotics
>Sierrra Nevada
>Tyvak

All of them will LAND on Moon. We'll need a size comparison soon.

[Anonymous No.11158716]

>>11158536

[Anonymous No.11158720]

>>11158689
>We'll need a size comparison soon.

There’s not enough information about most the submissions to do that, we only know how big Blue Moon and SS are, due to an IAC mock-up and two crumpled cans.

[Anonymous No.11158724]

>>11158716
Big dick vs small balls

[Anonymous No.11158748]

>>11158670
When's the first flight that they'll test recovery?

[Anonymous No.11158773]

How many female astronauts were mothers at the time of (any of) their missions?

A cursory check of bio pages suggests Naoko Yamazaki as one possible example, but the birth dates of her children are unclear.

[Anonymous No.11158788]

>>11158773
She had her child in 2002, during training.

[Anonymous No.11158789]

>>11158417
>SpaceX joins
>I flew all the way here to laugh at you

[Anonymous No.11158877]

>>11158432
But no matter what, those "novel applications" need the lower price before they can exist, so you still won't be getting the original price.

[Anonymous No.11158893]

>>11158773
Out of curiosity, why are you asking this?

[Anonymous No.11158935]

>>11158553
kek

>>11158893
He wants to know about the jello babies of course.

[Anonymous No.11158943]

>Shotwell: "We're aiming to be able to drop Starship on the lunar surface by 2022."

How much elon-time does Shotwell factor in her estimates?

[Anonymous No.11158963]

>Get RPA
>Try to enable film cooling
>No guide on that
>Fights errors and unspecified "out of bound parameters"
>"No thermal table available for coolant, pick another"
>Picks another coolant
>It doesn't prevent the rocket engine from melting
>mrw

[Anonymous No.11158993]

>>11158417
>>11158523
ABSOLUTE MADMAN! They actually did it! Here I was thinking that the CLPS program had mass and size restrictions that would have prevented SpaceX from bidding Starship, but THEY ACTUALLY DID ANYWAY!

[Anonymous No.11159013]

>>11155131
BULLSHIT, acceleration can be a reasonable 0.9 g. Here's a study on going suborbital to orbital using tethers:
http://www.niac.usra.edu/files/studies/final_report/391Grant.pdf

[Anonymous No.11159015]

>>11158943
Depends, if they can do few dozen orbital runs by 2021, they should be able to do lunar by 2022.

>mid-late 2020
Orbital fullstack starship.

>2021
Bunch of starlink launches
Perfecting landing/orbital refueling

>2022
Bunch of starlinks
Moon cargo
Mars cargo

[Anonymous No.11159113]

>>11158150
>218 tonnes annual
>almost no industrial applications
Checks out

[Anonymous No.11159130]

looks like the first round of Mk1 testing went well

[Anonymous No.11159180]

>>11155131
>acceleration isn't real

[Anonymous No.11159190]

>>11159180
Acceleration is a hoax by Big Sensor to sell accelerometers. Everything actually instantly jumps to a given velocity in discrete steps that are too small to be perceived by the unaided eye.

Do your research.

[Anonymous No.11159201]

>>11159130
Anything specific? What were they testing exactly?

[Anonymous No.11159410]

>>11157733
There's a video somewhere of a guy on teh ISS unscrewing something. When the screwcomes out it keeps spinning in place like a cylinder, until it suddenly flips over due to some weird gyroscopic forces.
-
Actually it was teh whole screwdriver.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n-HMSCDYtM

[Anonymous No.11159429]

>>11158131
>SpaceX was clearly in the lead on CCP development, so we needed more money to catch up.
Also
>SpaceX has no actual experience in this domain.
Wait what!??

[Anonymous No.11159431]

>>11158343
I think that's one of the reasons fuel cell cars were pushed for a while, because they would still require loads of pgm catalysts for the cells.

[Anonymous No.11159432]

>>11158417
SNC's lander is kinda cute

[Anonymous No.11159433]

>>11159429
Have to cover all your bases.
I swear if they could submit randomly generated strings of infinite length they would just so they can point to line on a paper saying this is exactly what they're talking about.

[Anonymous No.11159436]

>>11158546
Bungie cords.

[Anonymous No.11159503]

>>11159410
That's fucking crazy. It spins for a while, then flips, then gyroscopic forces cause it to lock along the same axis for a while before it flips again and repeats.

[Anonymous No.11159561]

>>11159410
This is a good explanation. Apparently it's easier to understand from the rotating frame of reference. It's still fucking crazy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VPfZ_XzisU

[Anonymous No.11159880]

>>11158748
The next launch on November 25th is apparently testing everything up to deploying the chute, so will be cool to see if the stage can survive reentry.

>>11157565
Speaking of Rocket Lab, I'll never not be mad the only reason they didn't meet this milestone was because the third-party range safety telemetry fucked out.

[Anonymous No.11159911]

The Government's demands were clear even if not written.

Traditional lander design is demanded.

Spacex did not listen and they will pay a dear price for provoking the Powers.

[Anonymous No.11159925]

>>11159880
No way it's surviving re entry imo, it's just such a tiny flimsy little thing made of carbon fibre I can't see it happening at all. If it does then great but I will remain sceptical.

[Anonymous No.11160132]

>you will never crack the tip of a Montecristo on the shore of Butane Bay courtesy of the Kraken Mare Gentleman's Club and LUG

[Anonymous No.11160196]

>>11159911
>SpaceX needs to read minds in order to get goverment contract
Well if Neuralink is what it claims to be they are on the right track.