/sci/ - Science & Math

>>9817736
>>9817735
You had one job

nigger I made the thread first, no fair

>>9817746
really tho, can people not search the catalog nowadays

>>9817746
>>9817749
yeah sorry, overlooked it.
Delete this thread mods, please.

>>9817746
hold on
>literally one post off from one another
lmao

>>9817754
yeah, your right, and lets be honest, this is /sci/ normaly we dont have this much attention for one thread.
Lets just be happy that there is more than one guy that wants to keep it alive.

>>9817761
aye

>>9817737
How is life support supposed to work on this thing? Has there been any research into closed ecological systems? Or is it all just scrubbers and stored O2.

>>9817776
Pretty much the setup of what ISS has right now.
And this as back up probably:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_oxygen_generator#Uses

>>9817776
same way it works on the ISS, MIR, shuttle, SkyLab, and Soyuz. You have ins and outs. Some of those outs go back to ins. The life support for BFR is the least of my worries

HAHAHA LE EBIN BIG FUCKING ROCKET
>I.JUST.LOVE.SCIENCE!
SCIENCE BITCHES!

AHAHA ELON MUSKKKKKK <333

so fucking reddit

>>9817877
go away Tory

Your realistic timeline?

>>9817884
San Pedro will be built quicker than expected. suborbital hops with BFR next year. They'll lose a test article (or two). Come late 2020, first BFB rolls out. Will be lots of issues with BFR-BFB integration. GSE delays everywhere. First successful orbital test 2022. People onboard 2023 (they will be testing just BFR with humans all the while). One launch per week cadence by 2024. F9 fully phased out 2028

it's going to be fascinating when Mars is a growing outpost to see how the politics and culture develops. If Elon's beliefs are anything to be considered, then early Mars will be a Heinlein-esque utopia. What do you think?

>>9817946
>What do you think?
I think that Musk doesn't have the electricity to make rocket fuel on Mars and he is totally underestimating the amount of supplies even 6 people are going to need.

>tldr: There will be no Mars colony.

>>9817737
ITS != BFR
BFR is 9m diameter with 31 engines on the booster and 7 on the ship

>>9817950
Do you have some math to back your statement?

>>9817950
Also, you don't *need* to make rocket fuel if it's a colony

>>9818207
To be fair to him the prime discussion of the last thread was if they had enough power to refuel their rocket in a rough 1 year timescale. Generally we concluded they would lack the power although there was some belief that it could be done given another BFR of power generation supplies which to be fair is quite reasonable given the plan includes a minimum of 6 BFR (4 cargo, 2 crew) rockets to start the colony.


>>9818210
The idea of creating rocket fuel is quite elegant. Seeing as Musk's goal is to have his reusable rockets travelling back and forth with colonists and supplies constantly reinforcing the colony. Which is only possible by refuelling them on mars.

If that ain't possible, then suddenly the colony becomes far more expensive to set up and reinforce as he loses not only the invested colony supplies and such but the rockets and all the "for-profit" missions they could be bringing him back at earth had he not sent it.

>>9818210
Good luck finding well rounded sane people with high degree science&engineering degrees who want to go on a one way trip to mars.

>>9818424
>good luck finding well rounded sane people with educations to colonize the new world

>>9818489
Educated people didn't go to the new world, it was convicts and religious nutters.

>>9818207
Calculate how much electricity you need to warm ice to liquid water, calculate how much electricity you need to filter all that water from carbon etc., calculate how much electricity you need to synthesize hydrogen, calculate how much electricity you need to synthesize methane out of hydrogen, then how much you need to lquify the methane, then how much electricity you need to filter and lquify oxygen, and then consider that you need around 100 ton of liquid methan and 200 tons of lquid oxygen for a return trip, and you need to produce that within 1,5 years, and you end up with energy requirements equal to the output of a small nuclear power plant.

>>9818545
There is no basic incompatibility with belonging tp either of those groups and being an educated person.

>>9818553

>and you end up with energy requirements equal to the output of a small nuclear power plant.

No, calculate all that and you end up with 1-2 MW. This amount of solar panels should easily fit onto BFS.

>>9818489
They literally didn't though, which is why they had to mass-import slaves. An immigration boom to the new world only happened after the industrial revolution when the population growth exploded. The only regions with exploding populations right now are in Africa, so have fun with your african colonisers.

>>9818616
Lol, no. Just synthesizing 1kg hydrogen out of 10 litres of water takes around 50Kwh. And you need around 200 tons at least. So just synthesizing hydrogen out of water will need around 10GWh. And that is by far not the only energy-intensive process. All in all you will definetely need something in the range of >500GWh annual output. That's completely impossible to put on Mars.

>>9818631

>So just synthesizing hydrogen out of water will need around 10GWh. And that is by far not the only energy-intensive process.

Water electrolysis is certainly the most energy intensive process. All the other processes are significantly less energy intensive, and methane synthesis is actually exothermic. You need only ~low tens of GWh to refuel a BFS. Your >500 GWh number is nonsense. Read some Zubrin, please. Even Mueller has explicitly stated that they "need a megawatt". You can cram several megawatts of solar panels into a single BFS. Power is a concern but not a showstopper for BRR Mars mission.

>>9817946
>>9817736
Did anyone knew about the whole Von Braun Elon thing he is the choosen one

>>9818655

>>9818647
To produce 200 tons of hydrogen, you need around 2000 tons of water, to produce 2000 tons of water, you need to drill around 8000 tons of mars ice (assuming an average water content of 25%). The energy requirements to drill, transport, heat and filter all that ice are way bigger than synthesizing the hydrogen.

Also, 1MW of solar panels will produce around 13GWh in 1,5 years on Mars, so it will barely meet the energy requirements for the hydrogen synthesizing alone, let alone all the other production steps.

Also note that all this would only be enough for one single return trip of an empty BFS every 1,5 years. To actually return humans with all the required life support, you need much more.

>>9818631
>>9818647

much smarter people than in this thread have already calculated in detail how much energy and mass you need for this

To refuel a BFR on Mars you need:

~10 GWh of energy (3.8 GWh to mine the water, 5.5 GWh to electrolyse it, rest for cryogenics and Sabatier)

600 Earth days

65 tons of solar panels, 28 tons of other equipment (mostly mining, cryogenics)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dg_EWTdrzwTITDlLsh4stYzgUDA52z6u9GLXMs1uN_U/edit#gid=1431088437

>>9818660
With 5,5 GWh, you can synthesize pretty much 110 ton of hydrogen. They are dreming.

And drilling, transporting, heating and filtering 10 kilotons of material with just 3,8GWh is even more laughable.

>>9818666
>With 5,5 GWh, you can synthesize pretty much 110 ton of hydrogen.

You forgot that they are making methane, not hydrogen. You need only ~100 tons of hydrogen to make 240 tons of methane. Again, much smarter people have already calculated this in detail. It is feasible.

>>9818670
And to just transport 1 ton for 1km you already need ~5KWh. To transport 10.000 tons 1km you will need 50GWh.

Drilling though will be the most energy intensive process, you'll need around 200-300GWh depending on how deep it goes and so on.

a note about water:
- you need 240t of fuel to direct-return to Earth
- methane is 25% hydrogen by mass
- water is 11% hydrogen by mass
therefore: you need to acquire 550 tons of water, assuming perfect conversion

550 tons is a lot.

>>9818680

>Water mining efficiency (kWh/kg H2O) Sanders (2010) says 6.6kWh/kg for 8% water in soil and 13.9 for 3% water. HabNet says 7 and 12.2. Values for ice deposits will probably be much lower

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dg_EWTdrzwTITDlLsh4stYzgUDA52z6u9GLXMs1uN_U/edit#gid=1431088437

>>9818680
Also note that all this setup would only enable ONE return trip every 1,5 years. Solar panels need replacement every 20 years, the drills and filters will break and so on. So let's give the facilities a lifetime of 20 years. You would be able to do ~14 return trips of empty BFSesover 20 years. So this whole think is a. not pracitcal and b. wouldn't really make a lot of sense from an economic point of view. Setting all this up to have 14 return trips over 20 years isn't worth it.

>>9818696
why not, if the marginal cost of a BFR flight is 8 million dollars? the huge quantities of flights shouldn't be considered an issue, I think. There are other bigger problems to consider

>>9818696

14 return trips is practical as fuck. That is over 2000 tons of cargo landed on Mars surface. More than enough to build several new refueling plants and all kinds of infrastructure.

>>9818696

>So let's give the facilities a lifetime of 20 years.

They are not going to disintegrate into dust after 20 years. Chances are you will have to change some parts but not all of it. Just like chemical plants on Earth.

>>9817736
When are the missions planned is it still 2022 for cargo, how long until crewed

>>9818719
the firmest schedule we know right now is suborbital BFR hops next year. That's it

>>9818704
solar panels have lost most of their efficiency after 20 years, drills and filters will be broken long before that.

>>9818720
This thing is really gonna be built by next year?

>>9818701
I dont know what the BFS is projected to cost, but let's say 100 million, then what you are looking at is saving 1,4 billion over 20 years, or 70 million a year. Not really worth it. Probably even less than that, since what is returning is a used BFS that will probably need some refurbishment.

The r&d cost for having mars-specific drills and filters and so on will be way more than that.

good collection of mars info related to windows, dV, etc https://smartech.gatech.edu/bitstream/handle/1853/14747/HumanMarsMissionTrajectories.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

>>9818724
what? high quality panels work fine after long periods of time. Sure, you might lose 15% efficiency, but they're still going to produce electricity just fine

>>9818729
it's being built right now, so I'd say yes

>>9818696

>Solar panels need replacement every 20 years

False. Modern solar panels lose efficiency at around 1% per year. So their power output will decrease somewhat but will be far from zero/ Also safe to say that solar panels going to Mars will be designed as durable as possible and to last for more than 20 years. ISS solar panels are still going strong and so are Opportunity panels.

>>9818732

>I dont know what the BFS is projected to cost, but let's say 100 million

More like 200-300 million. Comparable to Boeing 787,not an expendable rocket. Maybe a lot more.

>>9818736
the direct cost to SpaceX of building a new Falcon 9, 1st + 2nd stage, is 30 million. BFR is what, 3x the size, with some fancy composite materials? I don't think each BFR will cost more than 150mil. Super cheap.

>>9818693
Your maths is objectively wrong but my post explaining it is being blocked because 4chan thinks it is spam. You are over by 10.8904 tonnes.

https://www.businessinsider.nl/nasa-nuclear-reactor-kilopower-how-it-works-2018-5/?international=true&r=US

another nasa moneysink or a good solution for a future mars/moon base?

>>9818698
>why not, if the marginal cost of a BFR flight is 8 million dollars?
If you leave the cargo crafts there, the price goes up A LOT. Also I suppose a craft that flew to mars and stayed on its surface for at least a year will probably not be in that great of a shape, so it's not like they're gonna use a Mars ship for launching sattellites daily right after it comes back from Mars.
7 million per launch is for a craft that actually gets rapidly reused. Not one you send to Mars and back over the course 2 years +++

>>9818917
>stayed on its surface for at least a year will probably not be in that great of a shape,
i dont see why that should be a problem for a dormant craft that landed on the surface.
Just look at the Opportunity rover, even if it never recovers from the sandstorm it still had a 14 year carreer on mars
>a machine full of moving parts
>exposed to the elements of mars
>going way beyond its design
>up until the sandstorm everything worked as when it first landed.

And when the duststorm is over it probably will just reactivate and load up its battery's and go for another few years until it gets stuck in some ditch.

What would happen if you put a block of concrete or a tank in front of it?

>>9817946
Posting what he said on twitter.

I don't think he has this very well fleshed out so far, for me it would be either a direct democracy provided average IQ is like 130 or something like the Singapore Model.

It is going to be interesting to see how it develops, my biggest nightmare is a democracy like today, rather have the Chinese model, compare the rates of the construction of the subways in china vs the New York subway system, in 15 years china built 13 bigger subways than the NY subway yet NY one looks almost identical since it was constructed.

I'm really sad with the current state of "democracy", almost all Chinese government is made of STEM students with an average IQ of 120 compared to 110 avg with non stem degrees in the US for example (study I read a while ago.)

I don't know.. I hope we can finally have true freedom in mars, I think the Singapore model + Direct democracy + Average IQ of 120 would be ideal, but what do I know.

>>9818655

spooky asf

>>9818987
So how many setlers should mars have before they start some kind of goverment?
And with setlers i mean people who live there and will raise a family there and die there.
a thousand? a million?
Or when the colony is truly self sustaining?

>>9818996
they'll have a pseudo government the moment they arrive, since they'll need some way of organizing and directing workflow
when it comes down to it, it wont be any different from a regular government

>>9818996
two. And I say that seriously.
There was a legit mutiny on SkyLab, and that was only three astronauts. With any space activities, you'll have schedules, timelines, goals, a very rigid human-controlling system to maximize safety and mission success, all of that stuff. There will always be regulations, rules, and consequences. That's a government, more or less.

>>9819013
well i can imagine that there will be at some point a moment where there will be more manual labor jobs on mars then scientific ones when industrialization takes off.
There will have to be unions too then at that point.

>>9819014
well, they learned a lot from the skylab incident.
But two is a bit low i think.

>>9818987

>>9819047
spooky as fuck

>>9818214
>given the plan includes a minimum
It was 2 supply rockets and 1 crew ship, unless they changed it recently, hence it not being able to be done. Nothing suggests they needed an entire rocket of solar panels which is our conclusion.

>It's hard so we shouldn't do it
>We need to fix our problems on Earth first

>>9819078
There is benefit in waiting. Just think of drones. Any Mars colony now would use them heavily. Just two decades ago no one would have thought that.

Autonomous vehicles and robotic farming will greatly help and Mars colony and they need more time.

>>9819088
>just assdrag and push it further away until you never do it at all
NASA please go and stay go

>>9819088
So we have to wait until an arbitrary decision that we have enough technology? I agree more tech would be useful, fusion is coming pretty close, along with several other technologies like lab grown meat and solid state batteries, however these are nice to haves, not need to haves. Autonomous farming is already well enough advanced for a Mars colony, especially given that they will have stacks of indoor grows rather than open fields. Look up farmbot, this was thrown together by some dudes in their fucking backyard, mount 10 of these on sets of rails 500m long and you are good to go.

>>9819179
>rails 500m long
Now time to build half kilometer long Mars buildings.

>>9819088
You're right. The question now, more than ever before, is whether going to Mars a few decades sooner is worth the potential loss in human life when we could probably do those missions entirely autonomously in the near future. The are no "correct" answers to that question, it's a matter of personal preference. Fortunately we (or rather pesky gubernment officials) don't have to answer it ourselves, Elon is quite intent on doing it all by himself.

r8 my plan

>have Elon Musk set up Mars colony
>set up spaceport, refueling infrastructure, and material refining shit on Mars
>launch drones from Mars to the asteroid belt
>have drones latch onto platinum group asteroids and deliver them to Mars
>refine them at the Mars colony
>send the precious metals back to earth
>use all of the Palladium to make more iPads so that the next generation of children will be too stupid to set up something like a Mars colony

>>9819292
>What are lava tubes

Literally premade habitats kilometers long, they just have to have any cracks sealed and then pressurised for acres and acres of living space.

>>9819539
there will always be enough brain to go around. The dumbos can just be sent to the borloi farms

>>9819637
>lava tubes
monorail

monorail!

>>9819637
>kilometers long
>have to seal all of the cracks to 1 atm pressure before you can use any of it

You'd probably be better off bringing a small tunnel boring machine

>>9819735
if only Elon was working on such a..... oh wait

>>9819743
All according to keikaku.

>>9819539
my 2 year old knows all his letters, has a pretty firm grasp on the idea of a base 10 number system, and can spell/sound out three letter words. this is almost entirely due to his tablet, which he can pretty much fully manipulate. we try to keep it to only a few hours a day, but he's still hearing the abc song x1000 and going through dozens of word building videos.

i'm really conflicted about this technology thing.

>>9819749
If properly used, any piece of technology will generally improve the capabilities of a human in some regard. Allowing easy access to audio-visual information in an easily understood format that can be intuitively controlled? Very useful.


The problem is that they are all too frequently and easily misused. Just try to ensure your child maintains an interest in reading or other such things and they'll be fine.

>>9819749
Anything that children have, that is better than what I had as a child, is immoral.

>>9819735
>>9819743
Let me ask you a simple question. What supports tunnel boring machine walls? Concrete I'm sure pops in your head. Good at least we know it still works. Well see if we are going to need a giant drill that takes a power plant to run to make a tunnel that is supported by concrete on all sides, then WHY THE FUCK DON'T WE USE THE CONCRETE TO MAKE A BUILDING

>>9819758
On Mars, you can support tunnel walls with air.

I'm not sure if 15 PSI is enough to keep shit from collapsing. It would be really convenient if it was.

>>9818987
cringed unconciously

>>9819749
when I was a kid I played educational games allll the fucking time. I think it benefited my development bretty well

>>9819758
lots of reasons, but it's irrelevant to list them since the internal tunnel support issue on mars (or the moon) isn't an issue to begin with

t. a bucket of research that I did a while ago

>>9817946
>>9817950
>>9818214
>>9818987
>>9819047
LE me guess... You bought the Mars One meme too
hahahaha

>>9819772
huh?

>>9819762
>>9819766
Tunnel support is a major reason. For one the weight of a tunnel boring machine would damage it without supports.

>>9819776
>For one the weight of a tunnel boring machine would damage it without supports

I'm trying to get my head around this statement.

How is the weight of a TBM, which falls on the solid rock at the bottom of the tunnel, going to be a problem for the tunnel itself.

It's like saying that "this basement can't handle that heavy grand piano"

The load is transmitted directly into the ground. There is nothing to break.

>>9819780
exactly. we've known how to tunnel on the moon and mars for decades. It's pretty straightforward, despite how irreducible the processes and ideas seem to be.

here, have some light reading https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19890008382.pdf

>>9819774
it is not gonna happend. Mars one was a scam that said like in 2013 they would be in mars by 2018- google it

>>9819819
yeah no shit, no one fell for that back then. why are you comparing SpaceX vs mars one? lmao

>>9819823
/sci/'s idol did though he even started uploading videos for that https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tny2J2uzdt4
my point is it is not possible in the near future

>>9819179
farm.bot, right? Each one costs $3700? And that for one bed sized land? Why do they expect anyone to buy it? Can i easily remove it and shift it to another land?

>>9819078
Running away to Mars because liberalist degeneracy is destroying Earth is no solution
The liberalist insanity will just follow people to Mars

This idea of Mars or space colonization is a fucking joke, we currently have an imploding population.... Why would we need to colonize anywhere?

>>9819749
Definitely spend effort shoring up his ability to concentrate on long, boring tasks. Overstimulation from electronics as a child is a surefire path to ADHD.

>>9819074
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcVpMJp9Th4

Musk states it in this but I can't remember where.

>>9819088
If a mars colony is set up sooner however, not only do we get access to scientific data that we might otherwise lack (enabling faster and potentially otherwise unconsidered improvements) but we get more familiarity with the problems of martian living.

Plus, if manufacturing can be set up on mars then such machines could be produced on site to augment any existing population in their daily struggles rather than being the first wave.

>>9819924
>Running away to Mars because liberalist degeneracy is destroying Earth is no solution
It is a solution to the possibility that the entirety of humanity could be lost to such ideals. By providing an entire planet for people to spread out across and develop into new nations with new identities and ethos.

>The liberalist insanity will just follow people to Mars
Potentially but the fact is unless you are really interested in space and / or really qualified, you ain't going in the first few waves of colonisation until shit is set up. At first it's seemingly all going to be Musk's employees and anyone with a fat wad of cash.

>we currently have an imploding population.... Why would we need to colonise anywhere?
Population implosion has many causes. Martian colonisation is neither an attempt to solve that nor heavily effected by this fact given mars avoids many of the potential problems.

>>9819957
Here you go.

>>9819975
Thanks.


So aye, the plan calls for a minimum of 2 cargo rockets in 2022 (35:07) followed by 2 cargo and 2 crew rockets in 2024 (36:44). Rather interestingly, this implies Musk is considering sending more rockets than this minimum before 2024 which would greatly increase the viability of the colony based off of what we have discussed.

>>9819888
Oh yeah it's a total rip off for sure, but to be fair it is all open source and they have part lists and everything, not expensive really. Half of the cost of a large version of this is long ass tracks and wires, so instead you put the gantry on a set of wheels and put a battery on it. It's a proof of concept that hey look robotic farming is here right now

>>9818987
You people are completely deluded. Direct democracy on Mars lol.

Mars makes Antarctica look like a Garden Eden. How adult people can believe there will be cities on Mars is beyond me.

>>9819990
>>9819975

How about they concentrate on building a rocket that big first, something that been done only once, back in the day when NASA was not a buearocratic mess, but Wernher von Braun was in direct charge of everything, and had a budget equal to a mid-sized nation's GDP at his disposal.

>>9820286
You mean a rocket that was first built (meaning it was developed before this point) in 1967? 51 years and a load of technological revolutions ago? Aye I think they can manage it. Considering all the other shit they've managed to pull off like fairly reliable landing of rockets.

Also the budget of NASA at it's peak (1964–66) was only 4% of the US's federal spending and the "run-out cost" of the Apollo program was $136 Billion US dollars when adjusted for inflation. A very large amount but I feel you are underestimating the GDP of a mid-sized nation

>>9820292
What loads of technological revolutions are you talking about exactly? Rocketry didn't move a centimetre.

Inb4 vertical landing meme, NASA did that in the 60s on the moon.

Sweden had a GDP of 15 billion in 1960, so there's that.

>>9820319
>durr what is carbon fibre composites
>durr what is CAD
>durr what is half a century of material science
>durr what is advanced computing

yeah rocketry still in the exact same place as the 60s. Nice laugh m8.

>>9820353
Composite materials aren't really that useful in rocketry.

The Soyuz rocket is still the most flown rocket, and the Falcon 9 is rather primitive by 1960s standards, since it is a kerosen rocket.

>>9820319
vertical landing as a practical way to have a reusable rocket is a new thing and can be hugely important

in theory it was possible ling ago but then NASA is not very competent when it comes to keeepig costs down

>>9820358
kerosene rocket is superior to meme hydrogen due to high density and thrust

>>9817736
What is that a composite tank? And was not that composites were unsuitable for such tasks due cracks and structural problems at such low temperatures?

>>9820286
>>9820319
Your posts are shit.

Consider suicide.

>>9818893
Solar gets worse and worse the further you get from the sun.
Nuclear is our best option.

>>9820436
Vertical landing was never tried because with all the extra weight due to landing gear, fuel for the suicide burn etc. you can also just add delta wings and land horizontally, which was done for the Space Shuttle. Vertical landing is a gimmick, not more.

>>9820438
lol, no.

>>9820450
People who talk about suicide tend to have suicidal thoughts themselves.

>>9819828

ok thanks

>>9820284
Antarctica doesn't have an Elon

>>9820456
You're not wrong, but your posts are still trash

>>9820286
>>9820319
>SpaceX has committed to spend billions of dollars to do something and laid out a timeline, but it's impossible because I say so
>never mind that SpaceX has already successfully completed multiple aerospace projects in the past, they obviously decided to throw away their entire company on something impossible because I said so

Overall I find your tone to be unnecessarily belligerent and your analysis to be ill-informed.

Also, horizontal landing requires much, much more complex engineering and infrastructure than vertical landing. It might be more efficient from a Delta V standpoint, but the added complexity more than negates that advantage.

>>9818893
Are those round things heat radiators?
Can i have one for my ?

>>9820525
Its actually a pretty simple design when you think of it, a radoactive isotope gives of heat, the heat makes sterling engines turn, and the excess heat goes away in the heat radiators on top.
And it has a failsafe where the isotope is in a container that stops the chainreaction.
So you could make it so that the failsafe makes the rod fall back in its cointainer when it gets too hot or when power gets shut off.
And even when a rocket blows up with these on board the radation exposure would minimal.
The only problem is that sterling engines are moving parts and those will be a bitch to replace on mars.

>set up lasers on Mars
>attach solar sails to craft heading from Mars to Earth or the asteroid belt
>use the lasers to save delicious Delta V
>??????
>profit

Somebody tell me why this isn't a good idea.

>>9820535
Does your space craft weigh 2 grams?

>>9820319
>What loads of technological revolutions are you talking about exactly?
Well the obvious ones are improvements in material science, electronics, manufacturing precision, design methods and so on.

Every minor improvement enables a slight improvement of every design, part and piece of their rockets either by enabling better materials, preciser fabrication or more efficient designs.

>Rocketry didn't move a centimetre.
Aye and the internal combustion engine hasn't changed much since the model-T but I think we can both agree that modern cars have better performance at a relatively lower price for the product's quality.

>>9820443
Yeah but they developed a new carbon fibre "mix" or frame or whatever it's called that apparently can handle the needed temperatures and pressures.

>>9820560
>Well the obvious ones are improvements in material science, electronics, manufacturing precision, design methods and so on.

Like what precisely? What piece of technology do you think has made rocketry easier?

As I said, there is a reason why the Soyuz is still the most flown rocket.

Also, the biggest cost factor in rocketry is human labour. So an engineer who you had to pay 15k a year in 1960, you have to pay >100k now. So yeah, imagine what the cost will look like in 2018, when it was around 30 billion for the Saturn 5 in the 60s.

>>9820567
Adjusting for inflation, your figures are same.
New tech (computers) have made rocketry safer. They also enable reusablity which will beat soyuz prices.
Advances in electronics have enabled better communication satellites.
New materials will increase payload capacity.

>>9820581
Yes... exactly. If the Apollo program was 25 billion, you are definetely looking at expenditures of >100 billion today. And the Apollo program was extremely streamlined with Von Braun calling all shots. Even if SpaceX would be able to do it for a 1/4 of that it would still be much more than they have.

>>9820588
They'll be funded by the government. Just like commerical crew for ISS.
(Just noticed that you have been saying something similar, I just came to this thread now)

>>9820567
>Like what precisely? What piece of technology do you think has made rocketry easier?
No individual piece of technology but rather the general advance of technology meaning that achieving the same or better standards of precision in terms of material, fabrication and design are possible on lower budgets. Every percentile of a millimetre of greater precision and every increase in the precision of simulations enables the creation of parts above the standards that were once considered extremely precise while improvements in the behaviours of materials, marginal as they might be, result in needing slightly thinner struts and tanks or in having more heat resistant parts for the engine enabling a higher burn temperature or having slightly more efficient insinuators and conductors reducing electrical loss and reducing the needed mass.

>As I said, there is a reason why the Soyuz is still the most flown rocket.
You mean besides the obvious reason of the Americans abandoning rockets in favour of the shuttle and then abandoning the shuttle without having a replacement prepared? Also according to the following website, you are entirely wrong:

http://spaceflight101.com/2017-space-launch-statistics/

They say that there were 15 Soyuz launches in 2017 yet there were 16 Long march and 18 Falcon 9 launches. Meaning you are spewing bullshit and the Soyuz is the third most flown as of the last complete year of aerospace travel. Hell they even outright say that "Standing out in 2017 is SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket - flying more times than any other launch system and beating out the Russian Soyuz that held this position for most of recent memory."

>>9820567
human labor is the biggest cost in rocketry and that is precisely why full and rapid reusability as pursued by spacex is such a big deal

if it is even half as succesful as predicted labor costs will fall

>>9820602
rapid reusability itself doesn't recuperate the over one billion dollars of payroll that SpaceX pays out each year. Rapid reusability does allow you to fly more missions each year, brining in more revenue. being able to refly every 24hr doesn't mean anything unless you have payloads to stick on top (and luckily for SpaceX, Starlink means that they'll have plenty of payloads)

>>9820743
>starlink
But starlink will not pay spacex
so SpaceX still loses money in the short term

>>9820749
and Elon is a pretty long-term guy. Losing a couple billion each year for three years when you build the constellation isn't that big of a deal when you're predicting to take 10% of the ISP market (~8 billion each year in revenue) with the full network in place

>>9820755
You can absoluetely not serve 10% of the american market with only a few thousands satellites. You would need hundreds of thousands for that.

>>9820771
due to what? throughput? The point isn't to serve cities or suburbs, the point is to serve rural areas that are either using Hughesnet or 30-year old copper. Elon also says that they will do a full half of long-distance traffic too

Each starlink sat can handle 20 gbps. You'll have ten thousand sats. That's 200 terabits per second.

>>9820783
This theoretical maximum output, but we are talking satellites, so it will be depended on weather conditions and place in orbit. Plus, if we assume Starlink wants to sell 100Mbit/s flatrates, one satellite can only serve 200 customers. I can hardly imagine this can be profitable with current market prices.

Satellite internet is best suited to cover densely populated areas with an underdeveloped infrastructure, e.g. the 3rd world. For example, a Starlink satellite could serve 200 americans with 100 Mbit/s, or 20.000 Indians with 1Mbit/s. The first option is going to be really hard to turn a profit, but the second can be very profitable. You can charge 1$ a month for the Indians and you would probably still be profitable, even with today's launch prices.

>>9820783
Not all 10000 sats are going to be above you

>>9820906
no shit, that's why the individual max bandwidth for a single phased array box is 1 gbps

>>9820588
>using government program costs as realistic benchline figures

wew lad

>>9820588
Did someone say Von Braun?

>>9819732
venture bros?

>>9820990
Dude was a very active Christian, what exactly is your point?

>>9821003
>founder of NASA mentions a quote about the firmament on his gravestone.
Probably just a hilarious meme, those funny Germans!
Or... is it?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssWDiAZY9Hs

>>9821017
here's the actual longest photo ever taken, if anyone's interested
http://www.udeuschle.selfhost.pro/panoramas/panqueryfull.aspx?mode=newstandard&data=lon%3A2.13339%24%24%24lat%3A42.41455%24%24%24alt%3A2820%24%24%24altcam%3A2%24%24%24hialt%3Afalse%24%24%24resolution%3A200%24%24%24azimut%3A48%24%24%24sweep%3A7%24%24%24leftbound%3A44.5%24%24%24rightbound%3A51.5%24%24%24split%3A6%24%24%24splitnr%3A2%24%24%24tilt%3A-1.575%24%24%24tiltsplit%3Afalse%24%24%24elexagg%3A1%24%24%24range%3A700%24%24%24colorcoding%3Afalse%24%24%24colorcodinglimit%3A488%24%24%24title%3AFinestrelles-Ecrins%24%24%24description%3A%24%24%24email%3A%24%24%24language%3Aen%24%24%24screenwidth%3A939%24%24%24screenheight%3A714

(lol that URL)

more info: https://beyondhorizons.eu/2016/08/03/pic-de-finestrelles-pic-gaspard-ecrins-443-km/

>>9821017
Jesus Christ fuck off, why do we have to put up with this asinine shit every fucking thread about anything tangentially related to space.

>>9821017
You honestly believe Wernher Von Fucking Braun was a flat earther? Get the fuck out of here and return to >>>/x/.

>>9821028
1/10 individuals have an IQ under 83. Unless you actually start banning people it's never going to stop

>>9821028
>>9821038
A lie is still a lie even if everyone believes it, the truth is still the truth even if no one believes it.
If this was only a trolling attempt, then why does it bother you? Cognitive dissonance much?

>>9821039
>successfully regurgitating textbook info for tests is intelligence
Self awareness is hard.

>>9821055
Please clarify how the sun avoids lighting the discworld 24/7 and how the phases of the moon and eclipses work under your model. Shouldn't be hard to provide a coherent answer if all our models are based off lies.

>>9821060
don't bother, there's literally zero way to argue with these people. Report and move on.

>>9821060
Take your pick my friend
>sun and moon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwt9iQcdNDE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1Etazqg2X4
>seasons
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=in05eaDjU4k
>eclipses
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raO9RS3b8-A

>>9821060
The sun is small and local, acting like a spotlight, lighting up a certain portion of the earth as it circles above.

Because it's local, it is affected by perspective, hence it moves towards the horizon as it gets further away.

As it moves further away, its light must pass through more and more atmosphere, eventually becoming invisible, causing day and night.

>>9821060
dont feed the troll, that guy doesnt believe it too, he just wants you to get mad about it.

>>9821083
>10s into first video
>The moon is a transparent self illuminating disc

I guess you really can handwave any problems away with sufficient made up crap.

>>9821086
Assuming the sun is a flying spotloght, then clarify the issue of observed parallax at different equatorial regions.

>>9821089
friendo, there's like an 80% chance he's literally Eric Dubay. Don't reply... seriously

>>9821089
Did you give up that quickly when you first learned the heliocentric fairy tale in school?

>>9821089
>observed parallax at different equatorial regions
Learn how perspective works, you have this same perspective, so you can prove its effect for yourself.

How was every ancient culture stupid and wrong by today's popular opinion, yet had the same idea of living under a dome firmament?

>>9821118
Did those ancient cultures build rockets that could land men on the Moon? No? The only thing they were good at was killing each other over dumb shit and dying of easily preventable disease.

>>9821138
Ooh true. We're totally past that silliness now, cause we have UN world government, and allopathic medicine to protect us. No more violence or disease for us, cause went to the moon! All checks out.

stop feeding the trolls.

>>9820811
>one satellite can only serve 200 customers.

bullshit, that is not how isp works, most customers only use a fraction of their capacity at a single time

>Crew Dragon is at @NASA’s Plum Brook Station testing facility in Ohio, home to the largest thermal vacuum chamber in the world, to demonstrate its capability to withstand the extreme temperatures and vacuum of space. Once complete, Crew Dragon will travel to Kennedy Space Center in Florida ahead of its first flight.

>flat earth tard got banned
Praise be the mods

>>9821442
>when you notice the people standing around it and get a sense of scale
owo

>>9820456
>you can also just add delta wings and land horizontally
Only if you are China or Russia and are overflying land, so you could land on a runway
Every other country launch over the ocean

>>9821493
glory to industry

>>9821504
>BFR will be as wide as the hole that dragon is being lowered into
christ

who'd a thunk a nerd developing Zip2 would go on to become the Martian Overlord

We must all obey the rulings of House Elon

>>9819990
>Rather interestingly
What is more interesting is when Musk was talking about fuel production. He said they were going to need a 'very large' (emphasis) solar array.

So I guess he realizes he needs a ridiculous amount of power.

Of course the big issue right now is finding a place they can drill for water and all the equipment for that. By comparison a stand along fuel production center is much easier.

>>9821679
one idea is that you bring the oxygen you need the first time around, to focus on making Methane. Once you get that done, you can move on to figuring out the oxygen issue

>>9821683
It seems like the easiest option could be to compress the Martian atmosphere.

It's CO2 and Nitrogen, so you could just pump it into the greenhouses little by little and let the plants convert it into oxygen.

>>9821614
Elon's stoner tweets are the hero we deserve.

>>9821721
so.... algae farms then. Nothing else comes close to its oxygen production

>>9821743
Grimes is obsessed with Dune, so perhaps it's rubbing off on him.
Wonder if he sees Grimes as more of a Chani or Bene Gesserit, wew

>>9818729
SpaceX plans to have a grasshopper-type BFS test article in operation next year. Full scale rocket should be flying by 2022, provided everything goes to plan.

>>9821683
You need to get the hydrogen from somewhere. If you can get enough water for the hydrogen you need to make the methane and break it up, then you should end up with plenty of oxygen too.

>>9821804
that's true

>>9821785
wonder if Johnny will again hitch a ride on the BFRhopper

>>9821808
pic is Johnny, he was on all of the original grasshopper flights

Question. Instead of using traditional propellant, could you not use a super dense power source to run big coils to "push" on the magnetic field?

>>9821896
You know that Mars has no magnetic field, right? That's how the sun was able to BTFO its atmosphere millions of years ago.

who the fuck cares about rockets when DARPA has spaceships with electrogravitics technology

>>9821498
You would simply return to the launching site and land there. Bonus points for the fact that the rocket is already horizontal and can be transported quicker and easier.

>>9821683
Other way round. You can bring the Hydrogen with you and don't have to worry about finding water. Of the 1100 tons of propellant, 60 tons are Hydrogen.

>>9818734
>Modern solar panels lose efficiency at around 1% per year

They're only 14% effective anyway so that's only fourteen years of use.

So lets talk longer term for once. Assuming Musk does somehow set up a martian colony and it doesn't fall into chaos or something, how are it's borders going to be defined? How are they going to defend themselves? Would the nations of earth even recognise it as a new nation?


Fact is it's only a matter of time until China or India or the EU manages a similar achievement of a stable martian colony. Hell it may even be underway by the time Musk has a large colony on mars.


Obvious martian warfare would be a insane affair given the costs of shipping troops out and the lack of infrastructure, industry and so on would render losses of material equally irreplaceable but given Musk is reducing the cost of it so much could it become feasible?


I want to hear what your thoughts are on the longer term of this project assuming it does somehow work out.

>>9822138
That is on Earth, so it would probably last twice as long on Mars with half the light. But you would have problems with dust, too.

>>9822138
They lose 1% efficiency on average to the nameplate capacity, this means that a new one is 14% effective and a 20 year old is roughly 11% effective. What that Anon doesn't know though is that it is losing 1% ON AVERAGE over 20 years, in reality it loses much less the first few years and degrades quicker and quicker over time. A 30 year old PV module will have around 60% of nameplate capacity, a 35 year old one will have less than 33%.

>>9820358
So 1960s had copv for helium and fsw construction and blisks?

>>9821743

>>9822490
The 1960s also had those awesome computers that you could fit into a shoebox.

>>9821932
>who the fuck cares?
People who dont smoke crack and bingewatch Infowars?

>>9819179
>fusion is coming pretty close
Fusion in the foreseeable future will be a terribly heavy monster of a machine. It simply won't work below power plant scale. Even if ARC works out, I still don't think you can put one of those pre-assembeled into space and this technology simply requires too much precission and is simply too high-tech to be assembeled on-site.
And then on top of all of that, even if you managed to somehow bring one of those to Mars, how would you even cool it? 15 BFRs just to deliver radiators?
And these things need a ton of energy from outside just to start-up in the first place.

Fusion may be around the corner at this point, but fusion in space is a long way off, I think.

>>9819637
Isn't Mars regolith toxic?
Don't know if it's a good idea to just live in a cave.

>>9822779
the martian rock would be covered with paneling, since the seal of the lava tubes is unlikely to be perfect enough to just straight pressurize the cave

>>9822239
It'll probably just be treated like Antarctica for the longest time.

>>9822788
I was thinking polyethylene bags inside of the tube.

The walls provide the structural strength, the plastic makes it airtight.

>>9818987
>Direct democracy
So mob rule?

>>9819924
If you think the problems on earth have anything to do with "liberalist degeneracy" then you're part of the problem. The political pendulum will swing away from liberal in a few years (in fact it's already well on it's way) back towards conservatives and we'll continue to get the complete dumb ass and abhorrent policies and actions from the right we saw not 15 years ago. The problem has nothing to do with the political spectrum and everything to do with people being to stupid and/or ignorant about what is actually good for them and society as a whole, and instead take easy, feel good alternatives peddled to them by snake oil salesman that are frankly anything but alternatives. There's a chance this wouldn't follow to mars, worth trying anyways.

couple SpaceX San Pedro updates

1) demolition has started

>>9823025
2) Mr Steven is being refurbished with the 2x as large net / arms

>>9823025
Yay!

Government contacts are already being won for FH. Air Force just awarded SpaceX $130,000,000 for a 2020 FH flight of AFSC-52 https://www.defense.gov/News/Contracts/Contract-View/Article/1557205/

ULA lost out on the bid to SpaceX

>>9823103
*AFSPC-52

>>9823103
>ULA lost out on the bid to SpaceX
I expect to hear that a lot in the future.

>>9821679
>>9821683
The colony can't be a colony without finding water.

>>9823025
Its a big site to tear down, even more if they dont want to reuse the old foundations.
This could take several years before they can start production.

>>9822714
you're dumb as they come
rockets are not needed for space flight

>>9823174
putting up a warehouse only takes a few months

>>9823330
This depends on the size. The plane assembly ones that are gigantic take years.

>>9823330
>>9823174
demolition/new construction is expected to take 16-18 months total; this is split into many phases (like the gigafactory). And, they're likely going to be making construction progress in the temporary tents while everything gets built anyways

see: https://www.portoflosangeles.org/MND/WWM/WWM_MND.pdf

>>9823362
>The plane assembly ones
=/= warehouse

And an Amish barn (kinda warehouse-like) takes about a day (not including foundation curing time)

>>9823325
ok buddy

>>9822490
I do FSW!

>>9822239
Why do you think anyone would want to invade some Outpost on Mars? This is not one of your video games

>>9823535
that's wood, not steel and concrete

>>9822239
>redding spacing.
Go away please.

>>9824317
christ has this meme leaked over from /pol/ or /v/ or whatever shithole it came from?

It contributes nothing to the conversation, it's not truthful to begin with, and to top it off the physical formatting itself in question is useful for readability.

Go die in a fire, and take your stupid braindead tribalism with you. Look, all of these anons are also redditors, oh no!

>>9817950
>>9818214
>>9818616
>>9818647
>>9818658
>>9818660
>>9818666
>>9818670
>>9818680
>>9818693
>>9818695
>>9818704
>>9818732
>>9818734
>>9818736
>>9818938
>>9819088
>>9819732
>>9819749
>>9819754
>>9819762
>>9819766
>>9819780
>>9819786
>>9819924
>>9819957
>>9819990
>>9820284
>>9820292
>>9820319
>>9820358
>>9820436
>>9820602
>>9820783
etc

>>9824245
As long as it's made out of prefab modules, there isn't that much as much of a difference.

>>9823535
What takes long is installing machinery, not putting together four walls and a roof.

>>9822239
>be America
>Chinese are screwing with your space colony
>nuke them
>they can no longer launch rockets to screw with your space colony
>you can
>send a couple of BFRs loaded with nuclear warheads to eradicated the Chinese colony

Whoever controls the earth will control Mars.

uh, should we be talking about this?

>>9821518
No, it will be about as wide as the round walkway those people are standing on

>>9824877
dragon is 3.7m in diameter, BFR is 9 meters. You seem to be right

>>9824896
>>9824877
*but not entirely right; it's like halfway between the two. Pic is a size comparison of 3.7 vs 9. Tried to find the specs for that opening to the vacuum chamber but I couldn't find it

>>9824857
Elon Musk's whole life ambition is basically just "what if sci-fi was real"

>>9824995
why is that an issue?
most things have been created by a person deciding they wanted to make dreams a reality

>>9824733
>nuke them
Enjoy having your 50 largest cities turned into rubble. Are you nuts? If you use nukes on another nuclear superpower it's game over man.

>>9825169
I probably could have picked a less retarded way of expressing what I'm thinking.

You don't see conventional wars between nuclear powers because nuclear powers can nuke each other.

If a country is capable of building a Mars colony, it is capable of building a nuclear warhead and a delivery system for that nuclear warhead.

So if two Mars colonies are fighting each other, the conflict will not be resolved on Mars. It will be resolved either by the threat of nuclear weapons or the use of nuclear weapons, on earth.

>>9825177
>Implying China wouldn't send a dozen ICBMs to their colony to btfo pesky Americans.

>>9824981
K I N O

I

N

O

>>9824995

>>9824981
That dress might not be so well-behaved in free-fall without some strategic extra threads to keep it together.

>>9825234
You'd need to wait like a year for them to get there, and there's a reasonable chance that if you nuked Americans on Mars, Americans would nuke you on earth.

There's always that risk of miscalculation, and when nuclear weapons are involved the consequences of miscalculation are very high.

>>9825314
Sure, but the point is that any colony established as the base of a country will have nuclear weapons, they will be smuggled in as plain warheads among other supplies to avoid international rage and then the rocketry will be put together on Mars.

>>9825321
I don't know why you'd bother.

It'd be like different countries arming their Everest climbers with pistols in case they run into a climber from another country that's at war.

There's enough space up there for everyone, and if there's a fight on the ground, the outcome of the fight up there doesn't really matter.

New Zealand is lunching in an hour >>9825085

>>9825357
Cute little kiwi rocket desu

>>9825375
not a cute as the cutest of all orbital rockets however, the SS-520-5. (and of course it's Japanese)

>>9825378
the japanese on isnt cute, its kawaii.
Please remember where you are!!

>>9825387
Japan's launch vehicles don't have that sense of sound design fundamentals and clear evidence of refinement to look truly great.

>>9824437
>s long as it's made out of prefab modules, there isn't that much as much of a difference.

Big difference when each "small" piece requires a crane to put it in place.

>>9827061
Builder here, a crane used to lift around prefabricated sections of precast concrete walls, prefab steel frame and siding sections and prefab roofing sections is THE FASTEST way to build large buildings. That's why they use cranes you dense cunt.

Even in my little town I see huge concrete slab warehouses go up in literally 2-3 days with only a small crane. Do you know fucking anything about construction?

>>9827070
Even an unskilled labor field, like construction, has subject domain knowledge that the general public will not be aware of without study. It's not surprising that /sci/ has clueless people that don't realize that designing things around cranes makes work easier and faster.

>>9827083
I just feel like it should be required if you post on /sci/ that you do a little bit of research on something before you spout your opinion, but I guess that's just the downside of 4chan attracting a lot of garbage.

Have we got a BFR chan yet?

>>9827151
I think BFR chan should be thicc?

>>9827162
for sure

Static fire of the TESS booster for CRS-15 is complete. Two month turnaround! They don’t even ship them out anymore, all of the refurbishment is done in FL

>>9823535
Was that a pickup I saw for an instant next to the barn? Some Amish these are.

>>9827101
See but you forget that many of us just say stuff to mess with people. Like our supposed construction expert here:
>>9827070

>>9827375
>Cranes and large scale construction is not quick and rapid

What fucking planet do you live on? This is literally the entire purpose of cranes, to move and fix large pieces into place very quickly.

>>9827375
>I post uninformed drivel
>le epin trole man

If I asked nicely would you stop doing it in this thread?