Dragon landing on Mars video
Pat Flannery
engines to land on Mars: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p6EruPdoXY
Pat
bob haller
OK a manned capsule has landed on mars:)
Hw does the crew return to earth?
Val Kraut
OK a manned capsule has landed on mars:)
Hw does the crew return to earth?
They don't. You leave them there as colonists ala Buzz Aldren's plan.
You might also wonder how they get to the required conditions that the small
engines would land them without parachutes (NG on Mars or the Moon) or a
descent stage - in which case you'd use it's engines. Also no considerations
of residual velocities and rolling over on landing amongst other things. The
devil, as always, is in the details.
Ed Wood (Plan 9 from Outer Space) called it suspension of belief. You can
easily see the ghoul is climbing out of a cardboard mausoleum and the grass
is a shaggy rug, but you continue with your pop corn and enjoy the story.
I've been told that I'd enjoy life so much more if I could watch a world war
two movie and not note that the Japanese didn't have F-16s, that the
fighters in Cattlecar Galactica didn't have any space for fuel - just 3 huge
engines, ME-109s aren't Piper Cub derivitives.... Looks like sou're
suffering from the same malady - acute realism.
Val Kraut
Brian Thorn
<mar...@optonline.net> wrote:
>OK a manned capsule has landed on mars:)
>
>Hw does the crew return to earth?
>
>They don't. You leave them there as colonists ala Buzz Aldren's plan.
There's a scene in "From the Earth to the Moon" where this is proposed
for Apollo. The NASA manager laughs the two guys who proposed it out
the door.
The same will happen for any one-way Mars proposal.
Never. Gonna. Happen.
But Dragon might be useful as a cargo delivery system for a Mars base.
Brian
Doug Freyburger
> "Val Kraut" <mar...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>>OK a manned capsule has landed on mars:)
>>Hw does the crew return to earth?
>>They don't. You leave them there as colonists ala Buzz Aldren's plan.
>
> There's a scene in "From the Earth to the Moon" where this is proposed
> for Apollo. The NASA manager laughs the two guys who proposed it out
> the door.
>
> The same will happen for any one-way Mars proposal.
>
> Never. Gonna. Happen.
On any government funded trip, agreed. Privately funded trips could
easily be one way. It's how a lot of the Earth has been colonized by
humanity.
Val Kraut
"> There's a scene in "From the Earth to the Moon" where this is proposed
> for Apollo. The NASA manager laughs the two guys who proposed it out
> the door.
>
> The same will happen for any one-way Mars proposal.
>
> Never. Gonna. Happen.
I agree, and it was meant as a slightly sarcastic explanation - yet I've
been at meetings and events where Buzz Aldren in all seriousness stated that
after five missions you can have 60 returned astronauts, limited samples and
data or a 60 person permanent colony living off the land. NASA has it all
wrong - plan for one way trips.
Val Kraut
Pat Flannery
> OK a manned capsule has landed on mars:)
>
> Hw does the crew return to earth?
In the video, there is a little outpost shown in the background.
> They don't. You leave them there as colonists ala Buzz Aldren's plan.
Then the colonists turn to cannibalism for food, and Darwin is allowed
to take his path. Soon we will have only one really big and well-fed
colonist who needs to be returned to Earth...if he hasn't evolved to eat
rocks and breath CO2 by then under the healthful influence of the
radiation from the Sun. He may not appear to be completely human to our
eyes once so evolved, looking more like a moving man-eating plant with
rock grinders where his ass used to be, but his heart well still be
American, and he well not tolerate communist tyranny in any form on that
now red, white, and blue planet.
> You might also wonder how they get to the required conditions that the small
> engines would land them without parachutes (NG on Mars or the Moon) or a
> descent stage - in which case you'd use it's engines. Also no considerations
> of residual velocities and rolling over on landing amongst other things. The
> devil, as always, is in the details.
I assume the lander would use chutes after atmospheric entry to do the
initial braking, then use the rockets to land, rather like a scaled-up
version of how Phoenix landed.
> Ed Wood (Plan 9 from Outer Space)
And Orgy of the Dead, which is even better.
> called it suspension of belief. You can
> easily see the ghoul is climbing out of a cardboard mausoleum and the grass
> is a shaggy rug, but you continue with your pop corn and enjoy the story.
> I've been told that I'd enjoy life so much more if I could watch a world war
> two movie and not note that the Japanese didn't have F-16s, that the
> fighters in Cattlecar Galactica didn't have any space for fuel - just 3 huge
> engines
That's the power of Tylium, which makes uranium look like a pathetic son
of a dagget as a propellant goes by comparison. ;-)
Some people look at Mars and ask: "Why go there?"
Elon Musk looks at Mars and answers: "Because I can breed an army of
man-eating, ass-grinding, liberty loving, moving plant people
there...and set out on my war of galactic conquest."
Never stand between a man and his dream, particularly if he has a gun.
Pat
Pat Flannery
> I agree, and it was meant as a slightly sarcastic explanation - yet I've
> been at meetings and events where Buzz Aldren in all seriousness stated that
> after five missions you can have 60 returned astronauts, limited samples and
> data or a 60 person permanent colony living off the land. NASA has it all
> wrong - plan for one way trips.
>
If that's a one-way trip for Buzz, I'm all for it. :-D
Pat
Pat Flannery
> On Fri, 29 Apr 2011 15:18:18 -0400, "Val Kraut"
> <mar...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>
>> OK a manned capsule has landed on mars:)
>>
>> Hw does the crew return to earth?
>>
>> They don't. You leave them there as colonists ala Buzz Aldren's plan.
>
> There's a scene in "From the Earth to the Moon" where this is proposed
> for Apollo. The NASA manager laughs the two guys who proposed it out
> the door.
That was the Bell proposal (the movie "Countdown" shows it in action).
The astronaut(s) wasn't going to live there permanently, just long
enough for the Apollo CSM/LM to complete development and come to return
him with the LM.
In the movie one astronaut is landed in a Gemini atop of a LM descent
stage after a shelter does a unmanned landing. He will live in the
shelter till they can recover him.
One interesting touch in the movie is when a crashed manned Soviet Moon
lander is shown that made it there before he landed; the lander is based
on the upper stage of a Vostok rocket with a domed top added.
The movie was based on a book, "The Pilgrim Project", in which a
modified Mercury is used to carry the astronaut:
http://www.amazon.com/pilgrim-project-novel-Hank-Searls/dp/B00005XOW7
Pat
Pat Flannery
> On any government funded trip, agreed. Privately funded trips could
> easily be one way. It's how a lot of the Earth has been colonized by
> humanity.
Sometimes unintentionally, when the ship gets lost on its way to another
planned destination, and ends up who-knows-where.
I get a sneaking suspicion that's how a lot of the smaller Pacific
islands got colonized, and probably Hawaii.
Pat
Robert Clark
Elon Musk wants to land a man on Mars in 10 to 20 years:
SpaceX Will Send Humans To Mars In the Next 10 to 20 Years.
By Rebecca BoylePosted 04.25.2011 at 10:59 am
http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2011-04/video-ceo-says-spacex-will-send-humans-mars-10-20-years
See the video interview linked on that page.
Bob Clark
Sam Wormley
One wonders what the plan is to keep the travelers from being killed
by radiation.
Val Kraut
> One wonders what the plan is to keep the travelers from being killed
> by radiation.
NASA tended to be in denial on this issue and made statements like the Mars
crew will get their lifetime dose during the round trip - so no Mars crews
will fly twice. What we need is th acceptance that shielding must be
provided asgainst both gamma and fast particles, and a realistic allotment
for the extra weight. May need some different thoughts on where we make the
fuel - Moon or Mars.
Val Kraut
Pat Flannery
They played around with shielding the spacecraft with an electrostatic
screen: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5079651/ns/technology_and_science-space/
Pat
David Spain
How about a SpaceX video showing the Dragon capsule landing on an island on
Titan, with a small oxidizer leaking combined with the ignition source of the
landing rockets setting fire to that lake of liquid dry cleaning fluid
surrounding the island.
Now THAT's a video!
One great thing about Titan, you bring your own oxygen and there's no shortage
of energy available!
;-)
Dave
David Spain
But the article ends with a statement about surrounding the habitable core of
a Mars transit ship with tanks of LH2 or L-H20 to provide shielding. If liquid
water is used as a shield wouldn't it also need to be heated while in transit
to Mars? Or would pressurizing the water tanks help? Or both? All it takes is
energy, energy, energy.
These Dragon capsule Mars exploration wet dreams produced by the SpaceX PR
department makes my even more off-topic ranting fair game:
Warp drive or an interplanetary 'transporter' would solve *all* these mundane
problems. You know if we *had* a really good quantum traveling device,
everyone could get a chance to be everywhere at least once in their lifetime.
Hence all of space exploration could be achieved in just a few years (time
needed to get everyone to experience the quantum trip). Or maybe we just sell
hallucinogenics on the street corner instead of spending millions on NASA.
Outsource space exploration to Mexico!
:-)
Back on topic for a second. Really, if Musk wants to go to Mars and HE is
footing the bill, he is free to try...
Dave
David Spain
>
> If that's a one-way trip for Buzz, I'm all for it. :-D
>
That may be one small trip for [a] Buzz,
but one giant trek for mankind.
Sorry...
Pat Flannery
> Pat Flannery wrote:
>> On 4/30/2011 7:29 AM, Val Kraut wrote:
>>>> One wonders what the plan is to keep the travelers from being killed
>>>> by radiation.
>>>
>>> NASA tended to be in denial on this issue and made statements like
>>> the Mars
>>> crew will get their lifetime dose during the round trip - so no Mars
>>> crews
>>> will fly twice. What we need is th acceptance that shielding must be
>>> provided asgainst both gamma and fast particles, and a realistic
>>> allotment
>>> for the extra weight. May need some different thoughts on where we
>>> make the
>>> fuel - Moon or Mars.
>>
>> They played around with shielding the spacecraft with an electrostatic
>> screen:
>> http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5079651/ns/technology_and_science-space/
>>
>
> But the article ends with a statement about surrounding the habitable
> core of a Mars transit ship with tanks of LH2 or L-H20 to provide
> shielding. If liquid water is used as a shield wouldn't it also need to
> be heated while in transit to Mars? Or would pressurizing the water
> tanks help? Or both? All it takes is energy, energy, energy.
Why does it have to be liquid? Ice would work as well, and make a great
micrometeor shield.
> Back on topic for a second. Really, if Musk wants to go to Mars and HE
> is footing the bill, he is free to try...
>
It does show that their very creative in what his team realizes Dragon
can do with its LES. The question is, did they plan for that from the
beginning, or realize it could do that after they decided on the escape
motors mounted in the capsule itself?
He may of gotten the idea from this Russian spacecraft design:
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/zarya.htm which used combo
escape/landing engines.
Pat
Pat Flannery
> Pat Flannery wrote:
>> New SpaceX video showing the Dragon capsule using its escape system
>> engines to land on Mars: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p6EruPdoXY
>>
>> Pat
>
> How about a SpaceX video showing the Dragon capsule landing on an island
> on Titan, with a small oxidizer leaking combined with the ignition
> source of the landing rockets setting fire to that lake of liquid dry
> cleaning fluid surrounding the island.
Titan is the perfect place to land via parachutes; the atmosphere is
twice as dense as Earth, while the gravity is about 1/6 of Earth's. In
short, on Titan you can get away with the old cartoon trick of safely
descending under a umbrella.
Pat
Val Kraut
There's always the Caviate about power source - Hey Airctraft Carriers could
do 200 MPH - you just need the power source capable of supporting that
energy use.
This is one of my favorite gripes - a group has a great idea which only has
one fatal flaw. So they propose it to the Government anyway and get money to
explore everything but the fatal flaw. Real example - this physical effect
can be use to denonate improvised explosive devices at a distance. They put
such a device on the road - step back where the convoy would be located,
turn on the device and whamo the device explodes. One small problem, the
fields that exploded the device don't penetrate any appreciable distance
into the ground, and these devices are always buried, and never will
penetrate into the ground unless you change the laws of physics. Not to
worry, get the local congressman or senator hyped - get pork barrel funding
and study things like field drop off with distance, light weight antenna
design, beam directionality etc.You're presenting the results of your study
and some guy in the audience who remembers Freshman Physics asks - will this
work on buried devices, you knowingly look him directly in the eye and say -
"That's a really good question, we're looking to address that issue in a
follow-on study next year" And the Major leans over and wispers to the
Colonel - "We better make sure they get those funds."
Val
Kraut
Val Kraut
"> One great thing about Titan, you bring your own oxygen and there's no
shortage
> of energy available!
"Trouble on Titan" by Alan Nourse - One of the books I grew up on.
Val Kraut
Alan Erskine
Here's another link to the same interview
http://www.marketwatch.com/video/asset/elon-musk-ill-put-a-man-on-mars-in-10-years-2011-04-22/CCF1FC62-BB0D-4561-938C-DF0DEFAD15BA#!CCF1FC62-BB0D-4561-938C-DF0DEFAD15BA
However, it is to be remembered that this has been described as his
"personal goal" and might not have much to do with overall SpaceX plans.
Brian Thorn
<dfre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>On any government funded trip, agreed. Privately funded trips could
>easily be one way. It's how a lot of the Earth has been colonized by
>humanity.
And that experience was not good (just ask Virginia Dare, oh wait, she
vanished without a trace along with the rest of her colony...).
It won't be repeated.
Brian
Pat Flannery
> NASA also had teams studying electric fields to protect bases on the Moon.
> There's always the Caviate about power source
It would obviously require a powerful nuclear reactor be mounted on the
Mars ship.
Getting rid of the heat from that could be a real problem for the
designers, as it would require some very large radiators.
Pat
Alan Erskine
> Pat Flannery wrote:
>> New SpaceX video showing the Dragon capsule using its escape system
>> engines to land on Mars: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p6EruPdoXY
>>
>> Pat
>
> How about a SpaceX video showing the Dragon capsule landing on an island
> on Titan, with a small oxidizer leaking combined with the ignition
> source of the landing rockets setting fire to that lake of liquid dry
> cleaning fluid surrounding the island.
Looks like Pat's got some competition. ;-)
Alan Erskine
PV (photo voltaic - solar cells) can still be used on Mars.
Why does everyone seem so intent on using nukes?
Sjouke Burry
Power per KG .
You need lots of power and a minimum of weight.
The choices are very limited.
Alan Erskine
Not necessarily a mass limit - just build a bigger vehicle. It won't be
launched from Earth in one, big piece like Apollo was; it will be
assembled in LEO first from smaller modules. Even the Ares V would not
have been big enough for a manned landing mission to Mars. So, instead
of two launches (one for the vehicle and one for the Earth Escape
stage), you launch three or four. While this doubles the launch
expense, it also increases the options by... four.
Payload is quadrupled and there would be sufficient mass for solar
power. As for Fred's suggestion of using some kind of 'force field'...
Just bury the entire vehicle under the Martian surface as you would on
the Moon. Two metres of soil and that's all the protection a crew would
need.
Alan Erskine
> discussed. It requires lots of power both for the transit and once
> you get there in order to do that.
>
> Hard to bury your vehicle under the Martian surface until you get
> there....
>
I thought you meant surface radiation. OK, got it now.
It will be difficult, but not insurmountable.
bob haller
> there....
>
you send robotic vehicles ahead unmanned...... land the base camp
probably a group of trans hab inflatables, and have the robots
execvate assemble inflate and bury the base camp..
install a landing pad with comm system for auto land.
around mars communication and GPS satellites are placed in permanent
orbit so communication will always be possible.and location info will
be exact. no matter where on the planet. a secondary base camp is
installed on a pole
the entire planet has rovers looking for areas of interest, the rovers
are AI some will be lost to accidents, but enough will be sent losses
wouldnt be a issue. astronauts may be able to salvage some once they
arrive:)
a few mini bases, are deployeed too. just like base camp but smaller
used for exploration and in a emergency a place to hole up, in case
base camp somehow got destroyed
need a bunch of crawler transporter excursion vehicles, with living
quarters for astronauts
the transit vehicle must have nuke engine to minimize transit ttime to
decrease raiation exposure. These should go in pairs one unmanned or
minimally manned in case a transit vehicle had a problem. 2 vehicles
each sufficent to support the entire crew might help with boredom and
social issues. Hey I will go visit bill and sharon at transit 2 and
get away from harry who is irritating me.
a return pair of flyers should be on station at mars just in case the
outbound vehicles have issues and cant get back.
a prototype transit vehicle should make a few laps back and forth
before sending a crewed one. it could bring back samples to a mars ISS
isolation lab, so a mars virus cant somehow wipe out mankind:(
this isnt flags and footprints its a permanent base:)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NOW BACK TO REALITY WHEN WE CANT AFFORD SOCIAL SECURITY, our country
is in economic collapse, congress approval rate is 12% a all time
historic low, republicans want to slash spending and cut taxes for the
1% super weathy from 35% to 25% and they refuse to raise the debt
cieling prefering the bankruptcy of our government. Around here
education is getting slashed so the next generation wouldnt know how
to go to mars.
A brite spot is china, they have a major power shortage from their
economy growing so fast.
It takes a lot of power to produce all those exports for the US, so
american companies can make big bucks and pay no taxes like GE.
Forget Mars:( Forget moon:( ISS will be scuttled.... maybe no loss
there......
we can no longer afford anything
Val Kraut
Around here
> education is getting slashed so the next generation wouldnt know how
> to go to mars.
>
the moon - there were many articles on today's NASA staff removing Apollo
Hardware from museums to understand how it was done back then. The old teams
are gone or disbanded and there is no master repository of Apollo data,
orany other old program data. Not only are we slahing funds - but we're
dumbing down the text books so more wil graduate. There are undergraduate
text books that actually start with intros like - we've made the present
edition more friendly by removing all the problems that require Calculus, or
replaced many mathematical problems with discussion questions. Other
countries pride themselves in science and math education - we pride ouselves
on turning out business majors and sports.
Val Kraut
Alan Erskine
This is getting to be a bad habit, but I agree with Bob on most of this.
I'm still not convinced that nuke is the best way, especially for the
comparitively small power needed for an initial outpost/base. What
about wind technology combined with solar and fuel cells (wind when it
blows and combined solar for day and fuel cells at night [just like what
could be done on the Moon])?
bob haller
>
> - Show quoted text -
Well if they are using nuke for transit craft propulsion a base camp
nuke plant wouldnt cost much extra, the transit part would make it
affordable and the power could be used to make fuel for the return to
orbit vehicle, saving weight and complexity.
why have fueled vehicle sitting on mars soil if liftoff for eturn is a
couple years or more away?.
given mars low pressure windmills may not be effective and dust storms
can muck up solar panel systems
Rick Jones
> You know if we *had* a really good quantum traveling device,
> everyone could get a chance to be everywhere at least once in their
> lifetime.
When it went wrong they could be everywhere all at once.
rick jones
--
denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance, rebirth...
where do you want to be today?
these opinions are mine, all mine; HP might not want them anyway... :)
feel free to post, OR email to rick.jones2 in hp.com but NOT BOTH...
Rick Jones
> Titan is the perfect place to land via parachutes; the atmosphere is
> twice as dense as Earth, while the gravity is about 1/6 of Earth's. In
> short, on Titan you can get away with the old cartoon trick of safely
> descending under a umbrella.
I fear even then, making an umbrella that stout is a lost art. The
last particularly stout bumbershoot was probably Mary Poppins' and the
old codger who made it died somewhere in London 25 years ago after
making the last Miltary Assault Umbrella Service Elizabeth Regent
model.
--
Process shall set you free from the need for rational thought.
David Spain
> In sci.space.history David Spain <nos...@127.0.0.1> wrote:
>
>> You know if we *had* a really good quantum traveling device,
>> everyone could get a chance to be everywhere at least once in their
>> lifetime.
>
> When it went wrong they could be everywhere all at once.
>
No, when it went wrong they would *remain* everywhere.
Let's see that computer controller menu selector:
Select a command:
qcde - quantum controller destructor execute
qced - quantum controller excursion designator
>
;-)
Dave