On 6 Aug 2005 15:00:29 -0700, "Alex Terrell"
wrote:

Cardman wrote:
On 6 Aug 2005 04:14:16 -0700, "Alex Terrell"
wrote:

I would much prefer to have the base all up and running even before
the first astronaut steps foot on there. They could have a rover do
some required assembly.

Well, that's the approach I've taken he
http://fp.alexterrell.plus.com/web/C...stellation.pdf

On page 14 of 66 you'll see the crew are just the 8th delivery to the
polar base. Once the crew arrive, there's a commitment to regular
supply and support flights.

Yes, I had a quick read through it, mostly picking up on interesting
points.

And the one thing that NASA won't grasp or do in a million years is to
actually keep people there to live and work. Construction seems like
the first priority. Communication, electricity, water (hopefully) and
to pave over the entire area to keep that pesky regolith out.

I've put in water mining and electrolysis, and general base development
initially.

The reason why I mentioned that this regolith dust matter should be
tacked early on, is because it poses a real toxic hazard for both
people and equipment. Not to mention that it is good at getting in
every fold and gap.

Since the main output from your chemical processing is bricks and
glass, then so is it easy to include paving slabs in this plan. And by
paving over the area around your base, then you both minimise the
regolith problem and it makes driving a damned lot easier.

From your document I noticed a few things, like how you often lack
backup facilities in case of failure.

Next would be that NASA is not a commercial company and thus they
won't ever become a dominant player in the energy market. How much
NASA allows commercial companies to do work remains to be seen.

I also noticed your plan to build a very long train track between
bases, where my thought was that there is only one ideal train system
for the Moon. That would be MagLev.

What I mean is that if you keep your track out of the sunlight, then
so do you have the perfect temperature for superconductivity. And to
top that off doing this in a void results close to zero friction.

Such trains in Earth already hold the world speed record, but this is
nothing compared to what you could do in a void. I am not even sure
how fast you could really go, where I guess that comes close to
unlimited, but a speed of like 7000 kph is certainly possible.

So instead of taking you 24 hours to move between bases, then this
could well take less than 1 hour. Certainly this is a more complex
system than your 100 year old technology, but then you are already on
page 54/66 at this point.

MagLev was born for the Moon. To not actually use it in this perfect
environment would be insane.

That bring me on to the other point not covered in your document,
which is death, disaster, crime and family emergency. Even this MagLev
system would produce a stunning display should it ever seriously go
wrong. Half your train doing 7000 kph aerobics into the side of some
hill, while your other half sends passengers, goods, and farm yard
animals, into deep space.

Sounds like a plan with a lot of good points anyway. I am just
doubting that NASA could even come close. More like a blow-up tent
that they spend 1 week at each 6 months.

Your large domes would find another interesting use it seems. Give
people wings and they could fly like the birds. Sound like a good
first lunar sports event. Throw in a ball and all that.

Cardman.