A Return to the Moon by the Apollo 11 50th Anniversary.

On Monday, November 5, 2012 12:05:16 PM UTC+13, bob haller wrote:
We could probably send a remote controlled rover by the 50th

anniversary, and have it take a look from a safe distance at the

apollo landing sites, and perhaps do some exploring, perhaps find what

remains of the apollo 11 LM upper stage which apparently crashed

somewhere on the moon......



Hopefully such a mission could give some info on the long term effects

50 years of exposure on the moons surface, close up photos of ranger

and surveyor couldnt do any harm.......

The system of interconnecting spheres - built with 3D printing technology - and equipped with an array of MEMS based rockets - as described in another post- can send a payload to the moon in the following way.

175.00 kg Total
167.55 kg propellant
7.45 kg structure & hardware

With 1,000 to 1 thrust to weight MEMS rockets - 300 kgf weighs 0.3 kg and covers 85.3 square cm of area.

With an exhaust speed of 4.5 km/sec the sphere attains 14.2 km/sec. A speed of 10.85 km/sec is needed to reach the moon. Another 2.64 km/sec is needed to execute a soft touchdown. This is 13.49 km/sec delta vee. Another 1..5 km/sec is needed to count for air-drag and gravity losses during ascent. So, we don't have enough for the trip.

To gain an advantage, two spheres each 1 meter in diameter are interconnected. One operates as a first stage supplying propellant to both accelerating both spheres and emptying and dropping away at 2.93 km/sec. Here we allow 1.5 km/sec for air drag and gravity losses, and we attain 1.43 km/sec true speed at stage separation. Another 153.43 kg of propellant is burned from the reserve of 167.55 kg adding another 9.42 km/sec raising the true speed to the required 10.85 km/sec. Another 9.58 kg of propellant is burned from the 14.02 kg reserve bringing the sphere down to the lunar surface for a soft landing. The remaining 3.50 kg propellant powers the sphere on the lunar surface by using the MEMS rocket array on the surface to cause the vehicle to roll in any direction.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iekwuScLmg

A dozen high def wide angle lens cameras each pointing in a different direction provide coverage in all directions. Using accelerometers built into the sphere's skin, a stable image is maintained in the computer's memory despite the sphere's rotation.

http://mafija.fmf.uni-lj.si/seminar/...ers-koncna.pdf

Also, the skin is equipped with a phased array antenna system that allows the 1 meter diameter sphere operate with a 32 dBi gain at 3.8 GHz. The accelerometer system that stabilizes the cameras also stabilize the beam communicating with Earth.

A commercial 4.6 m parabolic diameter antenna operates on Earth and provides a 43 dBi gain.

Control is fully automatic and does not require live feedback. Furthermore, several hundred GB of memory are stored on board allowing several hours of high definition video to be stored, which is then downloaded to Earth when the receiver is in view of the satellite.

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

http://design.caltech.edu/micropropulsion/

http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/64436/1/Coletti_Inkjet.pdf

I could build a fleet of these for less than $8 million and send six landers to the moon one way in a year for this price using 3D printing technology..

http://www.bikeradar.com/news/articl...ponents-37404/

Of course, a collection of 48 spheres operating as a five stage rocket, with an aeroshell covering the first stage, can send a man or woman to the moon and return them to Earth.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/40549127/Disk-Moonship