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What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? - and abouta lander to search for water on the Moon.
In this post I wondered what would be the hardest part of winning the
Google lunar X-prize: Newsgroups: sci.astro, sci.physics, sci.space.policy From: Robert Clark Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 08:51:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? http://groups.google.com/group/sci.a...929cb160?hl=en Some have argued the hardest part would be just getting the funding to complete the mission. Just saw this mentioned on Habitablezone.com: A Wet Moon Is Hot Once Again By Keith Cowing on November 15, 2009 8:01 AM 16 Comments "Keith's 14 Nov note: Word has it that NASA JSC has a stealth "Project M" underway whereby it would place a lander on the Moon in 1,000 days - once approved. "Meanwhile, word has it that NASA is now looking to match Google's $30 million pledge to the Google Lunar X Prize - and that Google may up their ante as well. Conversations are being held directly between X Prize and the 9th floor. IPP is not in the loop. Stay tuned." http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/20...moon-is-h.html Raising the prize amount to $60 million would go a long way to developing interest for a team to make the attempt. At this amount you might have teams also have one or more landers to land specifically in those locations shown to have high water amounts. Bob Clark |
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What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? - and abouta lander to search for water on the Moon.
On Dec 6, 5:47*am, Robert Clark wrote:
*In this post I wondered what would be the hardest part of winning the Google lunar X-prize: Newsgroups: sci.astro, sci.physics, sci.space.policy From: Robert Clark Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 08:51:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize?http://groups.google.com/group/sci.a...929cb160?hl=en *Some have argued the hardest part would be just getting the funding to complete the mission. *Just saw this mentioned on Habitablezone.com: A Wet Moon Is Hot Once Again By Keith Cowing on November 15, 2009 8:01 AM 16 Comments "Keith's 14 Nov note: Word has it that NASA JSC has a stealth "Project M" underway whereby it would place a lander on the Moon in 1,000 days - once approved. "Meanwhile, word has it that NASA is now looking to match Google's $30 million pledge to the Google Lunar X Prize - and that Google may up their ante as well. Conversations are being held directly between X Prize and the 9th floor. IPP is not in the loop. Stay tuned."http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/2009/11/a-wet-moon-is-h.html *Raising the prize amount to $60 million would go a long way to developing interest for a team to make the attempt. At this amount you might have teams also have one or more landers to land specifically in those locations shown to have high water amounts. * *Bob Clark With robust, rad-hard and thermally tolerant micro and even nano technology doable as is, and systems energy efficiency that's a thousand fold better off than anything Apollo had to work with, there's no good reason(s) to deploy anything much over 10 kg onto that physically dark, crystal dry, highly reactive via gamma, X-rays and UV and otherwise dusty and electrostatic charged surface. In fact, as little as a one kg item with its camera and a few other science instrument feedback capability, as such shouldn't be a problem. Excluding the fly-by-rocket hard-lander portion that would be separated at perhaps 100 meters above that extremely dusty surface, whereas this micro/nano rover or robo-bug like technology might not even sink out of sight. In order to get the 10 kg version plus its deorbit maximum 90 kg portion, as safely there (a total of 100 kg), as such should not demand all that significant of a primary rocket to begin with. Either China or India have relatively cheap rockets as is, that should more than accomplish this task of getting 100 kg into an elliptical lunar orbit of perhaps as low as 25 km, and otherwise I believe Russia once had hundreds of surplus ones that were even cheaper. So, your $60M prize suggestion should be sufficient, although $100M might be easier than you think because of what commercial and national sponsors should be capable of. A 10:1 return on the private investment would obviously insure many attempts at this prize. Of course our NASA is going to do everything possible to block/prevent any such Google moon X-prize efforts. ~ BG |
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What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? - and abouta lander to search for water on the Moon.
On Dec 6, 2:47*pm, Robert Clark wrote:
*In this post I wondered what would be the hardest part of winning the Google lunar X-prize: Newsgroups: sci.astro, sci.physics, sci.space.policy From: Robert Clark Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 08:51:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize?http://groups.google.com/group/sci.a...929cb160?hl=en *Some have argued the hardest part would be just getting the funding to complete the mission. *Just saw this mentioned on Habitablezone.com: A Wet Moon Is Hot Once Again By Keith Cowing on November 15, 2009 8:01 AM 16 Comments "Keith's 14 Nov note: Word has it that NASA JSC has a stealth "Project M" underway whereby it would place a lander on the Moon in 1,000 days - once approved. "Meanwhile, word has it that NASA is now looking to match Google's $30 million pledge to the Google Lunar X Prize - and that Google may up their ante as well. Conversations are being held directly between X Prize and the 9th floor. IPP is not in the loop. Stay tuned."http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/2009/11/a-wet-moon-is-h.html *Raising the prize amount to $60 million would go a long way to developing interest for a team to make the attempt. At this amount you might have teams also have one or more landers to land specifically in those locations shown to have high water amounts. * *Bob Clark Google sets Streetview cameras over fences around the world. Their 3D scanning of streets takes place from much higher position than people's heads, so one does see things he would not in person in a street. From space they would really dominate that aspect such big government freaks feel they need such powers and cameras up there in space. What is the future, currently 1000 US spy satellites, then 100 thousand spy satellites later this century? Send Google up there to space and see how many spyware a company as that would build. They are terror. |
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What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? - and abouta lander to search for water on the Moon.
The hardest part by far is propulsion. Everything else is easy by
comparison - but only by comparison. Nothing about space travel is easy. I tend to favor a radical departure in this area - namely MEMs engines (Micro-electromechanical system engines) Here, the same technology that is used to make integrated circuits the size of microbes, is used to make mechanical devices the size of microbes. The easiest way to think about how this is accomplished is to consider a microscope. With a microscope its easy to see a microbe. With the same optics as a microscope, you can also project an image the size of a microbe. With that ability, and a healthy knowledge of photo-chemical reactions, you can see how its possible to etch things on a tiny tiny scale. The other cool part is that fifty years of micro-circuit design has given us a tremendous capability to convert any micro-machine design into large scale production at very low cost. Micro machines are already in common use as air bag accelerometers, and actuators. Already in common use in HDTV plasma screens where millions of tiny nozzles glow in varying colors changing hundreds of times per second. Already in common use in ink jet printheads printing millions and millions of dots in seconds creating photographs on demand. Change the ink in an inkjet printer to rocket fuel, change the nozzles in a plasma screen to rocket nozzles, and you have a propulsive skin! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzXwctPXT4c Which can be attached to conventional tankage and feed systems to create a stage stack that is quite capable. http://www.scribd.com/doc/20053585/M...space-Overview The cool part is that propulsive skins once developed can be mass produced at very low cost. The other cool part is that these skins will have 1,000 to 1 thrust to weight ratios and produce 3.6 tons per square foot. Cryogenic propellants - using hydrogen and oxygen - have higher structural fraction than non-cryogenic propellants. In a SSTO configuration; H2/O2: 455 sec Isp, 3% structural fraction 87% propellant 10% payload H2O2/RP1: 375 sec Isp, 2% structural fraction 92% propellant 6% payload A lunar landing system requires a total delta vee of 15 km/sec - divided into 3 stages, that's 5 km/sec each, which using the rocket equation gives the sizing of the stack needed to reach the moon. |
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What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? - and abouta lander to search for water on the Moon.
On Dec 6, 11:10*pm, gb wrote:
On Dec 6, 2:47*pm, Robert Clark wrote: *In this post I wondered what would be the hardest part of winning the Google lunar X-prize: Newsgroups: sci.astro, sci.physics, sci.space.policy From: Robert Clark Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 08:51:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize?http://groups.google.com/group/sci.a...929cb160?hl=en *Some have argued the hardest part would be just getting the funding to complete the mission. *Just saw this mentioned on Habitablezone.com: A Wet Moon Is Hot Once Again By Keith Cowing on November 15, 2009 8:01 AM 16 Comments "Keith's 14 Nov note: Word has it that NASA JSC has a stealth "Project M" underway whereby it would place a lander on the Moon in 1,000 days - once approved. "Meanwhile, word has it that NASA is now looking to match Google's $30 million pledge to the Google Lunar X Prize - and that Google may up their ante as well. Conversations are being held directly between X Prize and the 9th floor. IPP is not in the loop. Stay tuned."http://www..nasawatch.com/archives/2009/11/a-wet-moon-is-h.html *Raising the prize amount to $60 million would go a long way to developing interest for a team to make the attempt. At this amount you might have teams also have one or more landers to land specifically in those locations shown to have high water amounts. * *Bob Clark Google sets Streetview cameras over fences around the world. Their 3D scanning of streets takes place from much higher position than people's heads, so one does see things he would not in person in a street. From space they would really dominate that aspect such big government freaks feel they need such powers and cameras up there in space. What is the future, currently 1000 US spy satellites, then 100 thousand spy satellites later this century? Send Google up there to space and see how many spyware a company as that would build. They are terror. Google is a first violation of human rights company. |
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What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? - and abouta lander to search for water on the Moon.
On Dec 7, 12:47*am, Robert Clark wrote:
*In this post I wondered what would be the hardest part of winning the Google lunar X-prize: Newsgroups: sci.astro, sci.physics, sci.space.policy From: Robert Clark Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 08:51:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize?http://groups.google.com/group/sci.a...929cb160?hl=en *Some have argued the hardest part would be just getting the funding to complete the mission. *Just saw this mentioned on Habitablezone.com: A Wet Moon Is Hot Once Again By Keith Cowing on November 15, 2009 8:01 AM 16 Comments "Keith's 14 Nov note: Word has it that NASA JSC has a stealth "Project M" underway whereby it would place a lander on the Moon in 1,000 days - once approved. "Meanwhile, word has it that NASA is now looking to match Google's $30 million pledge to the Google Lunar X Prize - and that Google may up their ante as well. Conversations are being held directly between X Prize and the 9th floor. IPP is not in the loop. Stay tuned."http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/2009/11/a-wet-moon-is-h.html *Raising the prize amount to $60 million would go a long way to developing interest for a team to make the attempt. At this amount you might have teams also have one or more landers to land specifically in those locations shown to have high water amounts. * *Bob Clark Hi, I was part of a half-hearted attempt at the Google lunar X prize that fizzled out. Details on: http://sssfmoon.proboards.com/index.cgi? There were various things that were difficult and ended up blocking the attempt. These included: 1. Getting together a critical mass of interested people in one place. 2. Convincing potential financiers that winning the money was not the main object of the exercise. 3. Intellectual disagreements over lander design - everyone seemed to have their own design. 4. Export limitations on components - this was a major hassle for any team from a country that does not have access to US and European hardware. In addition, my country has bans on some of the most appropriate fuels for the lunar lander because of environmental concerns. 5. Propulsion. 6. Launch cost. The main problem with propulsion units was that they had to have a very high thrust to weight ratio. A proposal from the Russians to use one of their existing engines had a low ratio, low enough to jeopardise the integrity of the mission. Similarly, we investigated a privately owned engine in the US, but again the thrust to weight ratio would have put the mission in jeopardy. Launch vehicles that were of an appropriate cost were either very unreliable, nearly unobtainable, or of very small payload - usually two of the three. |
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What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize? - and abouta lander to search for water on the Moon.
On Dec 7, 4:20*pm, "
wrote: On Dec 7, 12:47*am, Robert Clark wrote: *In this post I wondered what would be the hardest part of winning the Google lunar X-prize: Newsgroups: sci.astro, sci.physics, sci.space.policy From: Robert Clark Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 08:51:22 -0700 (PDT) Subject: What's the hardest part of the Google Lunar X prize?http://groups.google.com/group/sci.a...929cb160?hl=en *Some have argued the hardest part would be just getting the funding to complete the mission. *Just saw this mentioned on Habitablezone.com: A Wet Moon Is Hot Once Again By Keith Cowing on November 15, 2009 8:01 AM 16 Comments "Keith's 14 Nov note: Word has it that NASA JSC has a stealth "Project M" underway whereby it would place a lander on the Moon in 1,000 days - once approved. "Meanwhile, word has it that NASA is now looking to match Google's $30 million pledge to the Google Lunar X Prize - and that Google may up their ante as well. Conversations are being held directly between X Prize and the 9th floor. IPP is not in the loop. Stay tuned."http://www..nasawatch.com/archives/2009/11/a-wet-moon-is-h.html *Raising the prize amount to $60 million would go a long way to developing interest for a team to make the attempt. At this amount you might have teams also have one or more landers to land specifically in those locations shown to have high water amounts. * *Bob Clark Hi, I was part of a half-hearted attempt at the Google lunar X prize that fizzled out. Details on:http://sssfmoon.proboards.com/index.cgi? There were various things that were difficult and ended up blocking the attempt. These included: 1. Getting together a critical mass of interested people in one place. 2. Convincing potential financiers that winning the money was not the main object of the exercise. 3. Intellectual disagreements over lander design - everyone seemed to have their own design. 4. Export limitations on components - this was a major hassle for any team from a country that does not have access to US and European hardware. In addition, my country has bans on some of the most appropriate fuels for the lunar lander because of environmental concerns. 5. Propulsion. 6. Launch cost. The main problem with propulsion units was that they had to have a very high thrust to weight ratio. A proposal from the Russians to use one of their existing engines had a low ratio, low enough to jeopardise the integrity of the mission. Similarly, we investigated a privately owned engine in the US, but again the thrust to weight ratio would have put the mission in jeopardy. Launch vehicles that were of an appropriate cost were either very unreliable, nearly unobtainable, or of very small payload - usually two of the three. Public funded R&D simply isn't public. Even our NASA can't figure out how to affordably and safely get another lander onto our physically dark moon. Even 99.9% of the LRO mission is need-to-know or nondisclosure rated. ~ BG |
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