The European Space Agency just unveiled its plans to build a base onthe moon

Fred J McCall schrieb:
Thomas Koenig wrote:

Take a simple O-ring used as a seal as as an example.

Currently, this is made from an elastomer. If it needs to
withstand oil, you will probably need NBR, a rubber made from
1-3-Butadiene and Acrylonitrile.

So, you need 1-3-Butadiene.

snip petrochemical description

Or instead of cracking down complex hydrocarbons you don't have, you
build up what you need out of the pieces. Please read up on in situ
resource utilization.

What in situ resources could I use on the Moon (or Mars) to make an
O-ring capable of withstanding oil?

In sci.physics Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:

In sci.physics Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:

In sci.physics Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:

In sci.physics Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:


I would say the odds of finding limestone deposits to make cement
highly unlikely. You do know limestone is organically created, don't
you?


You do know that we can make concrete and cement out of lunar rock,
don't you?

Sure, one can make concrete out of just about anything. It is making
the cement that is the problem, which requires limestone.


You need to research before you run your mouth. They actually tested
the suitability of lunar rocks for making construction materials and
they could do everything they needed to do. We use limestone as the
calcium source here on Earth because it's easily gotten, but a lack of
limestone really doesn't mean **** as long as you have rocks with
calcium in them.

Are there extensive calcium deposits on the Moon?


Extensive enough. Is Google broken on your machine or what?

Are there cement factories on the Moon?


So colonization is impossible unless Pittsburgh already exists on
Mars?

Once again the voices in your head are telling you I said something
that I never said.



What would it cost to build a cement factory on the Moon?


A lot less than you apparently think. You don't need a huge factory
right off, after all. The Macedonians and Romans made and used
cement, after all.

Yep, on Earth with food, air, charcol, and water, but no pressure suits.

Have you ever seen an actual cement plant?

http://www.nss.org/settlement/nasa/s...3/lunacem1.htm

You may find bauxite or iron ore, but unless it is really close to
where you set up your colony, you would have no way to transport it.


This is presumably because the colony was planned by you and you
didn't allow any supplies but stone axes and bear skins.


That is both childish and stupid.


Oh, look whose talking, Mr "They all believe Star Trek science and
economics are real" who does nothing but wave hands and make strawman
arguments.


Like pointing out facts?


You have yet to point out any 'facts'. I've posted links to papers
and studies that explode any number of the falsehoods that seem to be
your stock in trade, though.

Care to detail how you would transport raw ore over just a hundred
miles on Mars and what would power that transport?


Truck. Hydrogen works. Yes, you have to plan on needing the truck.
You could crush and smelt to rough ingots (solar furnace works for
that) to lower the volume you need to drag to your factory.

Where do you get the hydrogen and what do you do with it then?


I posted a link to a paper about this. Perhaps you should bother to
actually read things people point you to instead of insisting on
remaining ignorant?

Unable to give a simple answer and prefer to be insulting?


Unable to read a cite and prefer to remain an ignorant ****e?

Pefer to remain an insulting asshole?

Let's try again. READ IT THIS TIME, YAMMERHEAD!

http://chapters.marssociety.org/winnipeg/plastics.html

Yes, that's not how we do it here on Earth, but we're not talking
about here on Earth anymore.

Right, we are talking about a place with zero infrastructure, a thin
atmosphere that is 95% CO2, and easily obtainable source of either
oxygen or water.


You really haven't kept up, have you? Turns out there's all sorts of
available water on Mars and there's even adequate amounts on the Moon.
That's why we send those probe things, you know.

Is there a water plant on the Moon or Mars?


Again you insist that Pittsburgh must already exist on Mars before
colonization is possible?

Again that is the voices in your head telling you I said something I did
not say.


How much would it cost to build a water plant on the Moon or Mars?


Easy peasy. Lots of free vacuum and power.

Nope, no power until you build a power plant and you still have to
have machinery and power for the machinery to dig.

Or, in other words, a huge amount of money.


If you setup your colony next to some ore deposit, you need a refinary
and power for it, which could only come from a fair sized reactor.


Certainly one way to do it (and probably easiest for the initial
colony), but long term production of power isn't that hard.


Really, where do you propose to get that power?


The same place all power comes from; the Sun. Crack water to get
hydrogen if you need a portable power source, take a bunch of small
reactors, RTGs, or whatever with you (along with a couple of big
reactors to get you started).

With a solar irradiance of less than 100 W/m^2 you are going to get
very little power from solar sources unless your array is measured
in kilometers.


Your number is low. Did you read the paper on power on Mars that I
pointed you to? Or did you just dishonestly delete the link?

I read several articles on the available irradiance on the surface
of Mars, all with wildly varying numbers from less than 100 W/m^2
average to as much as 500 W/m^2 average. The 100 W/m^2 number came
from a paper taking great care to include atmospheric diffusion.


No, it takes a lot more into account than that to get numbers that
low. Depending on what you take into account (like the day/night
cycle) you get numbers for Earth as low as 250 W/m^2 or so, so I guess
solar power won't work here, either.

And it doesn't is a lot of places.


There is no known readily available source of water to crack.


Of course there is. Pull your head out of your ass and update your
knowledge.

So you are saying there is a water plant on Mars all ready to go?


Still insisting Pittsburgh must have already been dropped on Mars
before colonization is possible?

What is it with the voices in your head that keep telling you I am
using the words "possible" and "impossible" when I am not?


Or would water plants have to be first built and at what cost?


Asked and answered. Water is the EASY part.

I could care less about easy, how much would it COST?



If you get the water somehow, you need to store both the hydrogen
and the oxygen.


Well, gee, no ****! You know, we sort of know how to do that.

So what does it cost to build the water plant, the oxygen/hydrogen
generation plant, and the power source for all of it?


Look it up. All that stuff is included in all those studies you
refuse to look at because they don't describe dropping Pittsburgh on
Mars.

None of the stuff you refered to has anything to do with establishing
a real colony, with families and kids.

And it would take a LOT more than just Pittsburgh.


What does it cost to ship oxygen and hydrogen tanks to Mars?


Unnecessary. What does it cost to get you to pull your head out of
your ass and actually think?

So you do not need tanks to hold the generated oxygen and hydrogen?

Are all your machines going to run on long rubber hoses?

Sure, all of this is theoretically posible.

The current cost to build a reactor on Earth is about $9 billion.


You're talking about a multi-hundred megawatt power reactor that we'd
never build on Mars. A big chunk of that cost is environmental
studies and other bureaucratic bull**** that won't need to take place
on Mars.

Most all the environmental savings will be offset by the one off cost
of designing a reactor that will work on Mars.


You don't just build one, you stupid ****. Incremental growth and all
that.

I see you know nothing about economies of scale or manufacturing actual
things.


Also, there is a chicken and egg problem. Massive amounts of water
will be required for you oxygen/hydrogen fuel and reactor cooling
but you can't get that until you have a reactor.

If you are talking about a real colony, then you do need that hundred
megawatt reactor.


No, what I need is a bunch of smaller ones that are gradually added.
We're not talking about instantly dropping a few million people on
Mars, after all. Well, perhaps YOU are in order to raise all the
objections you raise.

You don't have a real colony until you can accept and support migration
in numbers much bigger than 2 or 3 per year.

All you are talkiing about is a bigger and better research station.


If you are talking about a research station, you don't need any of
that expensive infrastructure, you just need resupply.


And you're wrong about that, too. Perhaps you should actually READ
some of those studies I pointed you to rather than blindly insisting
they don't apply.

I did.

None of them talk about a real colony, just a bigger and better research
station.

So what is the total cost to haul a reactor in pieces along with all
the needed to put it together on Mars?


Why haul it in pieces? Again, we're not talking about the sort of
power reactor we build here on Earth.

We are if you are taling about a real colony with families and kids.


Well, I'll agree that YOU are talking about that, but then you're
apparently not very smart. No one with sense is talking about
instantaneously needing to drop Pittsburgh on Mars.

There go those voice in your head again. I said nothing about instantaneously
but I have said a lot about total cost.

And it would take a lot more than just Pittsburgh.


What is the tranportation cost for the kilometers of solar panels?


In situ resource.

Last I heard the Chinese didn't have any solar panel plants on Mars,
so there is yet another thing that would have to be built for a
real colony.


Yes, Chimp, colonies have to BUILD THINGS. Wow, I guess that's
impossible. Again, go read some of those papers I pointed you to.

There go those voice in your head again. I said nothing about impossible.

And again, none of them talk about a real colony, just a bigger and better
research station.


What is the tranportation cost for the machinery to dig out the ice
we THINK is buried beneath the surface?


You 'think'. The rest of us are more current and 'know', because that
free flowing water NASA probes have found evidence of has to come from
somewhere and I'm pretty sure little green men aren't shipping the
stuff in.

Good way to ignore the question about the costs and throw in a gratuitous
insult.


I 'ignored the question' because it's a stupid question. It's a
stupid question because we KNOW there is water on Mars. It's not a
gratuitous insult when you hop up and down acting like a stupid ****
and begging for it.

Still ignoring the cost questions?

I guess you have to, otherwise you would realize your starry eyed dream
of space colonies is not economical.


What is the tranportation cost for the machinery crack water?

The point is that all this crap is just too expensive for it to ever
happen.


Well, nobody is going to throw a dart at a map of Mars and drop
Pittsburgh somewhere, true enough. Again (I don't know why I'm
bothering; you won't listen), you might want to read up on exploration
and colonization back in the 15th century or so and adjust the costs
by 600 years of inflation.

Wrong answer.


Go run the costs.


In the 15th century or so all you had to transport was basic hand tools,
seeds, clothes and a few other things.

There was no requirement for things like pressure suits, oxygen, water,
food and repair parts for high tech equiment just to stay alive for
more than a few minutes.


Irrelevant. That was the high tech stuff of the time.

Irrelevant. There was no need for high tech stuff.

Go read the Mars Reference Mission, Chimp.

Which is to establish a research station, not a colony.


Everything starts somewhere, Chimp. If you're waiting for us to be
able to drop Pittsburgh on Mars, you should just toddle back to your
Intel 8008-based computer. From the Mars Reference Mission "Goals and
Objectives":

"Goal IV+: Preparation for sustained human presence. MEPAG (2006) uses
the term ?Goal IV? to describe preparation for the first human
explorers. By definition, this cannot be a goal for the first human
missions; by then the preparation would have to have been complete.
However, a goal of the first human missions is to prepare for the
subsequent future after that."

In case you don't get it yet, "sustained human presence" is the start
of a colony.

No, it is not.


Yes it is too. Read the papers, you ****ing idiot.

You mean the papers that talk about bigger and better research stations,
space cadet?


We have had "sustained human presence" in Antartica for a long time,
but not a colony.


Because colonies are prohibited by treaty.

Only since 1959 yet in the nearly 500 years between 1492 and 1959 no
interest in colonies.

Certainly not from solar power as the solar irradiance on the surface
of Mars is less than 100 W/m^2.


Check your math. Your number is wrong.

Not my math, The Univerity of Colorado's math.

That was an average number adjusting for the presence of haze in the
atmosphere.


And counting hours of darkness and averaged over latitude, no doubt.
In other words, if you're STUPID that's the number you plan to and put
forward.

Nope, mid latitudes, ass hole.


Wrong, dip****.

Bite me, ass hole.

Certainly not from wind power as the atmosphere is so thin there
is no energy to speak of in the wind, no matter what you saw in
"The Martian".


Wrong again. Once again, please educate yourself on the issues before
flapping your arms and squawking. Again, let me help.

http://www.marspapers.org/papers/MAR98058.pdf

It appears that this paper pretty much agrees with what I said.


Then English isn't your first language.

You: Solar power is a non-starter.
Paper: "Solar power is readily available on Mars,..."

In small amounts; great for a research station, not so much so for an
actual colony.


Not what it says.

Yes, exactly what it says.


You: Wind power is a non-starter.
Paper: "Although the atmospheric density is about 100 times less than
the Earth, Mars has several advantages for successful wind power
applications..."

In small amounts; great for a research station, not so much so for an
actual colony.


Not what it says.

Yes, exactly what it says.


You need a lot of raw material and the ability to process it into
something usefull to build the domed and pressurized buildings
required to survive and do anything.


You need to be able to dig a hole.


Dig it with what and then what do you do with it?


Dig it with tools (they're this marvelous thing we've invented since
you looked at colonization of anywhere) and then seal it up and live
in it.

How much to transport all those tools to Mars?


As a percentage of mission cost, not much. And that's not how mission
costing for these things works anyway. You're sending the vehicle.
Cost is opportunity cost. Dollar cost once you are going to launch
the vehicle is irrelevant, since it doesn't cost you much less if you
leave out a few tons of stuff.

Dollar cost is always relevant as someone has to come up with the dollars.


But it's not relevant the way you're trying to use it. Dollar cost is
relevant FOR THE ENTIRE PAYLOAD but not relevant FOR THE INDIVIDUAL
PIECES because removing a piece doesn't change your cost.

There go those voice in your head again. I did not say anything about
payload.

Given a transport of some fixed size, the cost of transport is in how
much fuel is required per pound to get the cargo somewhere.


But the cost doesn't change if you delete part of the cargo because
the cost is PER LAUNCH, not PER POUND.

The cost is the cost of the vehicle, which may be amortized if it is
reusable, the cost of the cargo and crew, and the cost of the fuel to
get from point A to point B.


Where do you get stuff to seal it unless you send it from Earth and
what does that cost?


Which part of 'in situ plastics' is it that you missed?

Which part of there are no plastic plants on Mars or the Moon have
you missed?


Which part of having to build **** instead of just moving in have you
missed?

Which part of having to pay for something have you missed?

It doesn't matter if it is an O-ring or an O-ring manufacturing plant.

It has to be payed for to be acquired and payed for to be transported.

You may including building costs in the acquistion cost for the plant
if you so desire.

Line it and cover it with something shipped from Earth in pieces
at huge expense?


Or instead you can pull your head out of your ass and seal it with
locally produced plastics. What you suggest will probably be how a
base would do it initially, but again this is a problem people have
thought about. You need to study up.

Again, you would need massive infrastructure already in place to make
plastic on Mars.


Not as massive as you seem to think, but in any case you build up to
it. First missions you do with inflatables that you bury. Digging
holes and throwing dirt on top of something is pretty low tech stuff.
Each mission brings more stuff and leaves it behind for the next
group. Eventually you're staying full time and you start getting that
critical mass of 'infrastructure'. Nobody sane thinks we're going to
up and put Pittsburgh somewhere on Mars as the first 'colonization'
mission and nobody sane thinks we have to.

The needs of a research station and a colony with families and kids
are so horrendously different that you will never, even slowly,
get to that critical mass of 'infrastructure'. Resupply would be
far cheaper.


Wrong. Both ways.

Really?

Does a research station need schools, playgrounds, toys, diaper production
facilities, matenity wards, nipples and bottles for infants?

You will be lacking just about all usefull chemicals as most of
them come from petroleum, so no plastics.


Jimp, you just make them a different way. Unlikely on the Moon, but
not difficult at all on Mars. Educate yourself. People have examined
all your 'impossible' problems and there are solutions to all of them.


No, not difficult at all on Mars for someone that isn't going to be
doing it or paying for it.


Chimp, better people than you have thought about all the problems you
raise as things that are 'impossible' and it turns out they're just
not that hard if you plan for them.

I never said anything about hard, I am talking about the cost.


No, you were talking about solar being impossible and wind being
impossible and everything else being impossible until you got swatted
back on that and NOW you want to raise cost.

You are listening to the voices in your head again.


You are listening to the rumbling of your bowels around your head
again.

You are dreaming of plots in sifi novels again.


I never said ANYTHING was impossible, I said it was so horrendously
expensive no one will be willing to pay for it.


You vacillate. What is your threshold of unacceptable cost?

In the low tens of billions per year for the US, like maybe $20 billion
for the ENTIRE space program.

Budget you colony building accordingly.

I could care less what anyone else cares to kick in as it isn't my
tax money.



Again, the cost for all this pie in the sky is so horrendous it will
never happen.


Good Lord, man, Isabella had to hock her jewels to pay for it! This
whole 'new world' pie in the sky has such horrendous costs that it
will never happen!

And Isabella got a huge return on her investment.


Eventually.

Yep, shortly after Columbus returned.

There is no conceivable ROI for going to the Moon or Mars.


Wrong again. Your lack of imagination is your problem, not mine.

So demonstrate your imagination, what could possibly have a ROI?

Most things are valuable because they are rare. If you, for example,
find a huge deposit of platinum, the price will drop because of increased
supply and there goes the ROI.

The issue is not whether or not it is theoretically possible to do
something on Mars, the issue is that doing anything on Mars, including
gettting there in the first place is horrendously expensive.


Initially getting to North America was "horrendously expensive", too.
Just look at what those expeditions cost and adjust them for
inflation.

And most of them were done at a profit from all the stuff the expeditions
returned.


Go study some more.

Lke your example of Isabella which resulted in enormous wealth for Spain?


Eventually.

Yep, almost right after Columbus got back.


There is nothing on Mars that is anywhere near the value of the transportation
costs.


Not the argument you've been trying to make, Chimp.

Nope, not the arguement I am making but my response to why anyone would
attempt to establish a real colony off the Earth.


So your head is up and locked and you're just wasting everyone's time.
Got it.

And you are a starry eyed space cadet raised on scifi novels that has
never built anything, does not understand what it takes to build things.
and has no concept of cost and ROI.


You keep arguing how things "aren't possible". If you want to argue
that it's not worth the money, that's a different issue.

I have never said "aren't possible", that is the voices in your head.


And there's the Chimp that wonders why he gets bile and insults.

You mean because you keep saying I said things I never said?


I mean because you keep spewing bile and insults and then are

Only when YOU start it, ass hole.

surprised when they're returned to you. Please visit your
psychiatrist, as that sort of thinking is symptomatic of many types of
mental illness. Perhaps they can help you with appropriate medication
so you recognize your own behaviour.


What I have said over and over again is that the cost of a colony on
Mars is so horrendously expensive with zero economic return it will
never happen absent the invention of techology that reduces the costs
many orders of magnitude.


Yeah, the New World wasn't worth it for a long time, either.

Right, it took a year or two from the time Columbus sailed until Isabella
started seeing profits.


Bull****. Go read up on the history of failed colonies, mutiny, etc.

Irrelevant to YOUR example of Columbus.

Trudge back to your cave, Chimp...

Go back to your space cadet movies, dreamer.


Go back to your cave and stop making up lies, Chimp.

**** off and die, space cadet.


--
Jim Pennino

In sci.physics Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:

In sci.physics Doc O'Leary wrote:
For your reference, records indicate that
wrote:

As Antarctica has never had any colonies, Antarctica is irrelevant to
a discussion of colonies.

And yet *you* were the one who brought it up. It?s always fun to see
people attacking their own straw man arguments! :-)

So just what are the natural resources available on Mars?

All the ones we know about, and all the ones we *dont yet* know about.
The main problem with your thinking is that you seem to use Earth-
centric thinking when evaluating the resources that are available.

I use economic thinking.


No, you don't. Where did you get your degree in economics. They
should take it back.


It is well known that there is lots of gold in sea water but it costs
far more to extract than the gold is worth.


Wrong. It's just that the same amount of money applied elsewhere gets
you more gold. And you claim to be engaging in 'economic thinking'?
You don't know the meaning of the phrase!

Nope, the extraction cost exceeds the value.

There are no forests, no lakes, no rivers, no life and no air.

You seem to have more knowledge than NASA on those things. How is that?

When did NASA announce there are forests, lakes, rivers, life, and
air anywhere else than Earth?


They've announced there's free flowing water on Mars, water vapour in
the atmosphere, underground ices. You insist there aren't.

That is not the same thing as forests, lakes and rivers, i.e. things
you can stick a bucket in and fill it with drinkable water.

I would say the odds of finding limestone deposits to make cement
highly unlikely. You do know limestone is organically created, don't
you?

You do know that civilizations have been built without relying on
limestone, dont you?

Yep, but modern civilizations are built with concrete and steel; before
that it was wood.


Haven't heard of 'rocks', 'caves', and 'holes' in your neck of the
woods?

Sure but on Earth they don't need airlocks.

[blathering about industrial mining snipped]

something usefull to build the domed and pressurized buildings
required to survive and do anything.

If thats how you think about what is *required* to survive, you clearly
havent thought much about the problem. These are *your* straw men.

So you think you can survive on the Moon or Mars without a presurized
building? Are you going to live in a pressure suit 24/7?


So you think you can't survive on the Moon with Pittsburgh?

There go those voices in your head again. You really should see
someone about that.

You will be lacking just about all usefull chemicals as most of
them come from petroleum, so no plastics.

You do know that civilizations have been built without relying on
plastics, dont you?

Not modern ones with the advanced technology required to survive off
the Earth.


Gee, something hasn't been done yet, so it is forever impossible. Back
to your cave, Chimp.

There go those voices in your head again. You really should see
someone about that.


You miss the point, it would take Star Trek technology to make it affordable.

I dont miss that point at all. I *made* that point when I questioned
the proposed budget. But I am also making the point that it does *not*
require magical technology if you dont make the assumption that you?re
going to live an Earth-styled life on such an inhospitable landscape.


I have been talking about colonies, i.e. families and kids.

A research station requires very little in terms of infrastructure, just
constant resupply.


Wrong. You see, this is the kind of error you make when you misapply
'economic thinking' from ignorance. First example, it's cheaper to
ship an automated rocket fuel factory to Mars to make fuel for the
return trip than it is to ship the fuel.

Which has nothing to do with supplying those kids with diapers and
baby bottles.

You really ought to read some of those papers I keep pointing you to.
It would keep you from sounding so stupidly ignorant.


It is my opinion that an off Earth true colony would cost far too much
for anyone to ever try it and few people would be willing to permanently
move to one.

It is my opinion that off Earth research stations are of limited value
and the cost and rewards of doing them should be balanced against sending
swarms of robots throughout the solar system.


If people aren't going, there's no point to "swarms of robots" so the
cost there is zero.

The point to swarms of robots is scientific research.

Your point seems to be you want to cozy up to a three titted hooker
in a Martian bar just like in the movies.


--
Jim Pennino

On Friday, April 8, 2016 at 7:01:03 AM UTC+12, wrote:
In sci.physics Jeff Findley wrote:
In article , says...

On 4/5/2016 6:14 PM, Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:

All historical colonizations have been to places with air, water, and
growing things where one could be dropped nude and survive. ....




Bull****. Lots of colonies in the New World succeeded only by the
skin of their teeth and lots of them failed and they all had the best
technology available at the time.



silly boy,

the moon and mar have NO AIR, NO WATER, NO FOOD, NOTHING but sand and
rocks, and high radiation.

Both the moon and Mars have water. Mars has a very thin atmosphere of
CO2. Other chemicals, such as oxygen on the moon, can be extracted from
the local "soil". No, there are no animals or plants to eat, but the
raw materials are definitely there to make them.

Jeff

There are no raw materials off the Earth to make Jello.

Yes there is. The same materials that exist on Earth exist everywhere in the cosmos. Spectroscopy proves that.

Sure you can theoretically do all that,

So, which is it? Obviously, since the same materials exist everywhere as exist here, we can easily make whatever we want anywhere in the cosmos.

all it takes is very large, very
sophisticated, very heavy, very expensive, and very expensive to transport
equipment along with a very expensive power system to make it all work.

All things human do require very sophisticated processes. However, their cost and weight, and what must be transported to instantiate those processes is a function of technical skill and know how.

The key here is the horrendous cost of getting things to the Moon or Mars
in the first place and that any equipment used there will likely be a
one off custom design that will come at another huge expense.

You presume things that seem reasonable, but arise from a profound ignorance of what is possible, and as a result, your presumptions are not necessarily so.

You mentioned Jello. So, let's look at that as a good example

Jello is made from inedible collagens which are processed into edible proteins by dissolving those proteins in hydrochloric acid. The dissolved protiens then extracted and purified rendering them edible in the process. A very useful thing to do in a closed cycle setup. Its easy to see that this process is an important one since it is critical to close the life support system of a colony.

So, what's involved?

Here is a good primer reference on the process;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bYIow9pc6M

And a more detailed reference here;

https://www.academia.edu/8410348/Ind...y_and_Practice

Now, you can take this process chart and send it to a qualified vendor, such as this one;

http://www.precoinc.com/newsletter/2...ip-production/

To produce a process on chip that is about the size of a postage stamp, and processes a milliliter of gelatin per day.

These will cost about $35,000 per spin, and it will likely take 3 or 4 spins to get the details right. So, about $150,000 in risk capital. Then, you with a prototype, you figure out what the product will cost in larger quantities.

You will have something about 1 cm2 and a few mm thick, that processes a millilitre of gelatine a day from a millilitre of collagen a day. At that scale, you'd get 706 of them on a 300 mm diameter wafer. Such a wafer costs about $1500 in small quantity and trends down to $750 per wafer in larger quantity. So, you've got $1 to $2 per chip - to process 1 cc or more per day of gelatine massing 1 gram.

That's your basic jello making chip set.

How many do you need?

A pack of Jello-Brand gelatine weighs 85 grams and last year 300 million packets were sold in 158 flavourings in the USA. That's about 1 packet of 85 grams per person per year. So, a chip that costs $1 that makes bones, nail clippings skin hair fur feathers and similar wastes into edible products, for 4.3 persons per chip at this productivity and level of consumption.

Gelatine has about 42.5 MJ/kg so 1 gram has 42.5 kJ/g - and the process described above is about 16% efficient, so multiply by six - that means each chip will consume about 2.95 Watts of power - and that's 686 milliwatts per person. 6 kWh per year in energy costs and at $0.11 per kWh that's $0.66 for a package of gelatine.

The cost and weight are negligible. The feedstock is waste. The cost of energy determines the cost of the product.

In short, you can have Jello with your meals if you like all made in situ with no transportation costs between worlds.

Lab on Chip or Micro Electro Mechanical Systems - make 3D printed drugs possible. This can also be used to make 3D printed flavourings as well.

http://www.theatlantic.com/technolog...dustry/401177/

So, we can have the 158 flavourings too.

What can be done with gelatine, can be done with ANYTHING! We can print 3D organs for medicine, we can also print 3D food items.

http://3dprinting.com/food/

When we build swarms of mobile 'print heads' that operate together to create 3d patterns very rapidly, we will have something very similar to the food replicator of fiction, all using well defined near term technology available now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fl3JjgeDp68

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xK54Bu9HFRw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIEhi_sAkU8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihR9SX7dgRo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEez9lNh8Uw

So, what's the minimum mass we need to send to live well? We make use of self-replicating machine cells that swarm together to extract needed materials from the environment to organise the environment to our needs. This is called a self-replicating utility fog.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXpkG93KzdY

How much do we need? The answer is about 10 kg. Half of that are seed cells that are held in stasis during the trip. About 2,000 varieties of plant and animal cells, that are feed by algae that doubles in mass every 33 hours when in the right environment. The other half are a variety of machine cells that extract materials from the environment using available sunlight. One variety processes regolith. Another variety processes air. Yet another processes sunlight. Each variety cooperates with the others, and each is given a cascade of tasks after landing to grow into a self sufficient homestead for the astronauts who came along as well.

Housing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YiPLjozLdU

Clothing
http://www.electroloom.com

So, an adult that has sufficient resources to survive 30 days in the vacuum of space, along with another 20 kg of self-replicating utility fog, in a mechancal counter-pressure suit all massing 98 kg - including astronaut (on average) means that a 53 ton payload of a Falcon Heavy, with a LOX/Methane rocket with a 3.73 km/sec exhaust speed, must achieve a delta vee of 6 km/sec requires 42.9 tons of propellant and carries 10.1 tons of payload. At 100 kg per person, (structure) this is enough to carry 100 people to mars, in stasis. With 30 days of supplies, they spend a day watching Earth disappear, and re-awaken a day before aerobraking on Mars. I mentioned the deep space stage as if it were a single ship. It is not. Each person is dressed in a long duration spacesuit, and has their own MEMS based rocket array on the suit surface. The suit allows them to boost to Mars, enter stasis, re-awaken, and land on the red planet, plant your machine system, and tend to its growth into the homestead of your dreams.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-C_jPcUkVrM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqfnMzDhi38


Stasis - suspended animation - metabolic flexibility - are different words for the same thing. It is als a solved problem. It is being used on humans today to extend life at the scenes of tragic accidents. It is being explored as a means to bring combatants into custody with less risks to all. It will be used to explore the cosmos.

https://labs.fhcrc.org/roth/

The cost of a Falcon heavy launch with all parts thrown away is $61 million.. The cost of a Falcon heavy launch with all parts reused 150 times or more is less than $600,000. 100 divided by $600,000 is $6,000. Monsterous profits $10,000 - per person.

So, we can see that we are very near to achieving a transformation in the way we relate to the cosmos.

One ship whose parts and pieces are all brought back to the launch center and maintained and refuelled to relaunch in 4 hours, can place 6 payloads of 100 each per day. 600 persons per day - per ship.

So, one ship can send 219,156 people to Mars per year. Ten ships can transport 2.2 million per year. 1500 ships can send 330 million per year - which reduces Earth's population.

The world presently has nearly 20,000 airliners that transport 10 million people per day - 3.6 billion people per year.




--
Jim Pennino

On Friday, April 8, 2016 at 7:16:04 AM UTC+12, wrote:
In sci.physics Jeff Findley wrote:
In article ,
says...
Colonies with insufficient support from 'back home' tended to
disappear. You talk like all colonization attempts are easily
successful. There are enough failed colonies to prove that to be
bull****.

I never said anything like that.

However, support from 'back home' wasn't oxygen, food, water, and
repair parts for high tech equipment.

Water is available on both the moon and Mars at at least one of the
poles on each. Oxygen is also available on both the moon and Mars; it
just needs to be extracted. Food can therefore be grown.

Sure, all this is theoretically posible

Its possible in practice as well.

at a horrendous cost that no
one will ever want to finance.

Nonsense. You have no understandng of what it required using current best practices. If you did you would see just how simple it all is.

Repair parts for high tech equipment is exactly the sort of thing that
Fred is talking about when he says "support". For early earth colonies,
things which are difficult to manufacture locally, like anything made of
metal, had to be shipped in, unless there was a readily available source
of metal at the colony and all of the tools to smelt and then process
and work with it.

Repair parts take more than metal.

True.

Concider

Consider you mean.

all the bits and pieces
needed to make something as simple as a relay to control a blower
motor.

Yes, people are considering that and making machines that make machines - Self replicating machine systems are a solved problem. Have been since 2005.. Now, the effort is to figure out how to make those machines most efficient.

All scarcity is artificially induced and maintained by those who benefit from the scarcity. Those who point this out are largely ignored by those who arrange the scarcity in the first place. This is a very ancient problem for humanity.

Aristotle wrote about Plato's "Allegory of the Cave" the teaching of which resulted in Plato's sentence of death by the ruling oligarchy of Greece. Not before he awakened many Greeks to their plight, which resulted in the oligarchy abandoning Greece in favour of Rome. In the end, Rome was abandoned in favour of The Church, and that was abandoned in favour of Nation-States and International Banking Cartels. We are undergoing another transformation today, which will result in emergent systems of organising human behaviour having little to do with the legacy systems we take for granted today.

Today a general awakening is occurring and will result in absolute repudiation of all existing systems. You can see that happening now;

Government
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fU07AdnZiSw

Religion
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_TDgTebF_Y

Education
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeEWPbTad_Q

Culture
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiVxbS02kp0

The legacy systems described above will be replaced by an emergent system that is voluntarily supported by all without appeal to fear or violence.

Emergence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pooxD8XF5Uw

This will lead to the rapid transformation of humanity once we begin selecting for 'tameness' uniformly.

Balyaev Experiment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jFGNQScRNY

So, it is not only our range that will change, but outselves as well.

On 4/7/2016 4:26 PM, Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:

In sci.physics Doc O'Leary wrote:
For your reference, records indicate that
wrote:



So just what are the natural resources available on Mars?

rocks, dust, no air.


There are no forests, no lakes, no rivers, no life and no air.

You seem to have more knowledge than NASA on those things. How is that?

that is what NASA says...





They've announced there's free flowing water on Mars, water vapour in
the atmosphere, underground ices.

no, not free flowing water.





So you think you can survive on the Moon or Mars without a presurized
building? Are you going to live in a pressure suit 24/7?

how you gonna poop ?




I have been talking about colonies, i.e. families and kids.

you want your kids on Mars ? so do a lot of other parents.


A research station requires very little in terms of infrastructure, just
constant resupply.


Wrong. You see, this is the kind of error you make when you misapply
'economic thinking' from ignorance. First example, it's cheaper to
ship an automated rocket fuel factory to Mars to make fuel for the
return trip than it is to ship the fuel.

so, how do you make fuel from dust and rocks ?



It is my opinion that an off Earth true colony would cost far too much
for anyone to ever try it and few people would be willing to permanently
move to one.

agree, it will be worse than being in prison.



It is my opinion that off Earth research stations are of limited value
and the cost and rewards of doing them should be balanced against sending
swarms of robots throughout the solar system.


how do you wash clothes in space ? use how much water, then purify the
water, how ? be specific.

You will find washing clothes is one of the key restraints on space travel.

what do they do now? not washing, the ship new clothes up with the shuttle.

you will find that Man is specifically designed to exist on Earth.
(water, air, food, cleaning, poop, etc)

not Mars, Not the moon.



If people aren't going, there's no point to "swarms of robots" so the
cost there is zero.

robot probes will work

moon and mars habitats can be built in lava tubes or cut and cover transhab inflatables. the lunar dirt would provide radiation protection.

the key is cheap cost to orbit. space x is doing a excellent job at lowering the costs to orbit.

meanwhile nasa and their boondoggle SLS orion is a excellent example of how nooot to do it and waste big bucks

On Thu, Apr 07, 2016 at 10:43:48PM -0000, wrote:
In sci.physics Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:

In sci.physics Doc O'Leary wrote:
For your reference, records indicate that
wrote:

As Antarctica has never had any colonies, Antarctica is irrelevant to
a discussion of colonies.

And yet *you* were the one who brought it up. It?s always fun to see
people attacking their own straw man arguments! :-)

So just what are the natural resources available on Mars?

All the ones we know about, and all the ones we *dont yet* know about.
The main problem with your thinking is that you seem to use Earth-
centric thinking when evaluating the resources that are available.

I use economic thinking.


No, you don't. Where did you get your degree in economics. They
should take it back.


It is well known that there is lots of gold in sea water but it costs
far more to extract than the gold is worth.


Wrong. It's just that the same amount of money applied elsewhere gets
you more gold. And you claim to be engaging in 'economic thinking'?
You don't know the meaning of the phrase!

Nope, the extraction cost exceeds the value.

There are no forests, no lakes, no rivers, no life and no air.

You seem to have more knowledge than NASA on those things. How is that?

When did NASA announce there are forests, lakes, rivers, life, and
air anywhere else than Earth?


They've announced there's free flowing water on Mars, water vapour in
the atmosphere, underground ices. You insist there aren't.

That is not the same thing as forests, lakes and rivers, i.e. things
you can stick a bucket in and fill it with drinkable water.

I would say the odds of finding limestone deposits to make cement
highly unlikely. You do know limestone is organically created, don't
you?

You do know that civilizations have been built without relying on
limestone, dont you?

Yep, but modern civilizations are built with concrete and steel; before
that it was wood.


Haven't heard of 'rocks', 'caves', and 'holes' in your neck of the
woods?

Sure but on Earth they don't need airlocks.

[blathering about industrial mining snipped]

something usefull to build the domed and pressurized buildings
required to survive and do anything.

If thats how you think about what is *required* to survive, you clearly
havent thought much about the problem. These are *your* straw men.

So you think you can survive on the Moon or Mars without a presurized
building? Are you going to live in a pressure suit 24/7?


So you think you can't survive on the Moon with Pittsburgh?

There go those voices in your head again. You really should see
someone about that.

You will be lacking just about all usefull chemicals as most of
them come from petroleum, so no plastics.

You do know that civilizations have been built without relying on
plastics, dont you?

Not modern ones with the advanced technology required to survive off
the Earth.


Gee, something hasn't been done yet, so it is forever impossible. Back
to your cave, Chimp.

There go those voices in your head again. You really should see
someone about that.


You miss the point, it would take Star Trek technology to make it affordable.

I dont miss that point at all. I *made* that point when I questioned
the proposed budget. But I am also making the point that it does *not*
require magical technology if you dont make the assumption that you?re
going to live an Earth-styled life on such an inhospitable landscape.


I have been talking about colonies, i.e. families and kids.

A research station requires very little in terms of infrastructure, just
constant resupply.


Wrong. You see, this is the kind of error you make when you misapply
'economic thinking' from ignorance. First example, it's cheaper to
ship an automated rocket fuel factory to Mars to make fuel for the
return trip than it is to ship the fuel.

Which has nothing to do with supplying those kids with diapers and
baby bottles.

You really ought to read some of those papers I keep pointing you to.
It would keep you from sounding so stupidly ignorant.


It is my opinion that an off Earth true colony would cost far too much
for anyone to ever try it and few people would be willing to permanently
move to one.

It is my opinion that off Earth research stations are of limited value
and the cost and rewards of doing them should be balanced against sending
swarms of robots throughout the solar system.


If people aren't going, there's no point to "swarms of robots" so the
cost there is zero.

The point to swarms of robots is scientific research.

Your point seems to be you want to cozy up to a three titted hooker
in a Martian bar just like in the movies.

Fred is more of a "what happens on Mars, stays on Mars" sort of fella.
He would love an environment free from the all the stupid rules he has
to follow. No lawyers, no courts, no oversight, just a wide-open
horizon of possibilities as far as he can see.



--
These retarded Potemkin Village newsgroups with their population of
corrupt police-state collaborators and useful idiots loudly calls for
a sharp neo-stalinist pogrom to rid the world of all those who
knowingly participate and as well to deal with those who are
ultimately responsible for creating it.

Fred J McCall schrieb:
Thomas Koenig wrote:

Fred J McCall schrieb:

[Making an NBR O-ring]

Or instead of cracking down complex hydrocarbons you don't have, you
build up what you need out of the pieces. Please read up on in situ
resource utilization.

What in situ resources could I use on the Moon (or Mars) to make an
O-ring capable of withstanding oil?


Chemistry is chemistry.

I agree with you there.

Please go follow the link on in situ organic chemicals I gave the Chimp.

I'm not sure what link you refer to.

Can you give a quick outline how to do all the chemicals I mentioned
in my article?

We don't have to do this the exact way we do it on Earth. However,
the complexidy will not be less with a different raw material base.