3 ms·

There's about .7kPa of atmos on mars. I'd have a hard time seeing how that would meaningfully influence escape or entrance velocity. In fact it should make entr

There's about .7kPa of atmos on mars. I'd have a hard time seeing how that would meaningfully influence escape or entrance velocity. In fact it should make entry easier because you'll have a higher resistance coming in meaning you'll have to do a lower deceleration burn. Could you provide a source, of someone with experiance in this sort of work, telling me why this is the case? Why does this completely change the game? Why is a moon landing not the eaisiest "we know basically what we're doing"?

nickik 10y ago
You can bounce on the atmo and by passing threw it multible times you can bleed away speed. Then you can fly your capsule like a wing for a bit losing even more speed. That's why a Dragon 2 can land on Mars, but not on the Moon. Check out the Scott Manley video on Youtube for lots of details, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zuFdVkVxpM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zuFdVkVxpM.
T-A 10y ago
http://www.universetoday.com/7024/the-mars-landing-approach-getting-large-payloads-to-the-surface-of-the-red-planet/ http://www.universetoday.com/7024/the-mars-landing-approach-... Money quote: “There’s too much atmosphere on Mars to land heavy vehicles like we do on the moon, using propulsive technology completely,” said Manning, “and there’s too little atmosphere to land like we do on Earth. So, it’s in this ugly, grey zone.”
- jurjenh 10y ago
  I believe that comment is more or less based on the shuttle landing and/or the soyuz capsules (eg parachutes) - but as far as I can tell, SpaceX is the only one currently capable (and using) propulsive landing on earth - so essentially they've already leapfrogged the grey zone to a large extent. Makes me wonder whether testing a propulsive landing on an airborne drone barge is feasible? A blimp with a well-insulated large pad on the top - though I'm not sure how you'd effectively anchor it in the air - probably a active propulsion system as well.

nickik 10y ago

You can bounce on the atmo and by passing threw it multible times you can bleed away speed. Then you can fly your capsule like a wing for a bit losing even more speed. That's why a Dragon 2 can land on Mars, but not on the Moon. Check out the Scott Manley video on Youtube for lots of details, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zuFdVkVxpM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zuFdVkVxpM.

T-A 10y ago

http://www.universetoday.com/7024/the-mars-landing-approach-getting-large-payloads-to-the-surface-of-the-red-planet/ http://www.universetoday.com/7024/the-mars-landing-approach-... Money quote: “There’s too much atmosphere on Mars to land heavy vehicles like we do on the moon, using propulsive technology completely,” said Manning, “and there’s too little atmosphere to land like we do on Earth. So, it’s in this ugly, grey zone.”

jurjenh 10y ago
I believe that comment is more or less based on the shuttle landing and/or the soyuz capsules (eg parachutes) - but as far as I can tell, SpaceX is the only one currently capable (and using) propulsive landing on earth - so essentially they've already leapfrogged the grey zone to a large extent. Makes me wonder whether testing a propulsive landing on an airborne drone barge is feasible? A blimp with a well-insulated large pad on the top - though I'm not sure how you'd effectively anchor it in the air - probably a active propulsion system as well.