4 ms·

I loved this bit: > McMaster-Carr already stocks thousands of parts that will work in mines, on oil rigs, and any number of other horrendously corrosive, warra

by twic 5y ago

I loved this bit: > McMaster-Carr already stocks thousands of parts that will work in mines, on oil rigs, and any number of other horrendously corrosive, warranty voiding environments compared to which the vacuum of space is delightfully benign. Yeah, working underwater means it'll work in space no problem!

deelowe 5y ago
It's a bit naive to assume heavy industry doesn't already have solutions to most of environmental challenges in space. I'm constantly surprised by how dismissive high tech is of dinosaur industries.
- ARandumGuy 5y ago
  Heavy industry does not specialize in the environmental and logistical challenges of space. You can't just slap in some oil drilling equipment into your rocket and expect it to perform to the degree you need. Every bit of equipment needs extensive testing, and likely extensive modification as well. That's not cheap, and it's often better to just design something purpose built for space, instead of trying to modify some piece of Earth-based equipment.
  - deelowe 5y ago
    Maybe not an entire drilling apparatus but what about the bits? What about bolts and nuts that won't cold weld? Bearings that work in a vacuum? I'm sure there are plenty examples. Going further, what about launch systems? Surely those can mostly be built out of off the shelf parts.
blkhawk 5y ago
I don't think it means that you take the underwater parts and use them in space - it means that it was possible to make it work in adverse environments at cheaper than NASA prices.
- ahartmetz 5y ago
  Space is probably harder just because there is less experience and it's much more difficult to get it. Temperature extremes and lubricants seem to be obvious difficulies.
- h2odragon 5y ago
  I'm trying to conceive a vacuum capable hydraulic cylinder. As someone who has used backhoes to dig in water then helped refurb the cylinders afterwards. I'm not seeing any happy possibilities, myself. I agree that it should be possible to make things work at cheaper prices than NASA, but that's still a long way from "easy" or "Commercial off the Shelf"
  - s1artibartfast 5y ago
    I'm curious in what ways a industrial cylinder wouldn't be vacuum capable. Pressure shouldn't be a concern. they operate at 5-10,000 PSI above the ambient environment, so an additional 14 PSI differential shouldn't matter. I'm guessing operating temperatures would be a big concern What failed in water?
    - h2odragon 5y ago
      Corrosion is a concern, all over but especially on the inner cylinder that has to seal. The seals are probably OK but they're important and redo them anyway when its open. The fluid will pick up some water and thats a whole hydraulic system flush, once you get "too much". Then you've got bearings and grease ports and channels that not only don't necessarily like water; but you're not operating in clean water either and that compounds all the problems. Noting almost total ignorance of the realities: I forsee vacuum hydraulics problems including keeping seals tight, the inevitable oil coating on cylinders boiling off and getting polymerized residue buildup. Double enclose all the actuators and have another seal system so you can have a moving thing poking out of a hull, as is done for boats, will probably be necessary... and that'll have its own problems at the actuation points i bet.
    - twic 5y ago
qayxc 5y ago
The author is a physicist, not an engineer and shows in all of his articles. Physicists are trained to check whether a concept passes the constraints of the current theoretical models. If it does, the rest is just an engineering problem - i.e. take the theoretical upper limits of mechanics and material science and extrapolate from there. No concern for the pesky 10% that take up 90% of the development time and make or break a product. In this context: sure, there's equipment that can work in space. But all of this equipment needs to be operated and maintained by humans and there's where your problem starts. Remote operation is impractical beyond the Earth-Moon system.
- TeMPOraL 5y ago
  > No concern for the pesky 10% that take up 90% of the development time and make or break a product. You're missing the author's main point and the whole reason Starship is a big deal. With current launch costs, all that equipment has to be designed, reviewed and tested up front to guarantee, as much as humanly possible, that it'll work in space the first time, because there's no money to try again. With launch costs Starship offers even under pessimistic estimates, even non-space companies will be able to afford to just send stuff to space to see what breaks, and then iterate until it works. That "10% work" becomes orders of magnitude cheaper.
  - giantrobot 5y ago
    > With launch costs Starship offers even under pessimistic estimates, even non-space companies will be able to afford to just send stuff to space to see what breaks, and then iterate until it works. That "10% work" becomes orders of magnitude cheaper. That is a ridiculous position to take. If you have a drill on Earth that burns out you might pop a circuit breaker and have to deal with some acrid smoke for a second or two. You wave it away and it will dissipate into the five and a half quadrillion metric tons of atmosphere. If some parts fly off they'll fall to the ground pretty quickly. If you drop the drill it will fall to the ground. If you've got a drill on a spacecraft that burns out popping a circuit breaker or some acrid smoke is a thousand times more dangerous. Just spalling of some parts can send debris flying around the craft to cause short circuits or damage life support equipment. If you let the drill go because it hurt you it doesn't fall to the ground but instead float there being dangerous or bouncing off equipment that won't like a drill bouncing off of it. Lot's of stuff works fine on Earth, even down in mines or other places, because we've got a relatively thick atmosphere with favorable temperature and gravity. Lubricants don't literally boil off equipment if they're left in the sun for a few minutes. We also don't have to deal with temperature variations of hundreds of degrees between shade and full sunlight. Sending random crap to space without understanding the environment or failure modes would be extremely foolish.

by twic 5y ago

deelowe 5y ago

It's a bit naive to assume heavy industry doesn't already have solutions to most of environmental challenges in space. I'm constantly surprised by how dismissive high tech is of dinosaur industries.

ARandumGuy 5y ago
Heavy industry does not specialize in the environmental and logistical challenges of space. You can't just slap in some oil drilling equipment into your rocket and expect it to perform to the degree you need. Every bit of equipment needs extensive testing, and likely extensive modification as well. That's not cheap, and it's often better to just design something purpose built for space, instead of trying to modify some piece of Earth-based equipment.
- deelowe 5y ago
  Maybe not an entire drilling apparatus but what about the bits? What about bolts and nuts that won't cold weld? Bearings that work in a vacuum? I'm sure there are plenty examples. Going further, what about launch systems? Surely those can mostly be built out of off the shelf parts.

blkhawk 5y ago

I don't think it means that you take the underwater parts and use them in space - it means that it was possible to make it work in adverse environments at cheaper than NASA prices.

ahartmetz 5y ago
Space is probably harder just because there is less experience and it's much more difficult to get it. Temperature extremes and lubricants seem to be obvious difficulies.
h2odragon 5y ago
I'm trying to conceive a vacuum capable hydraulic cylinder. As someone who has used backhoes to dig in water then helped refurb the cylinders afterwards. I'm not seeing any happy possibilities, myself. I agree that it should be possible to make things work at cheaper prices than NASA, but that's still a long way from "easy" or "Commercial off the Shelf"
- s1artibartfast 5y ago
  I'm curious in what ways a industrial cylinder wouldn't be vacuum capable. Pressure shouldn't be a concern. they operate at 5-10,000 PSI above the ambient environment, so an additional 14 PSI differential shouldn't matter. I'm guessing operating temperatures would be a big concern What failed in water?
  - h2odragon 5y ago
    Corrosion is a concern, all over but especially on the inner cylinder that has to seal. The seals are probably OK but they're important and redo them anyway when its open. The fluid will pick up some water and thats a whole hydraulic system flush, once you get "too much". Then you've got bearings and grease ports and channels that not only don't necessarily like water; but you're not operating in clean water either and that compounds all the problems. Noting almost total ignorance of the realities: I forsee vacuum hydraulics problems including keeping seals tight, the inevitable oil coating on cylinders boiling off and getting polymerized residue buildup. Double enclose all the actuators and have another seal system so you can have a moving thing poking out of a hull, as is done for boats, will probably be necessary... and that'll have its own problems at the actuation points i bet.
  - twic 5y ago

qayxc 5y ago

The author is a physicist, not an engineer and shows in all of his articles. Physicists are trained to check whether a concept passes the constraints of the current theoretical models. If it does, the rest is just an engineering problem - i.e. take the theoretical upper limits of mechanics and material science and extrapolate from there. No concern for the pesky 10% that take up 90% of the development time and make or break a product. In this context: sure, there's equipment that can work in space. But all of this equipment needs to be operated and maintained by humans and there's where your problem starts. Remote operation is impractical beyond the Earth-Moon system.

TeMPOraL 5y ago
> No concern for the pesky 10% that take up 90% of the development time and make or break a product. You're missing the author's main point and the whole reason Starship is a big deal. With current launch costs, all that equipment has to be designed, reviewed and tested up front to guarantee, as much as humanly possible, that it'll work in space the first time, because there's no money to try again. With launch costs Starship offers even under pessimistic estimates, even non-space companies will be able to afford to just send stuff to space to see what breaks, and then iterate until it works. That "10% work" becomes orders of magnitude cheaper.
- giantrobot 5y ago
  > With launch costs Starship offers even under pessimistic estimates, even non-space companies will be able to afford to just send stuff to space to see what breaks, and then iterate until it works. That "10% work" becomes orders of magnitude cheaper. That is a ridiculous position to take. If you have a drill on Earth that burns out you might pop a circuit breaker and have to deal with some acrid smoke for a second or two. You wave it away and it will dissipate into the five and a half quadrillion metric tons of atmosphere. If some parts fly off they'll fall to the ground pretty quickly. If you drop the drill it will fall to the ground. If you've got a drill on a spacecraft that burns out popping a circuit breaker or some acrid smoke is a thousand times more dangerous. Just spalling of some parts can send debris flying around the craft to cause short circuits or damage life support equipment. If you let the drill go because it hurt you it doesn't fall to the ground but instead float there being dangerous or bouncing off equipment that won't like a drill bouncing off of it. Lot's of stuff works fine on Earth, even down in mines or other places, because we've got a relatively thick atmosphere with favorable temperature and gravity. Lubricants don't literally boil off equipment if they're left in the sun for a few minutes. We also don't have to deal with temperature variations of hundreds of degrees between shade and full sunlight. Sending random crap to space without understanding the environment or failure modes would be extremely foolish.