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I am seeing a lot of comments along the lines of 'windshield wipers?' Cars were invented in 1886, the first windshield wipers became available for them in 1917
by Communitivity 4y ago
I am seeing a lot of comments along the lines of 'windshield wipers?'
Cars were invented in 1886, the first windshield wipers became available for them in 1917, 31 years later. That is...
- in an environment with plenty of water - not near waterless,
- on glass windshields (much less fragile than solar panels),
- where we can physically replace the wipers when needed,
- where we can adjust if they get stuck,
- and where there is much less dust.
If we add 5 years of R&D to overcome each of those obstacles (very optimistic, it's more like 10 well-funded years I suspect), then even optimistically we're looking at 25 years. I suspect we might have a rover with self-cleaning panels, or safe cold-fusion, in 25 years. I don't expect one this decade.
- Mistletoe 4y agoThat’s the most bizarre math I’ve ever seen. Once you’ve designed something once it’s a lot faster to design over and over.
- Communitivity 4y agoEach one of those bullets is a different engineering problem. The math is based on real government R&D I've seen. "Once you’ve designed something once it’s a lot faster to design over and over". You forgot the last part of that sentence: Once you’ve designed something once it’s a lot faster to design over and over, if you are in a similar environment with somewhat similar conditions.
- chasd00 4y ago> government R&D I've seen oh, now i understand the math
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- hn_throwaway_99 4y agoThe tweet thread itself doesn't say that using self cleaning panels would be impossible, or even that hard, just that it's easier and more cost effective to just bring bigger panels. Not of your bullet points seem that relevant honestly - using an equivalent of a leaf blower would do the trick. But any added complexity to a mission just means there are more failure points.
- jws 4y agoWith an atmospheric density 1/150th that of Earth, the engineering of a leaf blower might be tricky. Clearly the atmosphere can move dust, but you might hit speed of sound problems in your turbine. Someone should spend a couple years doing some PhD work on Martian dust blowing turbine designs, but not burn out completely so they can write a 1000 word, interesting blog post with some pretty pictures for me to consume.