4 ms·

i like the idea of factories in space - just doubt the possibility. for example, can you imagine constructing a modern chip fab in orbit? it's hard enough down

i like the idea of factories in space - just doubt the possibility. for example, can you imagine constructing a modern chip fab in orbit? it's hard enough down here.

ben_w 3y ago
Depending on what you're doing, it can be easier. No need for a clean room for the chips or an ultra-hard vacuum chamber for your extreme-UV laser when you're already in the cleanest hardest vacuum around. I read somewhere that some specialist types of fibre optic cables already make sense to make in orbit just for the microgravity, but I don't know if that was a proposal to try it or if they already do…
- photochemsyn 3y ago
  All the equipment would need to be radiation-hardened, though, and radiation-hardening is pretty expensive, although maybe easier in low-Earth orbit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_hardening https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_hardening
  - Majestic121 3y ago
    Could be the walls of the hangar to be hardened, not necessarily the whole equipment. I'm not sure if it would be less expensive though
    - themanmaran 3y ago
      It's just heavier that way. The easiest way to rad harden things is to stick them in a big lead box. But that's not ideal for shipping things to space. Alternatively I've seen some companies successfully rad-hardening from the software level. Effectively software that is tolerant to random bit flips.
      - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > easiest way to rad harden things is to stick them in a big lead box Or work in a permanent shadow. Cosmic rays are easier to deal with than solar radiation.
        shagie 3y ago
        This makes power generation a bit more challenging. There are sun synchronous orbits (and the orbit at the dawn/dusk terminator is an interesting one - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun-synchronous_orbit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun-synchronous_orbit ), but there isn't an easy orbit around the Earth such that it is always in shadow... or rather, that's the Earth/Sun L2 point... which is where the JWST is. At that distance you lose the magnetic shielding of the Earth (and makes it even more expensive to get materials to and from it).
  - ianburrell 3y ago
    Also, the equipment either needs to be made to work in vacuum or have to maintain atmosphere for it.
  - dotnet00 3y ago
    Considering that most production in space (with even near future launch costs) would mainly only be worthwhile if the resources were also obtained from space, I don't think radiation shielding will be as much of an issue, since if you're doing ISRU, you can gather enough mass around the facility to handle shielding. For chip fab in particular, since current processes require a lot of water, and water is very good as radiation shielding, such a facility in space would probably just store water in the walls.
    - aziaziazi 3y ago
      Well problem solved then ! Just find a lot of water in space not too far from earth, or a cheap way to create it in orbit.
      - dotnet00 3y ago
        Yeah, that's why I said that most things aren't worth producing in space without the ability to obtain resources from space. Kinda pointless if you just have to launch the water from Earth.
  - marcosdumay 3y ago
    The factory needs to be shielded. You can't really harden fine processes. Right now, space manufacturing makes sense for exactly nothing. With enough research, it can in theory make sense for almost anything.
  - wongarsu 3y ago
    In (very) low earth orbit you can get by without radiation hardening. The ISS uses HP zbooks (and before that Thinkpads) and apparently they only really modify cooling and power, without any changes for radiation hardening. Seems like they are reliable enough for their job and just need the occasional reboot. For more critical systems you could probably get by with three computers voting on the result, and if they disagree the outlier gets rebooted (a fairly standard setup in aviation and space)
  - idiotsecant 3y ago
    It turns out space is full of big floaty rocks that you could hollow out and put your factory inside.
    - heavenlyblue 3y ago
      And how many of these big floaty rocks are close enough go Earth?
- ianburrell 3y ago
  Still need clean room for humans that needed to operate it. If have completely automated it, then don’t need clean room on Earth. The vacuum chamber is cheaper than the laser. Both reasons are saving millions at the expense of billions. Fabs are probably the worst factories to put in space because of how much human adjustment they require. Also, the equipment is expensive and delicate, and redesigning it to work in space would be enormously expensive. It would be ruinous to lose one. They require tons of chemicals to work, that have to come from Earth, and produce a lot of nasty waste, which still have to dispose of in space.
  - m0llusk 3y ago
    Use robots instead of humans maybe.
- wongarsu 3y ago
  > I read somewhere that some specialist types of fibre optic cables already make sense to make in orbit just for the microgravity, but I don't know if that was a proposal to try it or if they already do… They are testing various prototypes on the ISS since 2019. Apparently the fibre quality is great and better than what we can make on earth [1], and the current prototypes are about automating the process. I suspect that once access to space (and space stations) becomes cheap enough we will identify a lot of manufacturing processes where gravity is detrimental, and where the end product is valuable enough that shipping to and from space makes sense. 1: https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/flightopportunities/NASA_Supported_Optical_Fiber_Manufacturing_Arrives_at_Space_Station https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/flightopportunit...
m4rtink 3y ago
I think it depends - the lack of Earths gravity could make it possibly much easier or much harder. Definitely an interesting problem to look into. :)
wildzzz 3y ago
One thing I question is all of the materials that originate from petroleum, like polymers. I'm sure there's sufficient quantities of ore on other planets but anything made from polymers is going to only come from Earth. Are we just shipping the precursors to the moon and Mars or are we sending polymer products (Kevlar, Kapton, Tefzel, pretty much Dupont's entire high reliability catalog) to these places? Many synthetic polymers still rely on precursors that come from petroleum. It would require significant changes in how we produce many of the products we take for granted on Earth to be able to make them off-earth without just shipping massive tankers full of chemicals.
- zabzonk 3y ago
  yes, really my first question is not "how do we make chip fabs?", but "how do we make insulated wire?"
- nradov 3y ago
  In theory you can synthesize petroleum, polymers, or any similar chemicals out of elemental hydrogen / carbon / oxygen / nitrogen / etc. It just takes enormous amounts of energy, some expensive catalysts, and an large heavy physical plant. So in practice we're not going to be able to do chemical manufacturing in space at scale for several centuries at least.
- twic 3y ago
  For hydrocarbons, we build chemical plants on Titan: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Cassini-Huygens/Titan_s_surface_organics_surpass_oil_reserves_on_Earth https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Cassin...
midoridensha 3y ago
I think it would make a lot more sense to put stuff like this on the Moon. There's gravity, but only 1/6 as much, and you don't have to worry about environmental problems or generating vacuum. There's also water on the Moon.

i like the idea of factories in space - just doubt the possibility. for example, can you imagine constructing a modern chip fab in orbit? it's hard enough down here.

ben_w 3y ago

Depending on what you're doing, it can be easier. No need for a clean room for the chips or an ultra-hard vacuum chamber for your extreme-UV laser when you're already in the cleanest hardest vacuum around. I read somewhere that some specialist types of fibre optic cables already make sense to make in orbit just for the microgravity, but I don't know if that was a proposal to try it or if they already do…

photochemsyn 3y ago
All the equipment would need to be radiation-hardened, though, and radiation-hardening is pretty expensive, although maybe easier in low-Earth orbit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_hardening https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_hardening
- Majestic121 3y ago
  Could be the walls of the hangar to be hardened, not necessarily the whole equipment. I'm not sure if it would be less expensive though
  - themanmaran 3y ago
    It's just heavier that way. The easiest way to rad harden things is to stick them in a big lead box. But that's not ideal for shipping things to space. Alternatively I've seen some companies successfully rad-hardening from the software level. Effectively software that is tolerant to random bit flips.
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > easiest way to rad harden things is to stick them in a big lead box Or work in a permanent shadow. Cosmic rays are easier to deal with than solar radiation.
      - shagie 3y ago
        This makes power generation a bit more challenging. There are sun synchronous orbits (and the orbit at the dawn/dusk terminator is an interesting one - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun-synchronous_orbit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun-synchronous_orbit ), but there isn't an easy orbit around the Earth such that it is always in shadow... or rather, that's the Earth/Sun L2 point... which is where the JWST is. At that distance you lose the magnetic shielding of the Earth (and makes it even more expensive to get materials to and from it).
- ianburrell 3y ago
  Also, the equipment either needs to be made to work in vacuum or have to maintain atmosphere for it.
- dotnet00 3y ago
  Considering that most production in space (with even near future launch costs) would mainly only be worthwhile if the resources were also obtained from space, I don't think radiation shielding will be as much of an issue, since if you're doing ISRU, you can gather enough mass around the facility to handle shielding. For chip fab in particular, since current processes require a lot of water, and water is very good as radiation shielding, such a facility in space would probably just store water in the walls.
  - aziaziazi 3y ago
    Well problem solved then ! Just find a lot of water in space not too far from earth, or a cheap way to create it in orbit.
    - dotnet00 3y ago
      Yeah, that's why I said that most things aren't worth producing in space without the ability to obtain resources from space. Kinda pointless if you just have to launch the water from Earth.
- marcosdumay 3y ago
  The factory needs to be shielded. You can't really harden fine processes. Right now, space manufacturing makes sense for exactly nothing. With enough research, it can in theory make sense for almost anything.
- wongarsu 3y ago
  In (very) low earth orbit you can get by without radiation hardening. The ISS uses HP zbooks (and before that Thinkpads) and apparently they only really modify cooling and power, without any changes for radiation hardening. Seems like they are reliable enough for their job and just need the occasional reboot. For more critical systems you could probably get by with three computers voting on the result, and if they disagree the outlier gets rebooted (a fairly standard setup in aviation and space)
- idiotsecant 3y ago
  It turns out space is full of big floaty rocks that you could hollow out and put your factory inside.
  - heavenlyblue 3y ago
    And how many of these big floaty rocks are close enough go Earth?
ianburrell 3y ago
Still need clean room for humans that needed to operate it. If have completely automated it, then don’t need clean room on Earth. The vacuum chamber is cheaper than the laser. Both reasons are saving millions at the expense of billions. Fabs are probably the worst factories to put in space because of how much human adjustment they require. Also, the equipment is expensive and delicate, and redesigning it to work in space would be enormously expensive. It would be ruinous to lose one. They require tons of chemicals to work, that have to come from Earth, and produce a lot of nasty waste, which still have to dispose of in space.
- m0llusk 3y ago
  Use robots instead of humans maybe.
wongarsu 3y ago
> I read somewhere that some specialist types of fibre optic cables already make sense to make in orbit just for the microgravity, but I don't know if that was a proposal to try it or if they already do… They are testing various prototypes on the ISS since 2019. Apparently the fibre quality is great and better than what we can make on earth [1], and the current prototypes are about automating the process. I suspect that once access to space (and space stations) becomes cheap enough we will identify a lot of manufacturing processes where gravity is detrimental, and where the end product is valuable enough that shipping to and from space makes sense. 1: https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/flightopportunities/NASA_Supported_Optical_Fiber_Manufacturing_Arrives_at_Space_Station https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/flightopportunit...

m4rtink 3y ago

I think it depends - the lack of Earths gravity could make it possibly much easier or much harder. Definitely an interesting problem to look into. :)

wildzzz 3y ago

One thing I question is all of the materials that originate from petroleum, like polymers. I'm sure there's sufficient quantities of ore on other planets but anything made from polymers is going to only come from Earth. Are we just shipping the precursors to the moon and Mars or are we sending polymer products (Kevlar, Kapton, Tefzel, pretty much Dupont's entire high reliability catalog) to these places? Many synthetic polymers still rely on precursors that come from petroleum. It would require significant changes in how we produce many of the products we take for granted on Earth to be able to make them off-earth without just shipping massive tankers full of chemicals.

zabzonk 3y ago
yes, really my first question is not "how do we make chip fabs?", but "how do we make insulated wire?"
nradov 3y ago
In theory you can synthesize petroleum, polymers, or any similar chemicals out of elemental hydrogen / carbon / oxygen / nitrogen / etc. It just takes enormous amounts of energy, some expensive catalysts, and an large heavy physical plant. So in practice we're not going to be able to do chemical manufacturing in space at scale for several centuries at least.
twic 3y ago
For hydrocarbons, we build chemical plants on Titan: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Cassini-Huygens/Titan_s_surface_organics_surpass_oil_reserves_on_Earth https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Cassin...

midoridensha 3y ago

I think it would make a lot more sense to put stuff like this on the Moon. There's gravity, but only 1/6 as much, and you don't have to worry about environmental problems or generating vacuum. There's also water on the Moon.