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> On Mars you can build shelter with dirt or in caves. Really? What machines would be used to build these shelters? How do they get to Mars? How would they be

> On Mars you can build shelter with dirt or in caves. Really? What machines would be used to build these shelters? How do they get to Mars? How would they be powered? What auxilliary materials will they require and how do those get to Mars?

notfish 3y ago
Pretty sure we could design and launch a digging robot in 10 years, I dont really buy that as the bottleneck to mars exploration
- axus 3y ago
  I'm pretty sure that we could not, I guess our opinions cancel each other out.
  - feoren 3y ago
    Humans have 10 successful missions landing robots on Mars, starting in 1975. Robots have been operating on Mars continuously for almost 20 years. Opportunity was active for 15 years. The helicopter Ingenuity has flown 63 separate times and counting. The Perseverance rover is about the size of a hatchback car and carries seven advanced scientific instruments. Ten years of strong-willed national effort was enough to get us humans landing on the moon. From where we are now, you honestly don't think ten years of strong-willed national (or even international) effort could get us a robot capable of digging holes?
    - usrbinbash 3y ago
      > you honestly don't think ten years of strong-willed national (or even international) effort could get us a robot capable of digging holes? Yes, I do think that. Because there is a big difference between an exploratory vehicle that carries a number of scientific instruments and can be powered by a few solar panels or a small nuclear battery... ...and these beautys: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_boring_machine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_boring_machine Just for comparisons sake: Perseverances MMRTG provides 110 watts of power. A single metric horsepower is 735.5 watts. I leave looking up the power requirements of even a small machine that would be capable of digging habitats into the martian bedrock, as an exercise to the reader.
      - feoren 3y ago
        I agree it's not realistic to send a full tunnel boring machine, drilling out 200 to 700 meters per week for subways and highways, to Mars in the next 10 years. Such a thing would have to be assembled on Mars with advanced industry already in place. I vehemently disagree that we need a 700 meter/week behemoth, sized for heavy rail, to dig out a habitat for one or two dozen humans. I'm imagining something more like a small-ish Roadheader[1], two to four times larger than Perseverance. It would either need to be Diesel powered (yes, shipping the diesel would suck, but it doesn't need to run forever) or we'd need a small solar farm and a couple Tesla batteries powering the thing (we probably want that anyway, for our habitat). It would take months to dig out a cave large enough for 10 to 20 humans, and there are hundreds of other problems to solve to actually turn a small, potentially unstable Martian cave into a livable habitat. We know the first steps will be slow; that's OK. Besides, we have a decade of engineering to refine the design. Don't underestimate humans. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roadheader https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roadheader
        usrbinbash 3y ago
        Okay, let's talk about that. A (very) small roadheader starts at around 8 metric tonnes, and requires around 20kW of power...just for operating the cutting head. And that's a really small one. Again, for comparison, Perseverance: 1025kg, 110W of power > It would either need to be Diesel powered That would be a neat trick on a planet with an atmospheric pressure of 610 pascals, where oxygen registers barely above a trace element. > or we'd need a small solar farm Or maybe a not so small one. Using Tesla solar panels https://www.tesla.com/solarpanels https://www.tesla.com/solarpanels as a reference point, they produce up to 400W and are just shy of 2m². That's on Earth. Solar irradiance on Mars is 59% of Earths, so these panels will probably produce ~240W apiece. So to meet the energy requirements of even a small roadheader, we need 83 of these panels, each of which is ~21.5kg in mass, so a total of 1.784t in solar panels alone. Note, that is without cabling, inverters, electronics, spare panels, support structures, etc. ... or the batteries for that matter. Production numbers are also for peak sunlight conditions on Mars, so best-case daylight during the martian summer, and no dust storms. So depending on how heavy the batteries are, I reckon we are already looking at around 12-14 tons of equipment, just for digging with a single machine. And that doesn't include any prefabricated parts, spare parts, airlocks, other heavy machinery, support beams, other auxilliary materials.... I mean, these roadheaders will require new drill heads every now and then, won't they? What's the payload capacity of our current space ship designs again? Because... > It would take months to dig out a cave large enough for 10 to 20 humans, ...we need food and water and medical supplies and power and space suits, and a lot of other things for all these people. Oh, and habitats, because they will need somewhere to live during all these months bevore the cave is ready.
- usrbinbash 3y ago
  Design? Sure. Launch? Maybe. Launch while also having to launch everything the people we send there need for the rest of their lives, and also launch everything needed to power and maintain that robot for as long as it's required? Hmmmmm... But okay, let's say we do all that. We can now dig up Mars-dirt. How do we make that into airtight shelter that is also proof against cosmic radiation?
  - notfish 3y ago
    Probably, you dig a hole then put an inflatable hab inside and bury it? This feels like a supremely solvable problem
    - usrbinbash 3y ago
      > dig a hole then put an inflatable hab inside and bury it An inflatable hab...that somehow remains stable and sealed after getting "buried" under a pile of rock?
  - mr_toad 3y ago
    You keep raising these logistical issues like you’re the only person who ever thought of them. And you seem to be underestimating the resources that can be committed. It’s not like people are planning to send one or two rockets and calling it a day. Serious plans involve sending hundreds of rockets every year, and tens of thousands of tons of cargo.
    - usrbinbash 3y ago
      > You keep raising these logistical issues like you’re the only person who ever thought of them. Better than to hand-wave them wouldn't you agree? Because these issues are real, hard and very limiting factors, and they don't go away by throwing money at them. And I'm pretty sure I am not the only person who keeps raising these issues. > Serious plans involve sending hundreds of rockets every year That would be a really neat trick. Mars's synodic period with Earth is 780 days (about 26 months) and the resulting transfer window lasts a few weeks at most. So if you want to send even 100 rockets per year, you have to start +200 rockets within that launch window. To put that into perspective, since 1960 there were a grand total of 50 Mars missions, that includes unsuccessful ones, which were more than half: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_Mars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_Mars Most of these missions didn't land anything on Mars, and not a single one involved landing the spaceship itself, or had even remotely the kind of payload capacity that a colonisation effort requires. So unless someone has a workable idea for a completely new propulsion system, I'm afraid there won't be "hundreds of rockets every year". Edit: Oh, I almost forgot, small question: How do these "hundreds of rockets per year" get back to Earth? Because, if they don't, well, that's gonna up the launch costs somewhat, wouldn't it?

notfish 3y ago

Pretty sure we could design and launch a digging robot in 10 years, I dont really buy that as the bottleneck to mars exploration

axus 3y ago
I'm pretty sure that we could not, I guess our opinions cancel each other out.
- feoren 3y ago
  Humans have 10 successful missions landing robots on Mars, starting in 1975. Robots have been operating on Mars continuously for almost 20 years. Opportunity was active for 15 years. The helicopter Ingenuity has flown 63 separate times and counting. The Perseverance rover is about the size of a hatchback car and carries seven advanced scientific instruments. Ten years of strong-willed national effort was enough to get us humans landing on the moon. From where we are now, you honestly don't think ten years of strong-willed national (or even international) effort could get us a robot capable of digging holes?
  - usrbinbash 3y ago
    > you honestly don't think ten years of strong-willed national (or even international) effort could get us a robot capable of digging holes? Yes, I do think that. Because there is a big difference between an exploratory vehicle that carries a number of scientific instruments and can be powered by a few solar panels or a small nuclear battery... ...and these beautys: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_boring_machine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_boring_machine Just for comparisons sake: Perseverances MMRTG provides 110 watts of power. A single metric horsepower is 735.5 watts. I leave looking up the power requirements of even a small machine that would be capable of digging habitats into the martian bedrock, as an exercise to the reader.
    - feoren 3y ago
      I agree it's not realistic to send a full tunnel boring machine, drilling out 200 to 700 meters per week for subways and highways, to Mars in the next 10 years. Such a thing would have to be assembled on Mars with advanced industry already in place. I vehemently disagree that we need a 700 meter/week behemoth, sized for heavy rail, to dig out a habitat for one or two dozen humans. I'm imagining something more like a small-ish Roadheader[1], two to four times larger than Perseverance. It would either need to be Diesel powered (yes, shipping the diesel would suck, but it doesn't need to run forever) or we'd need a small solar farm and a couple Tesla batteries powering the thing (we probably want that anyway, for our habitat). It would take months to dig out a cave large enough for 10 to 20 humans, and there are hundreds of other problems to solve to actually turn a small, potentially unstable Martian cave into a livable habitat. We know the first steps will be slow; that's OK. Besides, we have a decade of engineering to refine the design. Don't underestimate humans. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roadheader https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roadheader
      - usrbinbash 3y ago
        Okay, let's talk about that. A (very) small roadheader starts at around 8 metric tonnes, and requires around 20kW of power...just for operating the cutting head. And that's a really small one. Again, for comparison, Perseverance: 1025kg, 110W of power > It would either need to be Diesel powered That would be a neat trick on a planet with an atmospheric pressure of 610 pascals, where oxygen registers barely above a trace element. > or we'd need a small solar farm Or maybe a not so small one. Using Tesla solar panels https://www.tesla.com/solarpanels https://www.tesla.com/solarpanels as a reference point, they produce up to 400W and are just shy of 2m². That's on Earth. Solar irradiance on Mars is 59% of Earths, so these panels will probably produce ~240W apiece. So to meet the energy requirements of even a small roadheader, we need 83 of these panels, each of which is ~21.5kg in mass, so a total of 1.784t in solar panels alone. Note, that is without cabling, inverters, electronics, spare panels, support structures, etc. ... or the batteries for that matter. Production numbers are also for peak sunlight conditions on Mars, so best-case daylight during the martian summer, and no dust storms. So depending on how heavy the batteries are, I reckon we are already looking at around 12-14 tons of equipment, just for digging with a single machine. And that doesn't include any prefabricated parts, spare parts, airlocks, other heavy machinery, support beams, other auxilliary materials.... I mean, these roadheaders will require new drill heads every now and then, won't they? What's the payload capacity of our current space ship designs again? Because... > It would take months to dig out a cave large enough for 10 to 20 humans, ...we need food and water and medical supplies and power and space suits, and a lot of other things for all these people. Oh, and habitats, because they will need somewhere to live during all these months bevore the cave is ready.
usrbinbash 3y ago
Design? Sure. Launch? Maybe. Launch while also having to launch everything the people we send there need for the rest of their lives, and also launch everything needed to power and maintain that robot for as long as it's required? Hmmmmm... But okay, let's say we do all that. We can now dig up Mars-dirt. How do we make that into airtight shelter that is also proof against cosmic radiation?
- notfish 3y ago
  Probably, you dig a hole then put an inflatable hab inside and bury it? This feels like a supremely solvable problem
  - usrbinbash 3y ago
    > dig a hole then put an inflatable hab inside and bury it An inflatable hab...that somehow remains stable and sealed after getting "buried" under a pile of rock?
- mr_toad 3y ago
  You keep raising these logistical issues like you’re the only person who ever thought of them. And you seem to be underestimating the resources that can be committed. It’s not like people are planning to send one or two rockets and calling it a day. Serious plans involve sending hundreds of rockets every year, and tens of thousands of tons of cargo.
  - usrbinbash 3y ago
    > You keep raising these logistical issues like you’re the only person who ever thought of them. Better than to hand-wave them wouldn't you agree? Because these issues are real, hard and very limiting factors, and they don't go away by throwing money at them. And I'm pretty sure I am not the only person who keeps raising these issues. > Serious plans involve sending hundreds of rockets every year That would be a really neat trick. Mars's synodic period with Earth is 780 days (about 26 months) and the resulting transfer window lasts a few weeks at most. So if you want to send even 100 rockets per year, you have to start +200 rockets within that launch window. To put that into perspective, since 1960 there were a grand total of 50 Mars missions, that includes unsuccessful ones, which were more than half: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_Mars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_Mars Most of these missions didn't land anything on Mars, and not a single one involved landing the spaceship itself, or had even remotely the kind of payload capacity that a colonisation effort requires. So unless someone has a workable idea for a completely new propulsion system, I'm afraid there won't be "hundreds of rockets every year". Edit: Oh, I almost forgot, small question: How do these "hundreds of rockets per year" get back to Earth? Because, if they don't, well, that's gonna up the launch costs somewhat, wouldn't it?