tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post7807512019961185860..comments2024-03-21T08:00:48.696-07:00Comments on No Shortage of Dreams: Making Rocket Propellants from Martian Air (1978)Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-75511651584527571852022-09-13T00:31:23.812-07:002022-09-13T00:31:23.812-07:00Yes please! The Case For Mars study is nearly unfi...Yes please! The Case For Mars study is nearly unfindable aside from the Emmart art. So a comprehensive article about it would be appreciated.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-66004744593708047602015-10-16T07:45:08.671-07:002015-10-16T07:45:08.671-07:00Wow. I thought when I said "hundreds" I ...Wow. I thought when I said "hundreds" I might be a little long. 900. Just wow.<br /><br />Agree your points - particularly Moon.<br />Analogous to my background, pharmaceuticals, you have 3 phases to bring a drug to market.<br /><br />FDA Model<br />Phase-I Don't kill anyone.<br />Phase-II Make sure it does what it claims.<br />Phase-III Make sure you can repeat the benefits across Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17639020344662007725noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-27387745427567353442015-10-15T13:14:06.030-07:002015-10-15T13:14:06.030-07:00Great article as always. History always has lesson...Great article as always. History always has lessons for us.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13117949230025468198noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-2071076744884166882015-10-15T08:55:24.914-07:002015-10-15T08:55:24.914-07:00Ben:
This makes me think back to the old argument...Ben:<br /><br />This makes me think back to the old argument that we did Apollo too soon. I think that's slightly silly - stuff happens when it does - but also profound. We weren't ready as a society to make a long-term commitment. Our internecine conflicts pushed us to the moon as surely as did the Saturn V rocket. And the tech was just barely capable of reaching to moon and giving us David S. F. Portreehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15818906581595028816noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-86584617571102110292015-10-15T05:41:24.491-07:002015-10-15T05:41:24.491-07:00This is why I somewhat obsessively read your histo...This is why I somewhat obsessively read your history posts. Each of these ideas was a concept given the knowledge of the day. Many early ideas were based on the assumption of Mars having a much thicker atmosphere and even higher oxygen content. So as our knowledge increases, the model adapts for future planetary expansion. <br /><br />Emmart's artwork would have to assume really HUGE lift Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17639020344662007725noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-50444031879269146762015-10-14T14:35:53.367-07:002015-10-14T14:35:53.367-07:00Propellants are typically the heaviest part of any...Propellants are typically the heaviest part of any Mars expedition. Life support consumables are also non-trivial. If you can get at those on Mars, that's significant.<br /><br />The gadgetry in the Emmart art is an artists' concept and assumes a really big base; 35 people, permanently staffed, cyclers, all Mars-to-cycler propellants (CO/LOX) made on Mars. I should write about it.<br /><David S. F. Portreehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15818906581595028816noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-49531271485285798912015-10-14T13:50:52.263-07:002015-10-14T13:50:52.263-07:00The early economic model for making things on Mars...The early economic model for making things on Mars will be overwhelmingly dependent on non-air-breathing robotics. Expensive, heavy, slow all-in-ones that will need to mine, refine, inventory, craft, and manufacture. I personally don't know with today's technology if this is do-able in 1mt packages, such as land now (Curiosity). In the Emmart painting above, I'm guessing that's Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17639020344662007725noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-71512580697696830192015-10-13T19:45:05.837-07:002015-10-13T19:45:05.837-07:00The connection with Viking is not that Martin Mari...The connection with Viking is not that Martin Marietta engineers built the Viking landers and Zubrin eventually worked at Martin Marietta, it is that scientists using Viking data confirmed the existence of and wrote about potential resources on Mars. Ash, et al, were first, but there were many, many others. I cite two others in the sources for my post. <br /><br />Please note that the concept of David S. F. Portreehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15818906581595028816noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-62131944705045514182015-10-13T16:41:30.610-07:002015-10-13T16:41:30.610-07:00Joe:
Your article is nothing like mine - yours ha...Joe:<br /><br />Your article is nothing like mine - yours has all the hard stuff in it! :-) Thanks for the kind words.<br /><br />dsfpDavid S. F. Portreehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15818906581595028816noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-1068365472081273892015-10-13T14:09:14.598-07:002015-10-13T14:09:14.598-07:00Great article! I've been a huge fan of yours f...Great article! I've been a huge fan of yours for many years. I wrote a similar article to this one as a high school math lesson over at RocketSTEM magazine that uses the Sabatier method for making methane fuel. It's based on the movie "The Martian" (http://www.rocketstem.org/2015/10/01/methane-in-the-membrane-producing-rocket-fuel-on-mars/). Thanks for the inspiration, and keep Joe Manesshttp://www.stemfortheclassroom.orgnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6633940777526327846.post-26884771824292635082015-10-13T09:26:15.696-07:002015-10-13T09:26:15.696-07:00This is interesting because that it shows that met...This is interesting because that it shows that methane/oxygen ISRU on Mars had been discovered long before Bob Zubrin imagined Mars Direct in the late 80's. <br />The link between those early studies and Bob Zubrin is Martin Marietta. The company build the Viking landers in the 70's, and ten years later (in 1988) a young Zubrin landed a job there. Zubrin worked with seasonned engineers Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com