39526
General Discussion / Re: Humans, and eventually a colony on Mars.
« on: December 29, 2012, 12:03:07 am »Wind power in some place with almost/no atmosphere?That sounds improbable.
...I didn't say that, did I?
It's probably been answered by now. Sorry about that....I don't think that answered my question.Ah, the without expending energy bit. It honestly wouldn't require that much energy. A small nuclear reactor is all the ISS needs for the gyros inside of the station to keep itself stable against all the movement of those on board. My argument isn't that it doesn't need to keep up the spin, but that even if the rotation slows down over time, it can be countered in a very cheap and very easily manageable way.
Yes, you'd get the energy from the reactors; no, it wouldn't be infinite. Solar energy might be close but won't be infinite.
Your example has you expending energy to spin. Why wouldn't a spacecraft need a (probably small) amount of energy spent to keep the centrifugal force up?
In any case, I don't really understand what you're asking me in that first response you wrote to me. Can you tell me what is it that you're confused about? The questions you're asking have a lot of variations as to what assumptions it is making. And I don't think I can address all of the iterations in a timely manner.
Quote
I think this was settled, too.QuoteI think you're thinking too literally. People on my side are putting forward that the craft dock in the middle of the donut. Not on the outside of it. Imagine me picking up a donut with a stick going through that hole. That is where the direction of the dock will be- from the hole, facing outward perpendicular to the rotation motion.Quote1. It's not going to solve the problem by spinning the spacecraft as it docks; it'll need to actually have a curved trajectory matching that of the outside of the ship. That's kinda hard without gravity (nil between such small objects) or tethers or something...It would really be like docking into a giant hour hand. The spin is virtually nil in the middle.If the craft is under several hundred meters, the spin will be problematic for docking procedures, but then again, what space craft can't turn on its axis? Matching it shouldn't be much of a problem. It's more or less an elementary engineering problem.
Quote
Au contrare. Solar energy will be about two and a half times more efficient in space, and while I can't remember the exact stats I seem to recall something like 1,367 watts per square meter available. Even at 10% efficiency (and current photovolkaic cells can get a bit above 17%) would generate over 50,000 watts with just two 5x5 meter squares.Solar is going to be the best power source for a while, unless we can tap geothermal wherever we are (yet another reason not to rely on space stations) or somehow use some massive resource like gas giants to power power plants.I beg to differ. Fission and fusion are the best sources of energy in space. For the amount required to fulfill life support. The other option if you're going to go with a a low amount of power in space, is to live in a spacesuit for almost the entire time to save up on energy.
Quote
To be more specific actually, there is likely a large deposit of uranium on mars.I'm a bit skeptical about fueling a whole fleet on uranium deposits. I guess I'm just thinking a few centuries/mellenia ahead of everyone else. Millenia? How do you even spell that word?
Quote
...Yeah, this. Yet another reason we should have gone to Luna with the Bay12 Space Program.there is wind.Only in dust stoms evidently...
there are dust storms.
there is alot of wind.
thickness of the atmosphere has almost on affect of wind.
unless there isn't any.
