Mars by 2020?

Rubecula · 28-07-2017 10:34pm

Fathom wrote: »

NASA plans to have humans on Mars during the 2030's.

I doubt I will be around to see it.

Fathom · 28-07-2017 10:36pm

Rubecula wrote: »

I doubt I will be around to see it.

Maybe SpaceX will launch sooner?

Rubecula · 28-07-2017 10:39pm

this year would help lol

Fathom · 28-07-2017 10:49pm

Rubecula wrote: »

this year would help lol

SpaceX may beat NASA. But years off for both.

Rubecula · 29-07-2017 2:16pm

yes I know hon.

Oh well I have lived through the space age from the very beginning, there i still nothing to compare with the sheer magnificent power of a Saturn 5 take off.

Fathom · 30-07-2017 11:08pm

Rubecula wrote: »

sheer magnificent power of a Saturn 5 take off.

Rubecula · 31-07-2017 12:04am

I made a massive model of the Saturn 5 rocket back in the day and dd one of the LEM too. :eek:

Happy memories

Rubecula · 31-07-2017 12:11am

this is not me by the way

Capt'n Midnight · 31-07-2017 5:53pm

https://xkcd.com/1133/

Fathom · 01-08-2017 7:45pm

Mars One. Plans to establish permanent Mars settlement. One-way trip only. Over 200,000 have volunteered since announced 2013.

Capt'n Midnight · 01-08-2017 9:26pm

The Russian Mars sample return mission - what might have been
the original N1 was to launch in 1975 - but the plan B was interesting too

http://russianspaceweb.com/5m-redesign.html

After the cancellation of the N1 development in 1974, the Mars sample return mission had to be downsized to fit onto the much smaller Proton rocket. To make it possible, the mission was initially split among three Proton boosters...

...
One would carry the 8,500-kilogram 5M spacecraft with the lander and the Mars ascent stage, while another would launch with the full complement of propellant for escaping the Earth's orbit. Finally, the third rocket would launch the Earth-return vehicle.

...
However, the whole scheme of the 5M project looked very complex and totally unreliable. In desperation, Soviet engineers even looked at NASA's Saturn-5 rocket, which could certainly carry enough payload to implement the Mars sample return mission in a single shot, with the biological security of the mission fully ensured. However the idea was politically unrealistic, not to mention the economics and the fact that the Saturn-5 itself had made its last launch in 1973.

AMKC · 01-08-2017 10:34pm

Fathom wrote: »

My error. Thanks for the correction. "Venus and Mars are also in this habitable zone, but aren't currently habitable."

Well not unless you want to be burned alive. I don't think they will ever be in the hapitable zone. Maybe they were a long time ago do.

Rubecula wrote: »

as the sunages it gets hotter, and thus the goldilocks zone is slowly moving outward. In the far future it may go out as far as Neptune. By ten though Earth will no longer have any life on it.

That's why humans need to get off Earth and go to planets like Mars and further.

Fathom wrote: »

Mars One. Plans to establish permanent Mars settlement. One-way trip only. Over 200,000 have volunteered since announced 2013.

Don,t thats ever going to happen and certainly not in the time they said it would. Its gone very quiet.

Rubecula · 02-08-2017 11:18pm

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

The Russian Mars sample return mission - what might have been
the original N1 was to launch in 1975 - but the plan B was interesting too

http://russianspaceweb.com/5m-redesign.html

that would never have worked though, for the length of time it would take, the crew would need to be able to move around, a bit more than that thing allows.

Or was it meant to be robotic?

Fathom · 03-08-2017 11:18pm

Rubecula wrote: »

Or was it meant to be robotic?

Long space flights. Robots practical. Humans not.

Rubecula · 04-08-2017 3:01am

may it be hereby known that slow moving robots are beter than fast moving robots for long jouneys such as this........ fast moving will have a disaster whie we are still communicating with the thing.

Fathom · 04-08-2017 8:27pm

Robots will be precursors to space exploration. Humans follow for various reasons. Not all rational.

Capt'n Midnight · 04-08-2017 8:43pm

Fathom wrote: »

Humans follow for various reasons. Not all rational.

Fathom · 06-08-2017 12:10am

Fathom · 06-08-2017 10:52pm

Rubecula · 08-08-2017 2:55am

Pity Spirit "died" so soon in a way.

Fathom · 08-08-2017 10:51pm

Rubecula wrote: »

Pity Spirit "died" so soon in a way.

Yes. There will be more.

Fathom · 11-08-2017 1:52am

Mars foot print...

Rubecula · 11-08-2017 8:56pm

wheel tracks or clown shoes on balance I go for the shoes ..... everybody knows that mars is inhabited by clowns lol lol

Fathom · 11-08-2017 9:20pm

Clowns? When humans arrive.

Rubecula · 11-08-2017 10:22pm

humans are not there yet??? omg. so who just ordered KFC in Corby Crater?

Fathom · 13-08-2017 9:17pm

NASA Transition Authorization Act of 2017. US Congress had appropriated $19.5 billion for fiscal year 2017 for exploration, space operations, science, technology, and education.

Rubecula · 14-08-2017 11:47am

not a lot of money in the grand scheme of things is it?

Fathom · 16-08-2017 11:55pm

Rubecula wrote: »

not a lot of money in the grand scheme of things is it?

Token budget for space exploration.

Fathom · 19-08-2017 6:02pm

Capt'n Midnight · 19-08-2017 10:49pm

Remember this ?

New report: NASA spends 72 cents of every SLS dollar on overhead costs

NASA has spent $19 billion on rockets, first on Ares I and V, and now on the SLS. Additionally, the agency has spent $13.9 billion on the Orion spacecraft. The agency hopes to finally fly its first crewed mission with the new vehicles in 2021. If it does so, the report estimates the agency will have spent $43 billion before that first flight, essentially a reprise of the Apollo 8 mission around the Moon.

This really gets me angry.
SLS for the most part is based on flight proven hardware from the Shuttle Program, ESA and even dare we say it the godless communists. They are repeatedly re-inventing the wheel, badly.

The plans for Saturn V exist.
You could save a bit of weight by using newer materials and newer electronics. Save time and money by using new machining methods and 3D printing and things like friction welding instead of rivets.
Keeping the mechanicals the same would save a lot of experimentation.

At the end of the day rocket fuel is cheap so spending extra money to get a little more efficiency ain't worth it. Just make the tanks a bit bigger.

Or you could get a Energia

Or you could assemble a Mars rocket from 20 tonne modules lofted up by the lowest bidder.

Mars by 2020?

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