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[Tk0n]

Just found out that Robert Zubrin lampoons the idea: https://www.facebook.com/robert.zubrin.1/posts/1799839760231952

uhm, where is he lampooning the idea?
he just says that he would do things a bit differently.

"...with a little modification, they could be made practical and very powerful."

 

[blu]

Really enjoyed the presentation despite Elon's awkward way of giving a keynote like this.

In the 90's, Dr. Robert Zubrin has created a "Mars Direct" plan, that was a design to get people to Mars. You also might enjoy watching this, as it may provide solutions to problems like energy, water consumption (and even waste).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKQSijn9FBs

This is seriously thought provoking. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Nocebo]

NASA are very risk-averse. This is the reason they are essentially using a hybrid of Apollo era/Shuttle era hardware in SLS - they are proven technologies. SLS and ICT existing in the same mars ecosystem is a case of everyone not putting their eggs in one basket too. It's for this same reason why they selected multiple providers for the Commercial Resupply and Commercial Crew missions.

I suspect that NASA will partner with SpaceX once the ICT is shown to be reliable and cheaper than it is. It shows that the SLS, even with it's current delays and smaller scale in what SpaceX and it's already overflowing costs are still the primary focus of NASA.

NASA being risk-averse doesn't prohibit them from collaborating with SpaceX. In fact SpaceX is one of 4 private companies that have some kind of collaboration agreement with NASA. Fairly recently SpaceX requested expanded assistance from NASA for their Red Dragon mission (the unmanned mission to Mars). Their request was approved and the level of assistance was/is being expanded.
http://spaceref.com/missions-and-pr...boration-with-spacexs-red-dragon-mission.html
NASA is very interested in expanding the capabilities of private space companies. It is not unreasonable to think collaboration continues for potential manned missions as well in some capacity.

 

[RSP]

This is seriously thought provoking. Thanks for sharing.

I just read that Zubrin was also present at the keynote, and has already responded with some ideas

 

[E-flux]

I kinda wish that we would go to the moon first, this mars-mania is all fine but i'd rather see us deploy an outpost on the moon first for scientific research and what not, it would be safer, we would already have water there if we chose a spot correctly. Plus going to mars we'd have to wait 1½ years till the orbits would match while we could get to moon and back whenever we want.

So i'm in the camp of colonizing moon first, we aren't terraforming mars anytime soon anyway.

 

[CoolOff]

I really liked his response about the fact that establishing a presence on Mars would create an incredibly powerful feedback loop in terms of tech advancements in space travel overall.

The fact that as soon as you get refueling in place you can extend this to practically our entire solar system is so incredible.

 

[Nocebo]

I kinda wish that we would go to the moon first, this mars-mania is all fine but i'd rather see us deploy an outpost on the moon first for scientific research and what not, it would be safer, we would already have water there if we chose a spot correctly. Plus going to mars we'd have to wait 1½ years till the orbits would match while we could get to moon and back whenever we want.

So i'm in the camp of colonizing moon first, we aren't terraforming mars anytime soon anyway.

With risk comes reward and putting people on Mars is far more rewarding. Not sure why you mention water because Mars has far more water, or ice more accurately, than the moon has. Not only that it has far more resources and more different kinds of resource than the moon has, making self-sustainability feasible. Scientifically Mars is also far more interesting. So wouldn't it be better to go there sooner rather than later?
http://www.nss.org/settlement/mars/zubrin-colonize.html
Mars has far more potential to facilitate/support an actual space industry.

 

[E-flux]

With risk comes reward and putting people on Mars is far more rewarding. Not sure why you mention water because Mars has far more water, or ice more accurately, than the moon has. Not only that it has far more resources and more different kinds of resource than the moon has, making self-sustainability feasible. Scientifically Mars is also far more interesting. So wouldn't it be better to go there sooner rather than later?
http://www.nss.org/settlement/mars/zubrin-colonize.html
Mars has far more potential to facilitate/support an actual space industry.

I mention water because most people i have talked think moon is just nothing but craters and moon rocks. I agree that we should try to colonize Mars, but not as the first place. The journey is perilous, from medical issues to psychological problems. I'd rather have a constant presence at moon first, get the kinks worked out there and then aim further into the solar system. Plus, if we could get a system working to collect Helium3 that could power the station on the moon along with solar energy without needing fuel from here.
I also agree that it has more potential but i'd still use moon as a stepping stone for the technology first.

EDIT:
Where there is water there is oxygen, only thing you might need to supply a moon base would be food and even that can be grown given enough time and space. And when it comes to Moon at least a rescue plan is somewhat feasible if something goes wrong suddenly. Given enough resources and time (and new technologies) sending ships out from Moon would be a lot better than sending them out from here anyway.

 

[Guy.brush]

I enjoyed the presentation but I wish he would've said something about why they don't go after a more solid orbital/lagrange point presence first, possibly with foundries, assembly in orbit so asteroid mining could be a thing etc.
Maybe he went for the thing they know best currently but it seems getting thousands of ships out of Earth's gravity well seems not the smartest, but maybe most doable with current tech?

 

[Doikor]

I kinda wish that we would go to the moon first, this mars-mania is all fine but i'd rather see us deploy an outpost on the moon first for scientific research and what not, it would be safer, we would already have water there if we chose a spot correctly. Plus going to mars we'd have to wait 1½ years till the orbits would match while we could get to moon and back whenever we want.

So i'm in the camp of colonizing moon first, we aren't terraforming mars anytime soon anyway.

As Elon mentioned Mars has carbon dioxide in its atmosphere which is a critical component in making methane which they use as fuel in the rockets together with oxygen which they can get from water ice. If they get this working it cuts down the amount of fuel you have to bring with you massively as you don't need to have fuel for the return trip when going there but instead you produce it on Mars. The space ship part has a projected cost of 100+ million so they really want to get it back to earth for reuse. Making the trip as cheap as possible is really important if you want any kind of permanent colony there and not just a science trip (like we did with the moon). Reusability is a very important part in getting the costs down in the long run.

I enjoyed the presentation but I wish he would've said something about why they don't go after a more solid orbital/lagrange point presence first, possibly with foundries, assembly in orbit so asteroid mining could be a thing etc.
Maybe he went for the thing they know best currently but it seems getting thousands of ships out of Earth's gravity well seems not the smartest, but maybe most doable with current tech?

I think that is something Elon would like to leave for someone else to implement. They provide the launchers from earth (and mars). If someone wants to buy their launch capabilities to build in orbit manufacturing capabilities go ahead.

 

[F!ReW!Re]

I mention water because most people i have talked think moon is just nothing but craters and moon rocks. I agree that we should try to colonize Mars, but not as the first place. The journey is perilous, from medical issues to psychological problems. I'd rather have a constant presence at moon first, get the kinks worked out there and then aim further into the solar system. Plus, if we could get a system working to collect Helium3 that could power the station on the moon along with solar energy without needing fuel from here.
I also agree that it has more potential but i'd still use moon as a stepping stone for the technology first.

EDIT:
Where there is water there is oxygen, only thing you might need to supply a moon base would be food and even that can be grown given enough time and space. And when it comes to Moon at least a rescue plan is somewhat feasible if something goes wrong suddenly. Given enough resources and time (and new technologies) sending ships out from Moon would be a lot better than sending them out from here anyway.

I'll quote myself from earlier in the thread:

That's the thing;
It's not though, there's not really a reason to set up a colony there because it wouldn't be able to be self-sustaining at one point and there's nothing there but moonstones/dust.

What I've read in some of the articles / seen in some videos is that the Mars colony could at a point in the future become self-sustaining as they can extract; oxygen, water and fuel (not oil) from the atmosphere/planet itself.
It'll ofcourse still be depending on Earth at the beginning for supplies, etc, but they suspect they can make it self-sustaining compared to a Lunar base where you would just need to be sending them "shit" all the time since there's nothing there.

Read some of the articles/watch some of the vids posted earlier in this thread.
This vid tells you some basic stuff about it;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMTLBhoCM8k

I'm on the subway, but I can find some more quotes/videos/articles when I get home.

 

[E-flux]

As Elon mentioned Mars has carbon dioxide in its atmosphere which is a critical component in making methane which they use as fuel in the rockets together with oxygen which they can get from water ice. If they get this working it cuts down the amount of fuel you have to bring with you massively as you don't need to have fuel for the return trip when going there but instead you produce it on Mars. The space ship part has a projected cost of 100+ million so they really want to get it back to earth for reuse. Making the trip as cheap as possible is really important if you want any kind of permanent colony there and not just a science trip (like we did with the moon). Reusability is a very important part in getting the costs down in the long run.



I think that is something Elon would like to leave for someone else to implement. They provide the launchers from earth (and mars). If someone wants to buy their launch capabilities to build in orbit manufacturing capabilities go ahead.

Musk is definitely a dreamer, until he actually proves that he can lead the space frontier i'm going to stay skeptical, i also don't even want to think what it would mean if some of the planned mars flights would get destroyed on the way, how big of a set back that might be for the public image, people would just think of the whole thing as a boondoggle.

I'll quote myself from earlier in the thread:



I'm on the subway, but I can find some more quotes/videos/articles when I get home.

There is water and oxygen on the moon too, and like i said helium3 which we could potentially use for our energy purposes along side the solar energy, if we dream big we could even manufacture and build ships on the moon which would bring the costs down a lot, there's plenty of iron and other metals in the moon but that goes too far into the future. And you wouldn't need to send shit for a moon colony either once it gets big enough for it to be self sustaining. Also atmosphere of mars is extremely thin, i would like to see the machine that extracts the gasses from the atmosphere while still being worth the effort. And like i said, you could extract water, oxygen, and fuel He3 from moon too for their energy purposes.

 

[blu]

I mention water because most people i have talked think moon is just nothing but craters and moon rocks. I agree that we should try to colonize Mars, but not as the first place. The journey is perilous, from medical issues to psychological problems. I'd rather have a constant presence at moon first, get the kinks worked out there and then aim further into the solar system. Plus, if we could get a system working to collect Helium3 that could power the station on the moon along with solar energy without needing fuel from here.
I also agree that it has more potential but i'd still use moon as a stepping stone for the technology first.

EDIT:
Where there is water there is oxygen, only thing you might need to supply a moon base would be food and even that can be grown given enough time and space. And when it comes to Moon at least a rescue plan is somewhat feasible if something goes wrong suddenly. Given enough resources and time (and new technologies) sending ships out from Moon would be a lot better than sending them out from here anyway.

Actually, it appears there might be more bound O on the moon than bound or molecular H: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_water

 

[Fersis]

Just found out that Robert Zubrin lampoons the idea: https://www.facebook.com/robert.zubrin.1/posts/1799839760231952

So it looks like it's just a dumb idea all around. I think after a few days nearly everyone will agree that this is a nonsense plan that won't work.

At the end of the day, we're just message board goers debating something we don't have any control over. All we can do is debate something is real or not, and I guess my issue is that I've recently become convinced that Elon Musk simply can't accomplish this.

Lampoon: A written attack ridiculing a person, group, or institution Source

I think you're reading what you want to read and not what it was written lol

 

[Crispy75]

Well...its just that i have not heard any real good reasons to invest all that money and technological ambition in something so nebulous as opposed to immediate problems we're facing right now, that will REALLY fuck us over if we're not focused on them right this second.

whycantwehaveboth.gif

At $200,000 per ticket, for one million people, we're talking $200bn. A lot of money, but not so large when you compare it to the USA's military budget of $600bn, per year

 

[Nocebo]

I mention water because most people i have talked think moon is just nothing but craters and moon rocks. I agree that we should try to colonize Mars, but not as the first place. The journey is perilous, from medical issues to psychological problems. I'd rather have a constant presence at moon first, get the kinks worked out there and then aim further into the solar system. Plus, if we could get a system working to collect Helium3 that could power the station on the moon along with solar energy without needing fuel from here.
I also agree that it has more potential but i'd still use moon as a stepping stone for the technology first.

Why not both at the same time? SpaceX is clearly set on going to Mars. There are other organizations interested in doing something on the moon. There is really no need for all these organizations to pool their resources and focus on one thing.
The psychological and medical issues are already being researched on earth and on the ISS as well. What difference would a moon base make in that respect?

Where there is water there is oxygen, only thing you might need to supply a moon base would be food and even that can be grown given enough time and space. And when it comes to Moon at least a rescue plan is somewhat feasible if something goes wrong suddenly. Given enough resources and time (and new technologies) sending ships out from Moon would be a lot better than sending them out from here anyway.

Sending ships from the moon would not be a lot better actually. It would be a waste of time and fuel to land ships on the moon, refuel and relaunch them from the moon. You can however, possibly, manufacture fuel on the moon and bring that fuel up to an Earth Moon Lagrange and refuel your ship.
But it is not necessary to do that in order to get to Mars so that certainly isn't a reason to wait. Plus it would probably take a long time to set up facilities.

There is very little benefit to establishing a base on the moon first. Any thing that can be learned on the moon that can be applied to a trip to and a stay on Mars can be learned from experiments on earth and the ISS as well.
Did you read or listen to anything from Dr. Robert Zubrin? There was a video link posted earlier. I think the part starting here especially addresses some of your points
https://youtu.be/EKQSijn9FBs?t=37m39s

Lampoon: A written attack ridiculing a person, group, or institution Source

I think you're reading what you want to read and not what it was written lol

Yeah, reading the quote. HyperionX's reaction seems pretty crazy and biased. Dr. Zubrin actually suggest a method that would just need the falcon heavy. A rocket that will be used later this year. So a ship that seems well within SpaceX's engineering capabilities.

In his talk today, Musk presented a number of interesting and very useful ideas. I don't think they are practical in the form he presented them. But with a little modification, they could be made practical and very powerful.

Yeah this doesn't say it is a dumb idea all around at all. Also Dr. Zubrin doesn't seem to laugh at Elon and his team. If HyperionX wants to argue from authority he just lost with his own example.

 

[CyclopsRock]

The moon's closer but in many other ways it's actually more difficult and, due to its mineral composition, could never be self sustainable in the way that mars can be at some point in the future.

 

[Chittagong]

<3 Elon Musk

Is there a way to download the keynote for offline viewing on iPad? 1:30h is a long time and flights are pretty much the only time I can spare... but would love to see every minute of it

 

[E-flux]

Why not both at the same time? SpaceX is clearly set on going to Mars. There are other organizations interested in doing something on the moon. There is really no need for all these organizations to pool their resources and focus on one thing.
The psychological and medical issues are already being researched on earth and on the ISS as well. What difference would a moon base make in that respect?


Sending ships from the moon would not be a lot better actually. It would be a waste of time and fuel to land ships on the moon, refuel and relaunch them from the moon. You can however, possibly, manufacture fuel on the moon and bring that fuel up to an Earth Moon Lagrange and refuel your ship.
But it is not necessary to do that in order to get to Mars so that certainly isn't a reason to wait. Plus it would probably take a long time to set up facilities.

There is very little benefit to establishing a base on the moon first. Any thing that can be learned on the moon that can be applied to a trip to and a stay on Mars can be learned from experiments on earth and the ISS as well.
Did you read or listen to anything from Dr. Robert Zubrin? There was a video link posted earlier. I think the part starting here especially addresses some of your points
https://youtu.be/EKQSijn9FBs?t=37m39s

I was thinking more in the lines of manufacturing ships and probes on the moon by mining the metals found there, granted that would go super sci-fi, and wouldn't be feasible any time soon. I remember skimming through the case for mars, haven't watched any of his stuff though. You could do more large scale experiments on the surface of the moon, it could also be used as a tourist attraction as soon as the space travel will become safer and cheaper.

And yes in the perfect world dividing up would be the best plan but i have very little faith in the space projects other companies have, and since SpaceX is the company in the spotlight i'd wish that they would align with the more safer and easier option. I will watch the Zubrins talk when i get home, can't really do that from work.

 

[Nocebo]

if we dream big we could even manufacture and build ships on the moon which would bring the costs down a lot, there's plenty of iron and other metals in the moon but that goes too far into the future. And you wouldn't need to send shit for a moon colony either once it gets big enough for it to be self sustaining. Also atmosphere of mars is extremely thin, i would like to see the machine that extracts the gasses from the atmosphere while still being worth the effort. And like i said, you could extract water, oxygen, and fuel He3 from moon too for their energy purposes.

If you want to dream big then going to Mars is a much bigger dream. There are more minerals on Mars so it can become self sustaining much easier as well.

And yes in the perfect world dividing up would be the best plan but i have very little faith in the space projects other companies have, and since SpaceX is the company in the spotlight i'd wish that they would align with the more safer and easier option. I will watch the Zubrins talk when i get home, can't really do that from work.

You have no faith in ESA?

 

[Crispy75]

<3 Elon Musk

Is there a way to download the keynote for offline viewing on iPad? 1:30h is a long time and flights are pretty much the only time I can spare... but would love to see every minute of it

You can download the presentation slides:

http://www.spacex.com/sites/spacex/files/mars_presentation.pdf

 

[Nocebo]

Another comment from Dr. Robert Zubrin:

Tyson doesn't understand what Musk is up to. The author of the article has a better idea, but hasn't quite figured it out. So I'll spill the beans.
Despite his public statements, Musk isn't going to fund humans to Mars out of his own pocket. But what he will do - is in fact already doing- is create the hardware set that will lower the cost threshold for sending humans to Mars so much that, sooner or later, a president will go for it. In that case, SpaceX will get the business - they will have earned it, and in any case, they'll be the only game in town. And Musk will leave all the cynics gaping in wonder at how anyone could ever make money sending humans to Mars.

https://www.facebook.com/robert.zubrin.1/posts/1729625920586670

 

[akileese]

Another comment from Dr. Robert Zubrin:

https://www.facebook.com/robert.zubrin.1/posts/1729625920586670

This is what I grasped from it and I'm kinda surprised most didn't see it this way. They're just trying to lower the cost of getting there and having governments/organizations foot the bill for actually getting people there. If you can lower the cost enough, people will have no problem spending the money to get there.

If they can do this it could really end up being incredibly profitable for SpaceX.

 

[Nocebo]

This is what I grasped from it and I'm kinda surprised most didn't see it this way. They're just trying to lower the cost of getting there and having governments/organizations foot the bill for actually getting people there. If you can lower the cost enough, people will have no problem spending the money to get there.

If they can do this it could really end up being incredibly profitable for SpaceX.

Indeed. I'm pretty sure Elon even mentioned it in the presentation. He just didn't emphasize it.

If SpaceX successfully completes its Red Dragon mission to Mars which should be launched in 2018 then they will undoubtedly turn some heads.

 

[CyclopsRock]

Indeed. I'm pretty sure Elon even mentioned it in the presentation. He just didn't emphasize it.

I think it was during the Q&A, he said that they weren't going to be making the actual stuff on the surface but that they were basically just the transport company.

 

[TyrantII]

whycantwehaveboth.gif

At $200,000 per ticket, for one million people, we're talking $200bn. A lot of money, but not so large when you compare it to the USA's military budget of $600bn, per year

$200b investment in a possible 10s of trillion economy isn't such a big deal. People tend to always focus on liabilities, when assets and revenue and projected growth make them under leveraged.

Same idea with asteroid farming. We get there, and the profits to be made and increased econimic activity of doing it and using those resources pays for itself by factors of magnitude.

 

[Nocebo]

I think it was during the Q&A, he said that they weren't going to be making the actual stuff on the surface but that they were basically just the transport company.

Yea, I think you're right.
He also mentions it during the funding portion of the talk.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjakmyOst0Y&feature=youtu.be&t=44m21s

I know there are a lot of people in the private sector interested in helping fund a base on mars and then perhaps there will be interest from the government sector side to also do that. Ultimately this will be a huge private/public partnership. I think that is how the United States was established...

 

[HyperionX]

uhm, where is he lampooning the idea?
he just says that he would do things a bit differently.

"...with a little modification, they could be made practical and very powerful."

The modification in question is abandoning the 500 ton rocket and use a 50 ton rocket instead. That's basically Zubrin saying to abandon the idea for something more practical in kinder words.

 

[HyperionX]

Am... am I reading this right? "Explosions" are a solved problem in rockets. Pack it up guys, Dave figured out how to stop rockets exploding back in the 60's.

Launchpad failures have been solved since the 1960s.

The fact that you think this is screaming out to me that you're not in any engineering field. Tesla is quite renowned for very, very good engineering and a lot of my friends and generally top talent coming out of university gets approached by them very actively. If they have an issue it's the insane work hours which burns a lot of engineers out causing them to leave for other companies, but the engineering talent they attract is top notch. Also the 2012 Model S had a 208 mile range and current models go up to 310 miles, so have no idea what you're talking about "first ev with 200+ mile range".

First low cost EV with 200+ mi range. Dropped a couple of words.

Please show me another car with the same functionality autopilot provides currently on the market?

http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/26/12287118/tesla-autopilot-crash-images-speed-limit-ntsb

It is extremely tragic that autopilot was unable to pick up the truck that the guy crashed into but he was speeding and there's a multitude of youtube videos the guy who died made which showed him explicitly misusing the autopilot feature.

To be honest everything you're saying just makes me feel like you have no idea about how engineering works in industry.

Pretty much everyone car with lane keep assist and adaptive cruise control has the same level of "autopilot" as Tesla's. It's just not marketed that way.

 

[Nocebo]

The modification in question is abandoning the 500 ton rocket and use a 50 ton rocket instead. That's basically Zubrin saying to abandon the idea for something more practical in kinder words.

You're reading too much into it. And at any rate, Dr. Zubrin seems to think SpaceX has the capabilities to produce the necessary hardware to go to Mars.

 

[Jebusman]

The modification in question is abandoning the 500 ton rocket and use a 50 ton rocket instead. That's basically Zubrin saying to abandon the idea for something more practical in kinder words.

What? Did you read the same post that I did?

He's saying that rather than send the entire 500 ton rocket all the ways to Mars and back every 4 years, they should just stage the launcher and only send the payload, along with a small propulsion system to control it.

Doing so would allow them to recover the launcher and fire again in the next available launch window. You'd be turning it into 10 trips at 50 tons each, rather than a single 500 ton trip every 4 years.

However in doing so, it would make it more difficult to return the payload to earth, or they would just have to scrap it and wait for the next payload to arrive.

He's not advocating that he "abandon the plan", more offering an alternative style of how to implement it, with it's own pros and cons.

If you see it as him shitting on the plan, that's more you injecting your apparent seething hatred of Elon Musk into everything you see.

 

[HyperionX]

What? Did you read the same post that I did?

He's saying that rather than send the entire 500 ton rocket all the ways to Mars and back every 4 years, they should just stage the launcher and only send the payload, along with a small propulsion system to control it.

Doing so would allow them to recover the launcher and fire again in the next available launch window. You'd be turning it into 10 trips at 50 tons each, rather than a single 500 ton trip every 4 years.

However in doing so, it would make it more difficult to return the payload to earth, or they would just have to scrap it and wait for the next payload to arrive.

He's not advocating that he "abandon the plan", more offering an alternative style of how to implement it, with it's own pros and cons.

If you see it as him shitting on the plan, that's more you injecting your apparent seething hatred of Elon Musk into everything you see.

I'm pretty sure Zubrin is disagree with Musk here. He said:

Alternatively, it could deliver the same payload with a system one tenth the size, which is what I would do.
So instead of needing a 500 ton launch capability, he could send the same number of people to Mars every opportunity with a 50 ton launcher, which is what Falcon heavy will be able to do.
The small landing propulsion unit could either be refilled and flown back to LEO, used on Mars for long distance travel, or scrapped and turned into useful parts on Mars using a 3D printer.
Done in this manner, such a transportation system could be implemented much sooner, possibly before the next decade is out, making settlement of Mars a real possibility for our time.

Zubrin is clearly saying he would use a smaller, 50 ton rocket instead, and that the big rocket will take much longer. I read "before the next decade is out" as 2029 or earlier, so he clearly doesn't think the big rocket idea is gonna work before then.

 

[Jebusman]

I'm pretty sure Zubrin is disagree with Musk here. He said:



Zubrin is clearly saying he would use a smaller, 50 ton rocket instead, and that the big rocket will take much longer. I read "before the next decade is out" as 2029 or earlier, so he clearly doesn't think the big rocket idea is gonna work before then.

You are reading way, way too much into this, and you seem to have way too much of a personal investment in trying to discredit SpaceX and Musk in general. Have fun arguing with people, because I can tell you you're not making a convincing case.

I'm still laughing at the "rocket explosions are a solved problem" idea as if unplanned catastrophic failure isn't always a possibility, even if it's 0.0000000001%.

 

[Disxo]

Hi jeff bezos!

 

[Nocebo]

Listening to Philip McAlister (director of the Commercial Spaceflight Division at NASA Headquarters) talk about the type of collaboration they have with SpaceX and a little bit about the Red Dragon mission amongst other things was really fascinating and sounded promising.

You are reading way, way too much into this, and you seem to have way too much of a personal investment in trying to discredit SpaceX and Musk in general. Have fun arguing with people, because I can tell you you're not making a convincing case.

Yeah, he also appears to be moving the goal posts now. It's a complete waste of time to argue with HyperionX at this point.

 

[Spiral Insanity]

I'm confused as to why the actual reveal didn't get a thread.

 

[superdeluxe]

I kinda wish that we would go to the moon first, this mars-mania is all fine but i'd rather see us deploy an outpost on the moon first for scientific research and what not, it would be safer, we would already have water there if we chose a spot correctly. Plus going to mars we'd have to wait 1½ years till the orbits would match while we could get to moon and back whenever we want.

So i'm in the camp of colonizing moon first, we aren't terraforming mars anytime soon anyway.

Musk explained why he isn't working to get back to the Moon, basically, its not worth it.

 

[HyperionX]

Yeah, he also appears to be moving the goal posts now. It's a complete waste of time to argue with HyperionX at this point.

I made my point. I think the evidence is pretty overwhelming that Musk can't accomplish this, but it's up to you if want to believe me or not.

 

[Alexlf]

I made my point. I think the evidence is pretty overwhelming that Musk can't accomplish this, but it's up to you if want to believe me or not.

You've yet to provide any evidence his organization couldn't, and yourself said earlier that the technology he's using is simply iterative anyways, so he shouldn't be credited with anything. So why would it fail again if the technology is, as you put it, solved? I don't think you've really answered that yet, and other's already asked.

You've also made an appeal to authority that Zubrin is saying he can't do it (and no, Zubrin is not saying that at all as far as I read. He's saying that he thinks the current course of actions will push their timeline beyond what they are predicting as far as I read it, at the worst).

So if you wanna come up with an actual concrete reason that isn't you misrepresenting someone elses argument I'm all ears.

EDIT: And this isn't arguing he CAN do it either, It seems he's gonna try though and that's the exciting part.

His organization is successfully dropping the price of space travel as is, and a large push for mars will continue to do so likely to greater degrees.

 

[PdotMichael]

I think in fact one day we could instead increase the sustainability of living on Earth by moving production facilities in space or on other places, keeping Earth as pristine and protected as possible from catastrophes. Of course we need to colonize space as well to some extent, but that's further off IMO than the usefulness of AI/robots being sent out over humans.

Well, if we compare a Mars base like something a research station in Antarctica then it should be possible although there are still many unresolved questions about such a mission. I already named a few. Other ones would be water supply, protection against micro asteroids (no protective atmosphere) or the plain fact that right now you would send people to die on Mars.

In fact a mission that involves the Mars and bringing people on them which didn't include a decade(s) of base building and further research can't be taken serious.

An interesting read is von Braun's concept for a Mars mission, although we have more technical options available now large parts are still legit.

 

[g0tm1lk]

Wow at the q&a...

 

[Walpurgis]

I really liked his response about the fact that establishing a presence on Mars would create an incredibly powerful feedback loop in terms of tech advancements in space travel overall.

The fact that as soon as you get refueling in place you can extend this to practically our entire solar system is so incredible.

I think we should avoid messing around with the moon too much since it's gravitational force is important for keeping things normal on Earth.

 

[Raticus79]

This could make a really good video game. Manufacturing and logistics to meet those 2 year windows, sending off the fleet, colony design, playing through the long term terraforming Sim Earth style... oh yeah

 

[blu]

Launchpad failures have been solved since the 1960s.

Just pre-launch failures, after 5 minutes of googling:

On 26 June 1973, a Kosmos 3M exploded on the pad at Plesetsk during a propellant loading accident, killing 9 people.

Soyuz 7K-ST No.16L, sometimes known as Soyuz T-10a or T-10-1, was an unsuccessful Soyuz mission intended to visit the Salyut 7 space station, which was occupied by the Soyuz T-9 crew. However, it never finished its launch countdown; the launch vehicle was destroyed on the launch pad by fire on September 26, 1983.

The 2003 Alcântara VLS accident was an accident involving a Brazilian Space Agency VLS-1 launch vehicle, which was intended to have launched two satellites into orbit. The rocket exploded on its launch pad at the Alcântara Launch Center, killing 21 people. This was the third attempt by the Brazilian Space Agency to launch the VLS rocket into space.

 

[HyperionX]

Just pre-launch failures, after 5 minutes of googling:

In the US it's the first in 50 years.

 

[Disxo]

I would be more uncomfortable if things didnt explode, just saying.
This mistake is surely NOT happening again.

 

[iamblades]

In the US it's the first in 50 years.

Conveniently it's also basically the only completely new liquid fueled medium-heavy lift booster engine that has been developed in most of that time period. There is the RS-68, but that's basically just a simplified SSME, AFAIK. Ariane uses SRBs, everyone else uses ancient Russian surplus.

I really don't understand the motivation to downplay SpaceX's engineering achievements or suggest they shouldn't set such ambitious goals though. That's really up to the person(s) writing the checks, and considering SpaceX is a private company, who cares if Musk downplays the engineering challenges to the public.

I'd get the scrutiny and skepticism if Musk was using this to try to launch an IPO or something, but as it is, why all the shit talk towards a group of people that are trying to do something? Because they weren't able to exceed the capabilities of large aerospace/defense contractors in a decade of starting from scratch with a blank sheet of paper? That is a ridiculous standard to hold anyone to.

 

[subrock]

new Wait But Why blog on the subject. It's a great read

http://waitbutwhy.com/2016/09/spacexs-big-fking-rocket-the-full-story.html

 

[HyperionX]

Conveniently it's also basically the only completely new liquid fueled medium-heavy lift booster engine that has been developed in most of that time period. There is the RS-68, but that's basically just a simplified SSME, AFAIK. Ariane uses SRBs, everyone else uses ancient Russian surplus.

The explosion started somewhere in the upper stage, likely related to the Helium storage system. Not sure what it has to do with the engine. RS-68 has nothing to do with the SSME, and the Ariane use the Vulcain engine. Atlas V uses new Russian engines. Pretty sure your claim of everyone else using old technology is wrong.

I really don't understand the motivation to downplay SpaceX's engineering achievements or suggest they shouldn't set such ambitious goals though. That's really up to the person(s) writing the checks, and considering SpaceX is a private company, who cares if Musk downplays the engineering challenges to the public.

I'd get the scrutiny and skepticism if Musk was using this to try to launch an IPO or something, but as it is, why all the shit talk towards a group of people that are trying to do something? Because they weren't able to exceed the capabilities of large aerospace/defense contractors in a decade of starting from scratch with a black sheet of paper? That is a ridiculous standard to hold anyone to.

His companies are pretty heavily dependent on taxpayer dollars to fund them. So a lot of the checks being written are government money, so we should be at least a little concerned if he's wasting it.

I'm not saying he hasn't impressed the world relative to where he started. Going from zero to a few dozen launches in a decade is certainly impressive by itself. If he had stopped there, no one would be this critical of him. The problem is, we're now expecting him to leapfrog NASA, the Russian space program, all other aerospace companies, etc., by millions of miles with ease. I think it's pretty obvious this is impossible.

 

[iamblades]

The explosion started somewhere in the upper stage, likely related to the Helium storage system. Not sure what it has to do with the engine. RS-68 has nothing to do with the SSME, and the Ariane use the Vulcain engine. Atlas V uses new Russian engines. Pretty sure your claim of everyone else using old technology is wrong.



His companies are pretty heavily dependent on taxpayer dollars to fund them. So a lot of the checks being written are government money, so we should be at least a little concerned if he's wasting it.

I'm not saying he hasn't impressed the world relative to where he started. Going from zero to a few dozen launches in a decade is certainly impressive by itself. If he had stopped there, no one would be this critical of him. The problem is, we're now expecting him to leapfrog NASA, the Russian space program, all other aerospace companies, etc., by millions of miles with ease. I think it's pretty obvious this is impossible.

The helium is used to pressures the fuel system, so it has quite a lot to do with the engines, even if that was not directly the part that failed.

He isn't wasting anything if NASA is getting what they are paying for. What he does with the profit is 100% up to him.

I don't think anyone is expecting any of this to be done 'with ease', but SpaceX pretty much has already leapfrogged all those other entities in cost effectiveness. I guess time will tell if they are doing this at a detriment to safety and reliability, but so far they have a better track record than older and more established competitors like Orbital.

I've got my own criticisms of this plan, as I think it focuses a bit too much on scale, leading to a more difficult mission architecture that substantially complicates things, though at least this plan doesn't require some kind of nonsensical orbital construction technology we aren't even close to achieving yet, which is more than we can say for NASA's plans.