[meteorite-list] Model Rockets and Moon Rocks was...13.5 kg lunar

From: MexicoDoug_at_aol.com <MexicoDoug_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sun May 15 17:24:18 2005
Message-ID: <1aa.38145300.2fb917fc_at_aol.com>

Hola Adam,

I need to add my support to Mark F and Darren's openminded interpretation of
your negative assessment of the (lack of) feasibility getting Lunar material
FOB Earth at a cost (mind you, not price) below $5000 per gram. The
optimistic figure starts at about $1 per POUND, cheaper than any US domestic mail
product.

Mark has already mentioned the mass catapult idea which certainly is
feasible and has numerous designs. On such design taken seriously by NASA is said
to cost about one dollar per pound to reach a cislunar geocentric orbital
location (Lagrangian: L1 for example). That is the orbital location materials
can be concentrated and collected for reentry into Earth's atmosphere and sent
back will minimal energy using airbraking technology that exists in a space
shuttle like set-up at worst, and at best in very oblique chute/balloon entry.
 Or just chucking the rocks at the Earth at nearly no extra charge forming
natural fusion crusts and very fresh low cost witnessed fall lunaites.

The "mass driver" catapult mentioned just uses a tubular set of circular
coils timed to become electromagnets as a magnetized payload in a bucket passes
through them, installed on the Moon with off the shelf modest technology to
accelerate the bucket with 1 kilogram or so of material. The many buckets in
the mass escalator are recoverable and detach and are reused many many times,
providing tons and tons of ejected material at its destination. Material
slightly overshot will probably fall to Earth as meteorites. And the energy is
all right there on the moon - electricity generated from solar cells to
power the coils (electromagnets) which nudge the bucket ever faster through the
tube and comfortably reach the necessary escape velocity.

The escape velocity of the moon is much lower as Darren has reminded and
there is practically no frictional slowing (drag), which on Earth causes most
entry difficulties, and that the escape velocity is much lower.

On the Moon, it is only an escape velocity 2400 m/s. I am betting that many
list members can relate to that in terms of model rocketry. Ever wonder
whether that model rocket you launched on Earth could be a space mission if
Launched from the Moon? Here are some calculations estimates I have made
regarding commercial hobby and amateur model rocket engines.
Company - Engine - Est. Maximum Velocity
Estes - D12 - 320 m/s
Apogee - F10 - 724 m/s
Aerotech - I65 - 955 m/s
Kosdan - K700 - 1118 m/s
Animal Motor Works - M2500 - 1404 m/s

So you can see, hobbyists (little and big kids like us) on the earth are
already using engines are practically there, when a little Estes kit can do 14%
of Lunar escape velocity reaching 2.65 miles height on the Moon, but only
0.25 of a mile on Earth. The AMW motor mentioned is two thirds of the way
there, but on Earth can only do a little over 2 miles height ... though if not for
the atmosphere it would make it into space, but not escape.

Last May a Hollywood stuntman actually did launch an amateur rocket into
space from the US for the first time, though it went relatively unnoticed in the
shadow of the X-prize multimillion dollar extravangaza. So you can bet
these commercial toy rockets and their engines are not limited by physics, but
rather the FAA, etc.

So the technology and feasibility for the Moon is a given, as it its
reserves. Now all we need is a reason. How about high oil prices? Lack of a
variety of economic metal reserves? 20 years may or many not be the number but I
am guessing it is close!

One further metion right on the Mark was the Lunar tourist (including
scientists)souvenier rocks stuffed in the pockets and boots of people. I believe
that is very true as well. Didn't Ron just post how a professor asked NASA
for dust from the astronauts boots of mixed Lunar origin on the site - and
didn't he get 100 grams of it?

Saludos, Doug
PS Mark, The crazy value of meteorites from the Moon, is principally because
they are from the Moon, not because they are meteorites. Perhaps the
craziness of collectors will prove without bound, but I am not too sure of that as
perspectives change and novelty wears off on many. And remember that there
will probably be more than enough Lunar slag reentering the Earth following
these points of discussion...And never mind the slag, "Made in Luna" or
"Assembled in Space from parts imported from Luna" is not as far away as you think
for some products. Earth and the human ADVENTUROUS spirit especially when a
buck is to be made, is too finite to believe anything less...
 

En un mensaje con fecha 05/15/2005 12:52:19 PM Mexico Daylight Time,
mqfowler_at_mac.com escribe:
> On Sat, 14 May 2005 17:03:53 -0700, "Adam Hupe" <raremeteorites at
> comcast.net> wrote:
>
> >That's ridiculous, Lunar material brought back from the moon would
> baseline
> >at more than $5,000.00 a gram. Anything less is not feasible because
> the
> >costs are tremendous and have already been calculated.
>
> Adam

One should be very careful about making dogmatic statements about what
will never be technically or financially possible in the future! Quite
possibly 100 years in the future, the cost of a package to or form the
moon may be little more in comparison to our income then, than the cost
of getting one banana from Ecuador to the USA was in comparison to the
income of Americans 150 years ago. I've observed in my lifetime that
the optimists have always been more right than the pessimists!
>

> Oh, maybe in the near future (I just used the 20 year figure because
> that is what the original
> poster used) but I refuse to believe that, for an established lunar
> mining colony launching material
> from the surface of the moon under the Moon's 1/6th g using lunar
> construction materials and lunar
> fuel, the price will always be in the thousands of dollars per gram
> range. I'm not talking about a
> simple sample return mission, here.
>
> Darren

Read Heinleins " The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" a classic SF story in
which a rail gun catapult plays a crucial part.

Certainly, if we have a lunar colony and there is enough commerce to
justify such a rail gun, the cost of transport from the moon to earth
will be reduced by more than a factor of 1000. Even before then,
colonists, astronauts, scientists, or tourists will have a personal
allowance of one or two kilos for personal effects. Who's to say that
they won't choose to leave behind their underwear, toothpaste, shaving
cream etc. and use their personal allowance to bring back moon rocks
instead. I would.

After the 20? or so specimens have been found in Dhofar (such a small
region) who is to say how many more my turn up elsewhere. The 13.5
kilo one from the Kalahari may be the tip of the iceberg.

A maxim of warfare is to ask not what is the intentions of your enemy
but rather what are his capabilities. NASA may have no intention of
ever selling those moon rocks, but they are there, and it could happen.
Received on Sun 15 May 2005 05:24:12 PM PDT