Author Topic: Private Moon Landing in the works?  (Read 152779 times)

Offline cro-magnon gramps

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1548
  • Very Ancient Martian National
  • Ontario, Canada
  • Liked: 843
  • Likes Given: 10995
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #40 on: 11/16/2012 06:47 pm »
And @NASAWatch
"Golden Spike" commercial lunar exploration company includes Wayne Hale, Jerry Griffin, Alan Stern

You've heard of them! ;D

I've been hearing bagpipes in the distance, all morning, and they seem to be getting louder...  :D perhaps I'll get to see another Moon landing in my lifetime yet...

Gramps,
Gramps "Earthling by Birth, Martian by the grace of The Elon." ~ "Hate, it has caused a lot of problems in the world, but it has not solved one yet." Maya Angelou ~ Tony Benn: "Hope is the fuel of progress and fear is the prison in which you put yourself."

Online oldAtlas_Eguy

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 5304
  • Florida
  • Liked: 5005
  • Likes Given: 1444
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #41 on: 11/16/2012 07:44 pm »
Most of ULA's depot technology actually comes from Ball Aerospace, passive and active cryogenics as well as cryo transfer technologies. The reason ULA is credited with these is that ULA has been quietly paying and partnering with Ball to fly experiments on Atlas V flights. Other technologies come from Boeing (the ICE). ULA is an integrator. But I am not sure who owns the stainless stell tank technology. It is probably public domain by now since the applicable patents probably date to the 1950's.

Someone else could become the integrator for a depot.

Offline strangequark

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1072
  • Co-Founder, Tesseract Space
  • San Francisco, CA
  • Liked: 226
  • Likes Given: 12
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #42 on: 11/16/2012 07:57 pm »
And @NASAWatch
"Golden Spike" commercial lunar exploration company includes Wayne Hale, Jerry Griffin, Alan Stern

You've heard of them! ;D

That is amazing. Godspeed gentlemen, and Go For TLI!

Online Galactic Penguin SST

Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #43 on: 11/16/2012 08:07 pm »
Oh and.....  :)

Quote
NASA Watch ‏@NASAWatch
"Golden Spike" commercial lunar exploration company has @HomerHickam on its board of advisors

https://twitter.com/NASAWatch/status/269524199163453440
Astronomy & spaceflight geek penguin. In a relationship w/ Space Shuttle Discovery. Current Priority: Chasing the Chinese Spaceflight Wonder Egg & A Certain Chinese Mars Rover

Offline robertross

  • Canadian Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 17939
  • Westphal, Nova Scotia
  • Liked: 659
  • Likes Given: 7691
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #44 on: 11/16/2012 08:26 pm »
And @NASAWatch
"Golden Spike" commercial lunar exploration company includes Wayne Hale, Jerry Griffin, Alan Stern

You've heard of them! ;D

WOW, this is getting tense.

Offline neilh

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2365
  • Pasadena, CA
  • Liked: 46
  • Likes Given: 149
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #45 on: 11/16/2012 08:36 pm »
And @NASAWatch
"Golden Spike" commercial lunar exploration company includes Wayne Hale, Jerry Griffin, Alan Stern

You've heard of them! ;D

Wow!
Someone is wrong on the Internet.
http://xkcd.com/386/

Offline corrodedNut

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1542
  • Liked: 216
  • Likes Given: 133
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #46 on: 11/16/2012 08:37 pm »
That answers the "business plan" question. They're going to open a casino on the far side of the moon...

Offline rcoppola

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2355
  • USA
  • Liked: 1967
  • Likes Given: 970
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #47 on: 11/16/2012 08:50 pm »
Ok, so we're seeing some of the industry/academic involvement which is interesting and exciting in the abstract.

But it's when we hear from all the committed "investors" who will be paying for this and the commercial companies that will actually be building it, that I'll get elated in the real.
Sail the oceans of space and set foot upon new lands!
http://www.stormsurgemedia.com

Offline corrodedNut

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1542
  • Liked: 216
  • Likes Given: 133
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #48 on: 11/16/2012 09:03 pm »
Paragon too:

"@NASAWatch 
Paragon Space Development is also involved w/ Golden Spike commercial lunar company"
 

Offline Nelson Bridwell

  • Member
  • Posts: 59
  • Liked: 0
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #49 on: 11/16/2012 09:19 pm »
From Homer Hickam, who is on the board of advisors of Golden Spike:
"If you read Back to the Moon...I won't say more."

Back to the Moon was his science fiction novel about a commercial group that "borrows" NASA hardware and flies a manned mission to the lunar surface to retrieve regolith to extract He3 for nuclear fusion power generation.

My initial guess has been that this was a geopolitical Apollo-lookalike resulting from agreements between Bigelow, SpaceX, and UAE+Dubai+Japan.  (Japan-China rivalry.)

If this is going to generate revenue then I would expect them to go heavy on unmanned hardware, like Planetary Resources.  However, if they want to perform significant construction on the lunar surface then having people up close can sometimes be very benificial (Hubble servicing missions)...

Offline corrodedNut

  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1542
  • Liked: 216
  • Likes Given: 133
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #50 on: 11/16/2012 09:31 pm »
From today's Royal Aeronautical Society lecture:

"Tim Robinson ‏@RAeSTimR
Q: Why r u focused on Mars rather than Moon? "We r happy to take people to Moon," quips Elon Musk"

Offline Nelson Bridwell

  • Member
  • Posts: 59
  • Liked: 0
  • Likes Given: 0
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #51 on: 11/16/2012 10:10 pm »
"A privately circulated proposal, known as “Golden Spike” and backed by respected scientific and astronautical entities, envisions the development of a reliable Cislunar Superhighway”.

That could explain the choice of the name Golden Spike.  Their focus could be the development of a commercial transportation system betweel LEO and the Lunar surface.

This is a real a longshot, but you might need boots on the Moon if you intend to to assemble a lunar elevator...

http://www.spacecalendar.com/may-21-27-2012-vol-31-no-21-hawaii-island-usa/9/

Offline robertross

  • Canadian Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 17939
  • Westphal, Nova Scotia
  • Liked: 659
  • Likes Given: 7691
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #52 on: 11/16/2012 10:46 pm »
From Homer Hickam, who is on the board of advisors of Golden Spike:
"If you read Back to the Moon...I won't say more."

Back to the Moon was his science fiction novel about a commercial group that "borrows" NASA hardware and flies a manned mission to the lunar surface to retrieve regolith to extract He3 for nuclear fusion power generation.

Well now...!!

So if the 'goal' is extracting He3, and you look at Wiki (yeah, I know), there is the notion that Chandrayaan-I may have been looking for it.

http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=11006.0

We know it found ice...

"NASA RADAR FINDS ICE DEPOSITS AT MOON'S NORTH POLE; ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE OF WATER ACTIVITY ON MOON

WASHINGTON -- Using data from a NASA radar that flew aboard India's
Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, scientists have detected ice deposits near
the moon's north pole. NASA's Mini-SAR instrument, a lightweight,
synthetic aperture radar, found more than 40 small craters with water
ice. The craters range in size from 1 to 9 miles (2 to15 km) in
diameter. Although the total amount of ice depends on its thickness
in each crater, it's estimated there could be at least 1.3 million
pounds (600 million metric tons) of water ice. "

http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=11006.msg554432#msg554432

Offline Robotbeat

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 39270
  • Minnesota
  • Liked: 25240
  • Likes Given: 12115
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #53 on: 11/16/2012 10:56 pm »
Helium-3? Why?
Chris  Whoever loves correction loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid.

To the maximum extent practicable, the Federal Government shall plan missions to accommodate the space transportation services capabilities of United States commercial providers. US law http://goo.gl/YZYNt0

Offline docmordrid

  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 6334
  • Michigan
  • Liked: 4207
  • Likes Given: 2
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #54 on: 11/16/2012 11:05 pm »
Helium-3? Why?

It's a good fuel for fusion reactors.
DM

Offline dad2059

  • Full Member
  • *
  • Posts: 198
    • Dad2059's Webzine of Science-Fiction, Science Fact and Esoterica
  • Liked: 0
  • Likes Given: 4
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #55 on: 11/16/2012 11:16 pm »

It's a good fuel for fusion reactors.

Yeah, but even with this hypothetical "golden highway", why would this be more cost effective than good ol' H2O on Earth?
NASA needs some good ol' fashioned 'singularity tech'

Offline robertross

  • Canadian Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 17939
  • Westphal, Nova Scotia
  • Liked: 659
  • Likes Given: 7691
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #56 on: 11/16/2012 11:48 pm »
Helium-3? Why?

I know, I'm having a hard time trying to see them justify a commercial endeavour centered around He3.

Now while nobody can theoretically 'own' the moon, or parts thereof - first come, first served. They could simply set up the necessary hardware to extract & refine it (later on, after discoveries & so on), and have it ready for Earth return. That way, if I'm correct, they wouldn't now 'own it' (along with any other finds).

There is a big part of me inside thinking that something WAS found on the moon, something worth persuing, and this is the attempt to lay claim on it. What that something is, if it indeed is He3, will likely require a large pre-positioning of hardware to obtain. If they have the right players - and clearly they have some great minds on it at the moment - things could happen.

Offline arachnitect

  • Member
  • Full Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1553
  • Liked: 501
  • Likes Given: 759
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #57 on: 11/17/2012 12:10 am »
Helium-3? Why?

It's a good fuel for fusion reactors.

Need for fusion fuel is a long way off.

Current demand is driven by neutron detectors (esp. homeland security applications).

Using alternatives or ramping up He3 production here on earth would probably be easier than scouring lunar regolith for the stuff.

Offline Atlan

  • Member
  • Posts: 68
  • Europe
  • Liked: 1
  • Likes Given: 3
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #58 on: 11/17/2012 12:13 am »
What is about Helium-3 for Fusion Research? As much as i know Scientists would love to have more Helium3 but its just too hard to get. Maybe they can earn some money with low amounts for research first while testing the mining hardware.

If you combine that with tourists that do research on the moon on behalf of the scientific community maybe it  pays off(or at least pays the bills).
Your mind is software. Program it.
Your body is a shell. Change it.
Death is a disease. Cure it.
Extinction is approaching. Fight it.

Offline robertross

  • Canadian Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 17939
  • Westphal, Nova Scotia
  • Liked: 659
  • Likes Given: 7691
Re: Private Moon Landing in the works?
« Reply #59 on: 11/17/2012 12:36 am »
What is about Helium-3 for Fusion Research? As much as i know Scientists would love to have more Helium3 but its just too hard to get. Maybe they can earn some money with low amounts for research first while testing the mining hardware.

If you combine that with tourists that do research on the moon on behalf of the scientific community maybe it  pays off(or at least pays the bills).

Reading up on Wiki (hey, it's a start, and you need to start somewhere), I'm more intruigued by the low temperature helium-3 refrigerator.

When you think of the research at CERN & the large hadron collider, and how much liquid helium they use, then put into perspective the super conducting magnets for medical imaging...there is a bright future for the needs of Helium & its isotopes.

Tags:
 

Advertisement NovaTech
Advertisement Northrop Grumman
Advertisement
Advertisement Margaritaville Beach Resort South Padre Island
Advertisement Brady Kenniston
Advertisement NextSpaceflight
Advertisement Nathan Barker Photography
0