Author Topic: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)  (Read 89157 times)

Offline Robotbeat

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #160 on: 07/18/2018 03:51 am »
mported modern computers are nice, but the local production can be '40s tech or earlier. You still need a chemical industry, metallurgy, glass blowing and vacuum pumps, but none of that needs intensive computing behind it.

What else is needed for a 1950s tech local production base?

1. functionally unlimited water resources
2. virtually unlimited legal restraint on air & water pollution emissions into the Mars environment
3. unlimited electrical power generation at $.01 to $.02 per kwh
4. fossil fuel resources on par per capita with Saudi Arabia's Gawar oil field
5. Demographics & legal institutions favorable to family formation, stability, & reproduction
6. A Bretton Woods style agreement making Martian currency the reserve currency of the solar system.
7. Arable land equivalent per capita to the fertility & productivity of the American midwest.

This could become a very long list, but I think even 1950's level technology is not achievable for a small colony. ( i.e a million people)  I hate to be a downer to this thread, but the premise that low tech will be the basis for long term survival is fatally flawed.  The entire notion of self sufficiency is very possibly flawed to the degree that self sufficiency may never be achievable on Mars, or any other body, natural or manmade, in our solar system.
That doesn't actually make any sense. Your post doesn't contribute anything to this thread at all. In fact, it's a negative contribution because it's full of inaccuracies. For instance:

To start with, the price of residential electricity in the US adjusted for inflation in the 1950s was almost double what it is today, over 20 cents per kWh in today's currency. I'm not even going to bother with the rest of your post. The amount of energy needed to refute BS is an order of magnitude greater than the energy needed to generate it.
« Last Edit: 07/18/2018 03:52 am by Robotbeat »
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Offline rakaydos

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #161 on: 07/18/2018 04:27 am »
From wikipedia: The photovoltaic effect was first observed by French physicist A. E. Becquerel in 1839. He explained his discovery in Les Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences, "the production of an electric current when two plates of platinum or gold immersed in an acid, neutral, or alkaline solution are exposed in an uneven way to solar radiation."[3] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photovoltaic_effect)

That's about as primitive as you can reasonably go, but with enough baseline power, you can slowly expand your energy production on an absurdly low tech base, until in a few thousand years the entire planet is covered in solar panels.

And that's not even counting solar-steam engines, for mechanical power.

Offline Robotbeat

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #162 on: 07/18/2018 04:36 am »
Taking a chronological approach to find the simplest tech tree is not actually a good plan. There are some things we discovered later that are actually simpler than the earlier methods.
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Offline Stan-1967

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #163 on: 07/18/2018 06:23 am »
....
That doesn't actually make any sense. Your post doesn't contribute anything to this thread at all. In fact, it's a negative contribution because it's full of inaccuracies. .....


I will spell it out for you.  If you don't get it, it doesn't mean it is of negative value to the thread.  It means I can't help you see the delusion that I think is plaguing this thread, which means maybe you are part of that.

Willingly ignoring the geopolitical, economic, & social conditions that led to the technological & civilizational  base of the 1950's is not  moving the ball in the direction of understanding if it is possible for a mars colony to be self sufficient, nor is it helpful in determining what technologies will be of most value. 

Treating certain technologies, or happy prosperous periods of  humanity as markers, or some type of magic bullet,  for achieving self sufficiency is cargo cult thinking. 

Every age is a product of what has preceded it.  Mars will be no exception to this.  A Mars colony, should it happen, will start out cutting edge technology wise.  As it grows, it is possible for it evolve in many unforeseen directions that depend on too many variables to count.

I also pointed out many non-technology related criteria because I think it is fallacious to think technology, whether steam punked or modern, will shelter martians from the other existential threats to a colony, as well as pointing out the the poor comparison of Mars to the extremely resource rich world of the 1950's. 


Offline johnfwhitesell

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #164 on: 07/18/2018 01:43 pm »
So it sounds to me like Stan is saying that he feels clean sheet designs offer more efficiency when it comes to maintaining a supply chain.

And it sounds to me like Robo is confident that technological advancement allows for some things that were previously uneconomical to become economical.

Am I getting you guys right?

Offline Lar

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #165 on: 07/19/2018 12:33 am »
So it sounds to me like Stan is saying that he feels clean sheet designs offer more efficiency when it comes to maintaining a supply chain.

And it sounds to me like Robo is confident that technological advancement allows for some things that were previously uneconomical to become economical.

Am I getting you guys right?
Thats what I got, and more over, these two viewpoints are not necessarily incompatible with each other.
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
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Offline john smith 19

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #166 on: 07/19/2018 05:44 am »
This could become a very long list, but I think even 1950's level technology is not achievable for a small colony. ( i.e a million people)  I hate to be a downer to this thread, but the premise that low tech will be the basis for long term survival is fatally flawed.  The entire notion of self sufficiency is very possibly flawed to the degree that self sufficiency may never be achievable on Mars, or any other body, natural or manmade, in our solar system.
The planet you're living on now is an existence proof that you're wrong.

It is a closed system, to the same extent that Mars is IE access to the Sun and interplanetary space.

The question (as it's always been) is what is the minimum subset of the resources of Earth that are needed  for another planet to be self-sufficient IE able to grow without external input in the worst case scenario of no more supplies (or people) coming from Earth.

What we do have now are a) Much better design resources to build an environment that is mostly working and b) The understanding of the consequences of our actions on the environment.

It his a hypothesis that it will be easier to achieve that closure by eliminating certain more modern paths and hence simplyfying the manufacturing chain that stands behind the parts being used.

Of course if someone builds a mechanochemical nano assembler that can replicate itself that would solve the technology level issues, since you could have whatever tech you needed. Unfortunately it's been more than 30 years since "Engines of Creation" and while progress has been made we still seem a long way from building such a machine.  Relying on such a technological fix seems very unwise if you're betting your life on it.
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline Stan-1967

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #167 on: 07/20/2018 06:02 am »
The planet you're living on now is an existence proof that you're wrong.

It is a closed system, to the same extent that Mars is IE access to the Sun and interplanetary space.

Earth as a closed system =/= Mars as a closed system.  These two things are vastly different from each other in the overriding consideration of sustaining human life.  Positing equality between these two, with the differentiator being only the technology choices that underly a civilization is superficial when weighed against the hundreds of millions of years of darwinian evolution that made Earth a friendly host to us humans.


The question (as it's always been) is what is the minimum subset of the resources of Earth that are needed  for another planet to be self-sufficient IE able to grow without external input in the worst case scenario of no more supplies (or people) coming from Earth.

I agree with you on this point. However I think the "problem definition" needs to be more explicit. 
1.  How long should the colony grow without external input?  indefinite? long enough to return after an apocalyptic event on earth wipes out life? 
2. At what technological level does the colony need to maintain itself?  An agrarian low level colony that feeds itself & makes the consumables for life, or do they need to be a spacefaring civilization like their earth cousins?

There will be orders of magnitude different levels of technology required depending on problem definition

What we do have now are a) Much better design resources to build an environment that is mostly working and b) The understanding of the consequences of our actions on the environment.

It his a hypothesis that it will be easier to achieve that closure by eliminating certain more modern paths and hence simplyfying the manufacturing chain that stands behind the parts being used.
I think their is a parametric balance to be struck with low vs. high tech.  The high tech solutions will be the most efficient from a mass/energy/time metric.  Low tech may win on cost vs. time for others.  The balance is that the high tech solutions will require a base level of survival that enable dedicating excess labor inputs into the specialized needs of supporting high tech.  Going low tech will be by nature, less efficient & more consuming of available excess labor.

My best guess for how a successful effort at colonization would go is that it is going to need to start out as a very expensive gift of excess everything from the Earth.  Power rich, technology rich, living space rich, water rich, air rich, you name it.  Martians will need massive 'margin' for the basics while real world events & needs dictate where excess labor can be dedicated to solving the millions of little problems & decisions on the road to self sufficiency.

I still stand by my previous post that in addition the technological & economic path that will have to unfold, so will an existential & cultural solution be needed.

Offline MikeAtkinson

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #168 on: 07/20/2018 07:26 am »
Going low tech will be by nature, less efficient & more consuming of available excess labor.

I think (but cannot think of a way of proving) that going low tech will lead to a productivity problem, in that it needs more than one man-year of labor to keep someone alive for a year.

The reasons for this are:

1. many things will be much less efficient on Mars (at any given technology level) than on Earth.

a - transport will have no ships (the most efficient), or aircraft (technically aircraft are possible, but much harder and less efficient than on Earth). The equivalent of trucks will be less efficient (cabins and loading docks need to be pressurized). Rail is less efficient (track maintenance is harder, loading and unloading). For all modes of transport there need to be air locks and breakdowns are harder to deal with.

b - agriculture is much less efficient, services that are free on Earth (light, watering, air circulation) will need to be engineered in. Whatever structures are used will need far more maintenance than a field.

c - many things that can be done outside on Earth will need to be inside on Mars, leading to more buildings being required, these buildings will need more maintenance as they need added life support services.

d - manufacturing will be less efficient, the much smaller population size means that economies of scale have less effect. Sourcing raw materials and controlling pollution are both likely to be more difficult - for instance many industrial processes need lots of water.


2. More work needs to be done to keep someone alive.

a - life support is needed, water extraction and air supply. Mars has no natural ecosystem services, everything has to be engineered in, built and maintained.

b - obtaining resources is likely to be harder. Water, some gasses (helium) and some minerals (limestone) almost certainly, most metals probably.

c - some things are harder to produce (paper, plastics, wooden items), substitution leads to lower efficiency as compared to Earth.


3. this productivity problem is likely to be worse at low tech levels.

a - automation is needed for manufacturing productivity.

b - electronic communication is much more efficient than letters on paper.

c - computers enable JIT manufacturing, process optimisation, cnc machine tools, advanced manufacturing automation, etc.

d - digital storage is much more efficient than alternatives (especially on Mars where paper is much harder to make).

e - workforce health will be worse due to the lessened ability to diagnose and treat diseases.


4. with a limited population, it will be inefficient or impossible to have competition in the supply of many goods and services. This will lead to many bad behaviors.


All these factors could easily lead to a situation where the population working as hard as they can are not able to maintain the infrastructure. The colony would then slowly decline, or perhaps continue on much as before until a crisis point is reached, or perhaps expand in population at a faster rate than the resources and infrastructure.



Offline colbourne

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #169 on: 07/20/2018 10:43 am »
The question (as it's always been) is what is the minimum subset of the resources of Earth that are needed  for another planet to be self-sufficient IE able to grow without external input in the worst case scenario of no more supplies (or people) coming from Earth.
This  sums up the problem of setting up a civilisation on Mars that has the potential to flourish and the possibility of growth, independently from Earth.

I think the minimum could be a base using very little, if any electricity. People and crops would live in tunnels and light could be reflected in with mirrors, and a few windows. Air would be cleaned by the vegetation as much as possible. The only requirement for complex production processes could be to produce glass (or transparent alternatives) and  airlocks, although even these could be made from rock , and sealed with ice. Suits for use outside could be fabric or leather , proofed with resin ? Breathing equipment for use outside will be a major problem.

I think there will be a requirement for making plastics and metals. It would be a great advantage if solar power could be harnessed, along with electrical lighting.
In Turkey there are underground cities , which were made thousands of years ago to avoid invaders. These may be very similar to what could be built on Mars. These underground cities had doors made from round rocks that were rolled into position.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4032200/Photos-underground-18-storey-city-Turkey-reveal-hidden-rooms-house-20-000-people.html

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #170 on: 07/21/2018 08:01 am »
The question (as it's always been) is what is the minimum subset of the resources of Earth that are needed  for another planet to be self-sufficient IE able to grow without external input in the worst case scenario of no more supplies (or people) coming from Earth.
This  sums up the problem of setting up a civilisation on Mars that has the potential to flourish and the possibility of growth, independently from Earth.

I think the minimum could be a base using very little, if any electricity. People and crops would live in tunnels and light could be reflected in with mirrors, and a few windows. Air would be cleaned by the vegetation as much as possible. The only requirement for complex production processes could be to produce glass (or transparent alternatives) and  airlocks, although even these could be made from rock , and sealed with ice. Suits for use outside could be fabric or leather , proofed with resin ? Breathing equipment for use outside will be a major problem.
So right there you're going to be needing animals for leather (not just now but in the future) and cloth and probably some kinds of trees for the design.

This illustrates the very  complex support system that needs to be in place for a self sufficient settlement, even one with a fairly low level of technology.
So it sounds to me like Stan is saying that he feels clean sheet designs offer more efficiency when it comes to maintaining a supply chain.
Going low tech will be by nature, less efficient & more consuming of available excess labor.

I think (but cannot think of a way of proving) that going low tech will lead to a productivity problem, in that it needs more than one man-year of labor to keep someone alive for a year.

The reasons for this are:

1. many things will be much less efficient on Mars (at any given technology level) than on Earth.

a - transport will have no ships (the most efficient), or aircraft (technically aircraft are possible, but much harder and less efficient than on Earth). The equivalent of trucks will be less efficient (cabins and loading docks need to be pressurized). Rail is less efficient (track maintenance is harder, loading and unloading). For all modes of transport there need to be air locks and breakdowns are harder to deal with.

b - agriculture is much less efficient, services that are free on Earth (light, watering, air circulation) will need to be engineered in. Whatever structures are used will need far more maintenance than a field.

c - many things that can be done outside on Earth will need to be inside on Mars, leading to more buildings being required, these buildings will need more maintenance as they need added life support services.

d - manufacturing will be less efficient, the much smaller population size means that economies of scale have less effect. Sourcing raw materials and controlling pollution are both likely to be more difficult - for instance many industrial processes need lots of water.

All of these posts make reference to the idea of "efficiency"

But efficiency can be measured in many different ways. On Earth "efficient" (depending on context) can mean

1) Minimum investment (because people are cheap)
2) Minimum staffing (because people are expensive)
3) Minimum specialized equipment (because special made-to-order hardware maybe too expensive or take too long).

and a bunch of other drivers that result in different ideas of what is the optimal  way to do things.
An obvious one is there is no confirmation of any fossil fuels on Mars (which is why reports of Mars Methane Clathrates are a really big deal) making Mars very energy poor by Earth standards (Uranium does seem to exist but the supply chain to mfg nuclear reactors is even more complex than conventional power plants).

With Earth this has simply not been an issue, first with wood, then charcoal, then coal, then oil and natural gas.

What I'm saying is that what "optimal" means on Mars is very unlikely to be the same as on Earth if you want a robust, self sufficient settlement. Even more so if you want it to grow, rather than just survive at the same size.

If you know the problem is going to be hard to begin with giving yourself as much of an edge as possible makes a lot of sense.

In this regard praying "JIT" will solve everything is not going to work.

The problem is that each item you buy will have had its manufacturing chain optimized to make that item (probably as cheaply as possible), not fitted into a mfg system that needs to make a very large number of different items (albeit at a fairly low volume for any individual part).

And "optimized" means (implicitly) optimized-for-the-Earth market.

Some of that could be compensated for. Say this is the only item that uses a certain kind of screw. That could be handled.

But what if it's the only one that uses a certain fractional Hp electric motor, and the whole design is built internally around that exact size and shape? Now you need all the support components (and their designs and specs) to make that part (because the unit was designed around that particular motor, because the manufacturers  design and cost analysis teams told them an OTS parts would be more expensive in their Earth market and they could charge a premium above cost for the replacement).

The only way to know if this a real issue would be do to a Bill of Materials analysis of the equipment your taking. Break it all down and find the common parts, the uncommon parts and the unique parts that cannot be substituted at all.

You don't need that if you just want to go to Mars, but if you're really thinking long term and you want serious contingency planning about surviving complete loss of contact with Earth (for whatever reason) doing this up front will make the self sufficiency a lot easier. 

And of course the implication is that the lower the base level of technology you need to support the easier maintaining it will be.

BTW Between doing mfg planning with paper based systems (not to mention having a paper making plant) and giving every part its own RFID tag you can just have a keypad by every machine. They can be simple (literally a set of switches that lock, so no display needed) and read by a central unit. Such systems have been in use for decades. They are paperless and quite robust.

However just because a system is implemented with decades old "primitive" technology does not mean it can't be designed with SoA tools and optimized with those same tools. Something like the "Skrodes" of Vernor Vinges "A Fire on the Deep".
MCT ITS BFR SS. The worlds first Methane fueled FFSC engined CFRP SS structure A380 sized aerospaceplane tail sitter capable of Earth & Mars atmospheric flight.First flight to Mars by end of 2022 TBC. T&C apply. Trust nothing. Run your own #s "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" R. Simberg."Competitve" means cheaper ¬cheap SCramjet proposed 1956. First +ve thrust 2004. US R&D spend to date > $10Bn. #deployed designs. Zero.

Offline MikeAtkinson

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #171 on: 07/21/2018 10:34 am »
Going low tech will be by nature, less efficient & more consuming of available excess labor.

I think (but cannot think of a way of proving) that going low tech will lead to a productivity problem, in that it needs more than one man-year of labor to keep someone alive for a year.

The reasons for this are:

1. many things will be much less efficient on Mars (at any given technology level) than on Earth.

a - transport will have no ships (the most efficient), or aircraft (technically aircraft are possible, but much harder and less efficient than on Earth). The equivalent of trucks will be less efficient (cabins and loading docks need to be pressurized). Rail is less efficient (track maintenance is harder, loading and unloading). For all modes of transport there need to be air locks and breakdowns are harder to deal with.

b - agriculture is much less efficient, services that are free on Earth (light, watering, air circulation) will need to be engineered in. Whatever structures are used will need far more maintenance than a field.

c - many things that can be done outside on Earth will need to be inside on Mars, leading to more buildings being required, these buildings will need more maintenance as they need added life support services.

d - manufacturing will be less efficient, the much smaller population size means that economies of scale have less effect. Sourcing raw materials and controlling pollution are both likely to be more difficult - for instance many industrial processes need lots of water.

All of these posts make reference to the idea of "efficiency"

But efficiency can be measured in many different ways. On Earth "efficient" (depending on context) can mean

1) Minimum investment (because people are cheap)
2) Minimum staffing (because people are expensive)
3) Minimum specialized equipment (because special made-to-order hardware maybe too expensive or take too long).

and a bunch of other drivers that result in different ideas of what is the optimal  way to do things.

It is pretty obvious I was talking about productivity - that is output per person. Not other measures of efficiency.

However feel free to argue that transport, agriculture, manufacturing or building use can be more efficient on Mars than on Earth for a low tech society, by any measure off efficiency you care to use.

It is also pretty obvious that the optimal way of doing something will be different on Mars than on Earth, to argue that productivity is not a problem you need to show that the optimal way of doing something on Mars is more productive than the optimal way on Earth (or perhaps the way it is currently done on Earth).

Also the optimal solution in the short term is unlikely to be optimal in the medium or long term. Short term optimal is probably monopoly supplier and very high state (government) share of GDP, a centrally planned war economy, long term that will lead to all sorts of problems.

Talking about screws, detailed motor design or keypads is missing the point. My post was about the whole shape of the economy and how it would seem to inevitably be less productive. Your reply was like turning the tap off while bushing your teeth in response to a drought, totally inadequate to the scale of the problem.

Offline Robotbeat

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #172 on: 07/21/2018 06:36 pm »
I think it’s perfectly appropriate to consider how low tech approaches can help self sustaining on Mars. Or really, “appropriate technology.” Because even the stuff practiced by Hunter gatherers is a kind of technology. It’s a useful counterpoint to the usually high tech bent of space exploration discussions, although not the end all be all.
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Offline blasphemer

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #173 on: 07/21/2018 07:33 pm »
When it comes to solar power, the most low tech solution I can think of is concentrated solar using polished metal parabolic mirrors running Stirling engines. Homemade 10 watt Stirling engine:


Offline guckyfan

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #174 on: 07/22/2018 04:55 am »
Any concentrator solution needs sun tracking. That makes it complex and failure prone. Concentrators are not even widely used on Earth where servicing is readily available.

Offline john smith 19

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #175 on: 07/22/2018 09:08 am »
Any concentrator solution needs sun tracking. That makes it complex and failure prone. Concentrators are not even widely used on Earth where servicing is readily available.
Again it's the question "What's 'expensive' on Mars, versus what's 'cheap' on Mars?"

Are you talking true sun tracking, or just rotating the reflector at a certain rate, or even so many degrees per tooth of a cog wheel?
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Offline guckyfan

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #176 on: 07/22/2018 10:23 am »
Tracking solar systems in the context of Steam Punk Mars. Doesn't make any sense to me.

Offline blasphemer

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #177 on: 07/22/2018 10:56 am »
Tracking solar systems in the context of Steam Punk Mars. Doesn't make any sense to me.

Sun tracking can be purely mechanical and as such very simple, if tedious. Fits into Steam Punk Mars theme, IMHO.

Is there an even simpler and more low tech solution for producing power? Non-tracking solar concentrator? Wind power? Or sticking to human power only?
« Last Edit: 07/22/2018 10:56 am by blasphemer »

Offline TinkerLaspeyrs

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #178 on: 07/22/2018 12:25 pm »
For concentrating the sun on Mars using a parabola does not have to been a piece of precision engineering. There is no need to attempt to make a parabola of optical quality. The solar cell is an area not a point and a little dispersion maybe a good thing. The simplest way of tracking is to use a parabolic trough with the solar cells in a line somewhat less than the focal length to get evenish distribution of the concentrated light over the whole cell. If the trough is aligned parallel with the equator then the tilt of the trough only needs to be adjusted about once a fortnight. A 30 metre X 30 cm roll of aluminium cooking foil would give enough concentration to make toast in moments, or about 1/5 the time of a 1000 watt toaster. To design the parabola accurate enough for the purpose with the focal length of your choice all you need is a length of string, a tape measure, a flat surface, 2 pegs and a pointy object similar to a pencil. No computers, no maths. It's geometry.
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Offline guckyfan

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Re: Steam Punk Mars (Self Sufficient Survival through Low Tech)
« Reply #179 on: 07/22/2018 01:43 pm »
The one solution is non tracking solar panels.

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