Lunar rocket industry

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wtrix

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It's been a buzz about the hydrides found in lunar surface. That enables future lunar explorers to refuel their rockets for round trips. But I found myself wondering, what about one-way payloads from Moon to Earth?

One thing is sure. Bringing empty rockets form Earth is plain waste. Also one can't manufacture high-power liquid rocket motors on the moon. It's too difficult with their tubing, high production turbopumps, super strong casings, precision injectors etc. Though, you can still manufacture small steering motors with pressure fed fuel systems.

So for main motor, it seems to be far easier to go for solid (or hybrid) rockets. There the main question is of where to find the carbon from, because all known binders use carbon. What I propose is to use the following mixture:
1. Oxydizer - Ammonium Nitrate (or LOX/NOS in case of hybrid) - it's difficult to manufacture ammonium perchlorate there because chlorine is a scarcity on moon
2. Fuel - Aluminium or magnesium - there's lot of them
3. Binder - polyborazylene (B3N3H4), which is a polymer that you can't use on earth, because it absorbs moisture (to my knowledge), but no such problem exists up there
 
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access

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Cool idea but i don't know enough to stick with the technical side of the discussion. wouldn't the abilities of lunar construction be solely based on the infrastructure available to construct on the moon so with enough facilities shouldn't anything possible at least within the constraints of the material available.
 
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Eman_3

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It does make sense to attempt to use the local materials. But this concept may take decades to unfold, if ever. By the time we may need to regularly travel to the moon and beyond, propulsion technology may have leapfrogged the traditional "rocket".

From what I have read, there appears to be indications of water in the moon soil, but it is so fine it is dryer than the desert sand found on earth. To extract it may be a daunting task. And for such extraction, some kind of factory has to be constructed, and it may require hundreds of tons of prefabricated materials.

It's a nice concept, but a lot of technology needs to mature and and we need to learn a lot more before we can state that such a concept is viable.
 
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EarthlingX

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There are steps, of course, before any kind of industry production starts on Moon or some orbit and here is a report to the OSEWG Workshop, Aug.5.2009, addressing those steps :
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/osewg2 ... hearer.pdf

Gravitation is needed and beneficial for some industrial processes, not so much for other and a lot in between. It is possible to create some artificial gravity by rotation, but again, not for all processes, or structures become very big and complex.
Here's a thread with a couple of calculators to play with:
Relativity Calculator

Absence of any other than artificially supplied gasses also has it's share of pluses and minuses. There are steps to get there, but i think that having a fine control over some basic processes like this and not excluding many, many, other:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_oxygen_steelmaking
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_foam
could show some final benefit.

Here is some machinery that could probably work on the Moon without much adjustment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_cutter
http://plastics.inwiki.org/Injection_molding_machines
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_robot
and a quick tour through NASA prototyping lab, where they test some of the potential gear:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtOkbF8I5z8 from From Nothing, Something: One Layer at a Time thread.

Before rockets get built on the Moon, it will take some time, but they will be built there for sure. It's easier to launch, if not else. There will probably be competition with orbit, that will define which classes and parts of vessels will be built where.

Maglev launcher would be very nice for the Moon industry, easier than elevator, cheaper and simpler than multiple rocket engines, very sustainable. Such solution would find use on many other worlds with lower gravity and no atmosphere, probably competing with elevator or sky hook, at least for industrial application.
Chinese attempt at Maglev Launch Assist Tech:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_92 ... Technology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_921-3
Private initiative:
http://www.cyrus-space-system.com/default.htm
Couple of possible solutions for deep Earth well with links to other:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Launch_loop
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_sled_launch

Here's a list of objects in our Solar System that are in hydrostatic equilibrium:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_So ... quilibrium
not that i'm saying they are only possible future location of launch infrastructure developed for the Moon, and perhaps later produced there.

At that time, Moon will probably be one of the bigger hubs on the Interplanetary Transport Network, with at least the first Moon Olympics behind :)

More about different views on what to do before building rockets on the Moon and when to start building them here:
Set your goals for Space Exploration
 
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