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2019 Mission to the Moon Announced


Waspie_Dwarf

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Astrobotic and United Launch Alliance Announce 
Mission to the Moon

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Rust Belt Company, Astrobotic selects ULA to launch its Peregrine Lander in 2019 for lunar mission 50 years after Apollo 11

Pittsburgh, PA – Astrobotic and United Launch Alliance (ULA) proudly announce today that Astrobotic’s Peregrine Lunar Lander will be onboard a ULA launch vehicle in 2019, during the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11.

“Astrobotic is thrilled to select a ULA launch vehicle as the means to get Peregrine to the Moon,” said John Thornton, CEO of Astrobotic. “By launching with ULA, Astrobotic can rest assured our payload customers will ride on a proven launch vehicle with a solid track record of success.  Together, our two organizations will honor the past and trail blaze the lunar future.”

arrow3.gif  Read More: Astrobotic

 

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Took a couple of paragraphs to clarify that this isn't a human mission, so forgive me if I remain a little underwhelmed given all the stuff that the US and other countries have plonked on the moon over the years....

Don't get me wrong, this is a good development to have a private conglomerate doing it, but the first mission will just take 35 kg of total payload...

In comparison,the first Apollo mission brought back 3 astronauts and all their gear  plus 22kg of lunar samples alone.  The Lunar Module they used to get to the surface and then back up to the CSM weighed over 5 tonnes, and by the last mission they were taking a little car (~210kg) up there amongst lots of other stuff and brought back over 100 kg of rocks/dirt....{apologies for being an Apollo fanboi}

Anyway, it's all good - maybe with this and the new discoveries of larger potential water sources, our interest in Luna might be getting rekindled...

 

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I guess the mission is just to show they can do it, because they are going to just leave it up there.  It isn't even going to be a science payload, it's going to be junk. Here is the page to get your little box for your "mementos."  https://www.astrobotic.com/moon-box/order    If they are going to send stuff to leave up there why not just do a rover to look for water.  When they find water start sending robots, habitats  and build a hotel along with a way station between here and the moon.   Everywhere we go we leave junk to the point it becomes a hazard. 

trash_1132845.jpg

science-space_program-trash-moon-astrona

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I wonder if it will be fitted with a camera to take live pictures of the Moon.  If it lands near a NASA landing we'll be able to prove to all the doubters that yes Neil did!

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Forget the cameras... bring a drill that can make a half inch hole but dig a good 30-50 feet or more down. Take a core sample. It should reveal what is going on. Take a mic also... to see if it rings like a bell after landing. I have no idea why we are sending stuff to mars when we should be drilling holes on the moon and seeing if there really is water. If there is, Time for moon base alpha. Its kind of late but I see no reason why we could not have a thriving underground community on the moon.

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4 hours ago, Nzo said:

Time for moon base alpha.

I used to love Space 1999, if they build Moonbase Alpha, I hope they also make the Eagles

imeab1025_1.jpg

Edited by EBE Hybrid
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1 hour ago, Frank_Hoenedge said:

At least I'm not qualified to worry about radiation 

http://www.electrostatics.org/images/ESA2010_A1_Delory.pdf

Why post a PDF without comment?  That document seems to me mainly about electrostatics, not radiation as such..

 

It's a subject I'm moderately well-acquainted with, so how can I help, Frank?  Or what is the point you are making?

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14 hours ago, paperdyer said:

I wonder if it will be fitted with a camera to take live pictures of the Moon.  If it lands near a NASA landing we'll be able to prove to all the doubters that yes Neil did!

Nah, that's just more evidence of the cover up. 

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56 minutes ago, ChrLzs said:

It's a subject I'm moderately well-acquainted with, so how can I help, Frank?  Or what is the point you are making?

I'm moderately of the persuasion that electrostatic discharges would center on any base planted on the moon

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8 minutes ago, Frank_Hoenedge said:

I'm moderately of the persuasion that electrostatic discharges would center on any base planted on the moon

And your point is?

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That it would disable any communications links over time, making it a resource drain. A vital system such as communication would not be one of those where you clean your keyboard once a month, it would be as soon as damaged occurred, potentially every sunrise.

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8 minutes ago, Frank_Hoenedge said:

That it would disable any communications links over time, making it a resource drain. A vital system such as communication would not be one of those where you clean your keyboard once a month, it would be as soon as damaged occurred, potentially every sunrise.

Thats nonsense because space angencies are capable to manage electrostatic discharging issues very well for decades. Examples: Mars rover Opportunity, touchdown on Mars in 2004, communication status: active; Voyager 1+2, grilled by Saturn >35 years ago, communication status: active.

 

 

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On 28/07/2017 at 5:52 PM, Frank_Hoenedge said:

I'm moderately of the persuasion that electrostatic discharges would center on any base planted on the moon

??  What is your 'moderate persuasion' based upon?  Do you have some specific issues from that PDF - if so, cite the pages and text.

You do realise that we have sent several missions to the Moon?

That we used comm's including live video and audio? - I'll grant you that they didn't do the sunrise thing, but those old comms were quite primitive, yet they all worked..)

That we have a pretty good handle on the electrostatic issues during those missions and from other data collected both before and after?

That dealing with electrostatics is pretty mild compared to other radiation issues?

That all sorts of industries and activities already deal with the issue down here on earth, especially where there are flammables or sensitive systems?

On 28/07/2017 at 6:06 PM, Frank_Hoenedge said:

That it would disable any communications links over time, making it a resource drain. A vital system such as communication would not be one of those where you clean your keyboard once a month, it would be as soon as damaged occurred, potentially every sunrise.

Sorry, Frank, that is just silly.  You are making a quite direct claim, yet have offered nothing but personal incredulity to back it up.  Explain the logic behind your claim, and throw in some numbers...

But first maybe you should look at what can easily be done to avoid electrostatic damage.  To be a little simplistic - you just need a conductor and a resistor...   Down here we routinely protect tall buildings from lightning strikes that may be in the hundreds of millions of volts, and carrying a hundred thousand amps...  and yet those building's comms systems don't go down..  Even you are relatively safe from being directly hit by one, simply by being inside a car... And even the most computerised, fly-by-wire aircraft are quite safe in thunderstorms...

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This is informative feedback, glad I asked.

I had some hangups.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stopping_power_(particle_radiation)

"Electronic stopping refers to the slowing down of a projectile ion due to the inelastic collisions between bound electrons in the medium and the ion moving through it. The term inelastic is used to signify that energy is lost during the process (the collisions may result both in excitations of bound electrons of the medium, and in excitations of the electron cloud of the ion as well). Linear electronic stopping power is identical to unrestricted linear energy transfer.

Instead of energy transfer, some models consider the electronic stopping power as momentum transfer between electron gas and energetic ion. This is consistent with the result of Bethe in the high energy range.[4]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passivity_(engineering)

... and resistance build up in circuitry, 

https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2008/17apr_magnetotail

""Earth's magnetotail extends well beyond the orbit of the Moon and, once a month, the Moon orbits through it," says Tim Stubbs, a University of Maryland scientist working at the Goddard Space Flight Center. "This can have consequences ranging from lunar 'dust storms' to electrostatic discharges.""

For me it was a long term degradation issue arising from the rapid buildup of solar radiation unhindered vs the quick cooling, seems it's not even a thing.

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1 hour ago, Frank_Hoenedge said:

{irrelevant stuff removed..}

For me it was a long term degradation issue arising from the rapid buildup of solar radiation unhindered vs the quick cooling, seems it's not even a thing.

No, it isn't.  Those links suggest you are getting very confused - Passivity????

1. There are two types of *damaging* radiation (neither of which is directly related to electrostatics) -

  - HEP (High Energy Particle) radiation, eg the Proton showers that the Sun throws out when it has a coronal mass ejection (CME) - they are what cause auroras...  

   - EM (electromagnetic) radiation, eg X-rays and Gamma Rays - think Chernobyl..

Both types can be quite dangerous to humans, especially if exposed over long periods, and can cause cancers, DNA damage, etc.

2. The radiation 'spectrum' also includes non-harmful radiation, radio- and micro- waves, IR - which warms you up each day, visible light, UV, etc..

3. Electrostatics has little to do with all that - it is related to substances gaining/losing charge by the simple transfer of electrons, and that can be caused by something as simple as wearing nylon underwear... right up to thunderstorms, etc.  It involves electrons being lost by one thing and gained by another.  If there is enough of an imbalance and there is sufficient conductivity, an electrostatic discharge can occur.  Really big imbalances cause sparks, arcs and lightning.  But the 'ions' involved in electrostatics are NOT like the ions sometimes referred to when discussing HEP radiation.  The 'ions' involved in electrostatics are not moving at incredibly high speeds and causing damage due to their collisions with other atoms/molecules...

In places like the Moon (vacuum, so no air or moisture to provide an easy conductive path), plus lots of dust and micrometeorite activity and yes, sudden changes in temperature as the sun rises and sets, there are lots of electrons being shuffled around so electrostatic buildups can be a problem.  The Apollo astronauts found this out firsthand - the clinging dust problem was a bit of an issue they didn't expect.

When the imbalance rectifies itself, there may well be an arc/spark that might interfere with unprotected comms or electronic equipment.  But the same solutions apply that we already use here on earth, be it on church spires and tall buildings or on spacecraft or satellites, or internal to the designs of the electronic equipment and any aerials or external surfaces.

It's no biggie..  

Edited by ChrLzs
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So, circuits with an exposed element wont gain and lose charge every lunation causing ampere issues. Got it

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On 27/07/2017 at 6:01 AM, ChrLzs said:

Took a couple of paragraphs to clarify that this isn't a human mission, so forgive me if I remain a little underwhelmed given all the stuff that the US and other countries have plonked on the moon over the years....

I think this needs to be put into perspective. This is one of the missions competing for the Lunar XPrize. The aim of this prize is to stimulate the commercial use of the moon.

If we were to take a look at the winner of the original XPrize, SpaceShipOne, and look at it out of context, in the same way you have with this mission, it would be easy to be underwhelmed by that too, after all SpaceShipOne really only repeated what the X15 had achieved 4 decades earlier. We could also dismiss SpaceX in the same way, after all what they do is put satellites in orbit, something government have been doing since 1957.

The thing that SpaceX, SpaceShipOne and Astrobiotic have in common is that they are none government funded. Because of SpaceX the cost of launching satellites is set to drop dramatically. Because of SpaceShipOne we are on the brink of space tourism. If the Lunar XPrize has the desired effect we will see a massive reduction in the cost of landing payloads on the moon. Just as with SpaceShipOne it is not this mission that should be impressing you, it is what it may lead to.

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