| | #1 (permalink) |
| Astounding Vision Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: South Eastern North Carolina, Cape Fear Region
Posts: 3,257
Blog Entries: 3 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() | Moveable space colony How about a space colony toroidal in shape half filled with foamed rock. The size of the space craft/colony would be determined by how much artifical gravety you would have to have and how strong the materials were you made it from. From an engeneering stand point it would be a lot like a suspension bridge with no end points. Carbon fiber tubes would be spun into cables that would wrap around the toroid and hold it in place. The toroid it's self would be made out of a strong polymer embed with carbon fibers. I'm not sure how big this could be scaled up but lets say 5 miles wide and 25 miles across. The toroid would be inflated to it's shape by air pressure. The gravity on the inside of the colony could maybe be held at one quarter earth normal. A nuclear reactor could be stationed at the center hub and magnetic sails could be used to move it slowly around the solar system. The spin and air pressure would be used to keep the shape static. Lighting the interior and maintaning an ecosystem would be just a few of the engeneering challenges. Probaly a much smaller version would lead to later and bigger versions. Michael |
| | |
| | #2 (permalink) |
| Questioning Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: central nth island NZ
Posts: 215
![]() ![]() ![]() | Re: Moveable space colony sounds like a "ringworld" Larry Niven the culture also used them -can't recall the authors name right now. We may need some in ~500years when the earths magnetic fields playing swoppo games haha. the Ringword was at 1 AU, half million km wide with rimwalls to hold in its atmosphere. It had oceans with replicas of mars earth and some alien planets as islands. The ringworld engineers (sequel) had sodded off and it was a little run down. It had shadow rectangles orbiting closer to the sun for night and day. |
| | |
| | #3 (permalink) | |
| Astounding Vision Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: South Eastern North Carolina, Cape Fear Region
Posts: 3,257
Blog Entries: 3 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() | Re: Moveable space colony Quote:
Michael | |
| | |
| | #4 (permalink) |
| Questioning Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: central nth island NZ
Posts: 215
![]() ![]() ![]() | Re: Moveable space colony In regard to starting cheap and bullding from there: this sort of thing is very achievable compared to the energy and reaction mass expendible to payload mass issues with starships for example. you could start with two asteroids connected with a pipe and spun for your gravity. If the pipe is a conductor you can use EM thrust with either a phantom loop (circuit closed by charged particles in the enviroment) or a shielded return path for the current. Hollowing out asteroids in levels gives you a huge living surface area. Radiation problems easily eliminated by meter+ outer rock walls. Scaling up to full toroid is easy to do with extra spokes and asteroids until a full circle is completed. Starting with 3 instead of two asteroids with one hub asteroid would probably be an advantage as zero g factories, rec areas, central powerplant away from living areas is incorperated. travel around the solar system requires only pathetic speeds and accelerations so such a research facility could be a very cost effective and easily engineered device. |
| | |
| | #5 (permalink) | |
| Astounding Vision Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: South Eastern North Carolina, Cape Fear Region
Posts: 3,257
Blog Entries: 3 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() | Re: Moveable space colony Quote:
Micahel | |
| | |
| | #6 (permalink) | |
| Astounding Vision Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: South Eastern North Carolina, Cape Fear Region
Posts: 3,257
Blog Entries: 3 ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() | Re: Moveable space colony Quote:
Michael | |
| | |
| | #7 (permalink) |
| Questioning Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: central nth island NZ
Posts: 215
![]() ![]() ![]() | Re: Moveable space colony All the ecology you need to start with is probably microscopic. A few algal strains will give all the nutrient higher orders of life need. Using a globe of water (other merits to this too) around human spaces you could build up to full aquatic ecologies. A bit wasteful though as 1 carnivore fish is dependant on consuming many many tons of microflora and fauna to grow to less than a kilo. Those funky moonlets with their odd earth-solar orbits would be great places to convert. |
| | |
![]() |
| Bookmarks |
| Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests) | |
| Thread Tools | |
| |
Similar Threads | ||||
| Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
| NASA's Largest Space Telescope Mirror Will See Deeper Into Space | C1ay | Astronomy news | 1 | 02-08-2007 |
| 2D vs 3D Space... | Boerseun | Strange Claims Forum | 5 | 01-12-2006 |
| Is space something or nothing? | geeteenodubya | Astronomy and Cosmology | 12 | 12-06-2004 |
| what is space? | sanctus | Physics and Mathematics | 11 | 07-18-2004 |