About Mars
- Thread starter Tales
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Karn Maeshalanadae
I'm a pineapple
Of course it would be expensive. There'd be liability costs, repair costs, supply costs, all that jazz. It would HAVE to be expensive just to cover insurance, let alone any possible-and inevitable-lawsuits that would occur.
The only way it wouldn't be expensive for a person is if they were born and raised on Mars. Then the trip to Earth would be prohibitively out of reach. Or the Moons of either planet, or whatever.
The only way it wouldn't be expensive for a person is if they were born and raised on Mars. Then the trip to Earth would be prohibitively out of reach. Or the Moons of either planet, or whatever.
What would be the price of an air ticket usually in your part of the world?? If so then an air ticket to Mars might be 10 or 20 times that price.
This might get interesting. If the main character is to get to find out what happened to her father, the price of the Space ticket would affect the way she is to get that ticket.
This might get interesting. If the main character is to get to find out what happened to her father, the price of the Space ticket would affect the way she is to get that ticket.
Karn Maeshalanadae
I'm a pineapple
All depends on what airline, where you purchase the ticket, and where you're heading to. Tickets can cost anywhere from a mere $100-$200 dollars to over $5,000. And of course, those prices are all in U.S. currency.
A trip to Mars certainly would rival the price of a new car. It could, quite possibly, even rival that of a new house.....
A trip to Mars certainly would rival the price of a new car. It could, quite possibly, even rival that of a new house.....
Karn Maeshalanadae
I'm a pineapple
Oh yes. I sure as hell wouldn't want a trip out to Spain or France or wherever, not first class at any rate. Coach eases the pain a bit.
Yes, even now airline tickets are expensive, though who'd want to head out of the U.S. by way of the airlines anyway, with the way the laws are now?
Yes, even now airline tickets are expensive, though who'd want to head out of the U.S. by way of the airlines anyway, with the way the laws are now?
I haven't got the ground for the castle in the air yet but thanks a lot guys.
So for now, space travel is like 10 times more expensive as first class rate? But what if say we dun need so much expensive rocket and the only focus is on outer space propulsion instead?
OOT: I like the joke on your avatar
So for now, space travel is like 10 times more expensive as first class rate? But what if say we dun need so much expensive rocket and the only focus is on outer space propulsion instead?
OOT: I like the joke on your avatar
Karn Maeshalanadae
I'm a pineapple
You're focusing solely on feul costs? Still, Tales, there's so many more to consider, the ones I had listed before. Insurance costs, liability, possible lawsuits, repairs, supplies, do I need to sound like a broken record?
Not to mention how dangerous such a job would be, so of course whatever flight crew you would have aboard those spaceships would command top pay for their risk and their time spent. Not to mention that under the best of circumstances, Tales, it takes over a year at current rates for anything launched from Earth to even REACH Mars, so costs would shoot up from that as well because of the length of time a single rocket ship would have to take to pay for itself. And the bigger and heavier the rocket you use-ie, trying to make up for that lost time by putting in more passenger room-the slower the rocket would have to go, or the more fuel-consuming the engine, or something that would prevent the increase of cost efficiency at all.
Not to mention how dangerous such a job would be, so of course whatever flight crew you would have aboard those spaceships would command top pay for their risk and their time spent. Not to mention that under the best of circumstances, Tales, it takes over a year at current rates for anything launched from Earth to even REACH Mars, so costs would shoot up from that as well because of the length of time a single rocket ship would have to take to pay for itself. And the bigger and heavier the rocket you use-ie, trying to make up for that lost time by putting in more passenger room-the slower the rocket would have to go, or the more fuel-consuming the engine, or something that would prevent the increase of cost efficiency at all.
Oh sorry let me rephrase myself. Just say that we do not need to use all that rocket fuel to get into space but only need that fuel to get to Mars for example. But I will reconsider the points your pointed out. Sounds like we are returning back to the Age of Sail when we are talking about space travel. It might drag the story a bit.
Karn Maeshalanadae
I'm a pineapple
Of course, it also all depends on how far into the future this is, Tales. But remember, you want your concepts to be believable, right? I don't go for sci-fi usually because such concepts it follows have to be restricted by the laws of physics and theory of relativity. You can't actually have the Enterprise, mind. People these days aren't nearly so gullible.
That's why I have to see how far can I bend the rules. Today's audiences are no longer so easy to fool. If I say I got Faster than light travel in 2080, that's ridiculous. If I make an aircraft float in the air like Star Wars Star Destroyers, that's even more ridiculous becos first off those vehicles break a long list of rules of aerodynamics.
I have a space elevator can reduce the costs needed for rocket fuel... But tickets prices maybe you might say prohibitively expensive. You might win one in a lottery. sounds like a Call to Adventure for the otherwise downtrodden protagonist.
I have a space elevator can reduce the costs needed for rocket fuel... But tickets prices maybe you might say prohibitively expensive. You might win one in a lottery. sounds like a Call to Adventure for the otherwise downtrodden protagonist.
Last edited:
Precise Calibre
Storywright
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The maintenance costs for a space elevator might be quite hefty as well. In all honesty, if you're trying to make travel to mars a regular sort of thing whose guest list isn't limited to the "top twenty richest" on earth, you're going to need to show us that Earth's economic or technological systems have changed in such a way that formerly exhaustive endeavors are part and parcel to daily life.
Perhaps not communism, but an altered way of resource distribution. Just musing here, nothing too serious.
Perhaps not communism, but an altered way of resource distribution. Just musing here, nothing too serious.
That's why I was thinking maybe not the top twenty richest but perhaps the top hundred or five hundred to be slightly realistic. So if you are lucky you might just win one ticket at the lottery. But of course there's the upper class[top1 - 20] and lower class... [top 21-100]
Becos the world's govts decided to cease all earth mining activities by 2060 to decrease CO2, CH4 and H2SO4 emissions as well as water pollution. There are special people who are allowed into Space; mining companies and scientists. Space mining in my story is a well mentioned occupation. Sometimes space miners and astro-scientists work hand in hand.
Mars was a new frontier in mining in my story. It's chemically speaking, a huge iron mine and the low gravity and CO2 makes iron extraction easier. Now I am looking into sources of conflict within the story. Perhaps NASA or some govt agency wanted to keep the existence of Mars a secret but then if so why?
One thing this is going to cost you is time; not a couple of days, like a modern trip to somewhere on Earth; your beanstalk climb will absorb that. Not even a couple of weeks like a transatlantic ocean liner, but several years, like Marco Polo visiting China. So you're going to get to know your fellow passengers very well. Indeed, a psychological compatibility certificate might easily be a requirement for a ticket, as might a week in 'Big Brother' confinement conditions.
So, your marsliner is either built on Earth and lifted up to orbit by the space elevator (unlikely, since it will be enormous to hold the supplies needed for the trip and return voyage, plus its fuel, and anything to be delivered to the growing colony on Mars) or, more likely, built in Earth orbit next to the geostationary counterweight of the tower partly out of bulk materials from the moon or the asteroids, partly from prefabricated sections lifted up from the planet by the elevator itself.
In the latter case you travel up to geostationary in your smaller cabin, which will later be reused as an orbital craft: it is, after all, equipped with everything a low-acceleration spaceship requires except the drive and fuel; and they might well decide to attach that, anyway, while it's going up. It's only worth sending capsules back down when they've something to carry: biologicals you don't want to risk in Earth's atmosphere, crystals that can only made perfect in negligible gravity, alloys that won't mix if acceleration if pulling their components apart. The geostationary hub is the centre of a floating city, hotels and residences, mainly industrial but quite a lot the commerces that have flowered in every port from the beginning of history.
For this is a port; the port for a planet. Unhurried crewless solar clippers set their country sized sails for multi decade trips to the outer system, lunar ferries service the colony on Earth's nearest neighbour, bustling service craft circle the planet repairing and replacing communications satellites and, once or twice a year a big manned ship sets off for Mars, or the moons of Jupiter.
The ship can wait a long time in stable orbit, but when it contacts the outward pointing spike of the orbital tower (which has to exist; it is the centre of gravity of the structure that is in geostationary orbit) and the motors start to pull it out, father from the Earth, where its own mass will fling it ever faster away, accelerated by the Earth's rotation way over escape velocity, timing becomes to the fraction of a second. And there is a detail here that most space elevator fanatics ignore; this extra speed, this acceleration has to come from somewhere; and the force in this case is from the tower itself, at right angles, slowing the orbit a tiny fraction. Only a tiny fraction, because the tower masses many times what even the massive ship does, but every time it flings something out into the dark the tower needs to be sped up by a reaction motor to keep it stable. It is not free power; even the capsules climbing to orbit are sapping tiny points of orbital speed, which need to be compensated for.
Now we come to a choice point; either the ship can slow down into a Mars orbit, and use small, simple landing craft (or an orbital Mars tower, though you'll need quite a lot of visitors before that becomes economic), which means, with a reasonable power engine, starting braking almost as soon as you've finished your release of the tower, or using more sophisticated craft for landing, big enough you can probably spend the entire voyage in them, and the most massive part of the ship firing them backwards and not slowing down at all, but settling in for a nice long circuit of the solar system (if it only goes as far out as Hailey's comet that's a seventy-five year cruise) Faster, but more wasteful. And a lot more expensive. Atmospheric braking, with something the size I'm considering, is not really an option (and Mars' magnetic field doesn't lend itself to eddy current braking; you could make the engines a whole lot more powerful but this would require more reaction mass, or a brand new technology to accelerate it (not impossible).
However, even the fast trip would be several months, and the trip back home a lot more, unless there was a Mars orbital tower, too. You can't expect the round trip to be less than a couple of years, even if you don't land on the planet (which would be silly). Even with the chronicles network beamed straight to the ship, that's a big lump out of a young person's life, a long time spent with a very limited selection of company. Particularly on the trip home, so colonists would have it easier than tourists. And as light speed delays grew, virtual conversations would get more and more detached, less and less personal.
As regards your mineral eating bacteria, not impossible, but there would have to be a reason why the de-energised substance was recharged; vulcanism as in the deep ocean rifts, ultra violet light cooking the surface layer and dust convection currents carrying the newly energetic matter into the depths (not impossible that, but a bit incompatible with caves), something. Remember, their has to be enough energy to drive the entire ecology.
On the mining front, iron is at the bottom of the energy curve and is going to be cosmically common, so lifting it out of Mars' gravity well doesn't sound economic; far more efficient to seek out a nickel-iron asteroid (the number of nickel-iron meteorites suggests this would not be particularly difficult). What you need is something that will only form in a gravitational field, or in the presence of carbon dioxide, or something. Some kind of crystal, perhaps? All the elements are likely to be cheaper to obtain in free fall, or extract from seawater, or something. Think of the quantity of steel used daily on Earth; now try and work out an economically viable way of transporting even a fraction of that mass (not that iron smelting doesn't put huge quantities of cee oh two into the atmosphere, but it's important only because of the immense tonnage involved.
Sorry about the length of this; I was without internet connection for two days, and it 'just growed'
So, your marsliner is either built on Earth and lifted up to orbit by the space elevator (unlikely, since it will be enormous to hold the supplies needed for the trip and return voyage, plus its fuel, and anything to be delivered to the growing colony on Mars) or, more likely, built in Earth orbit next to the geostationary counterweight of the tower partly out of bulk materials from the moon or the asteroids, partly from prefabricated sections lifted up from the planet by the elevator itself.
In the latter case you travel up to geostationary in your smaller cabin, which will later be reused as an orbital craft: it is, after all, equipped with everything a low-acceleration spaceship requires except the drive and fuel; and they might well decide to attach that, anyway, while it's going up. It's only worth sending capsules back down when they've something to carry: biologicals you don't want to risk in Earth's atmosphere, crystals that can only made perfect in negligible gravity, alloys that won't mix if acceleration if pulling their components apart. The geostationary hub is the centre of a floating city, hotels and residences, mainly industrial but quite a lot the commerces that have flowered in every port from the beginning of history.
For this is a port; the port for a planet. Unhurried crewless solar clippers set their country sized sails for multi decade trips to the outer system, lunar ferries service the colony on Earth's nearest neighbour, bustling service craft circle the planet repairing and replacing communications satellites and, once or twice a year a big manned ship sets off for Mars, or the moons of Jupiter.
The ship can wait a long time in stable orbit, but when it contacts the outward pointing spike of the orbital tower (which has to exist; it is the centre of gravity of the structure that is in geostationary orbit) and the motors start to pull it out, father from the Earth, where its own mass will fling it ever faster away, accelerated by the Earth's rotation way over escape velocity, timing becomes to the fraction of a second. And there is a detail here that most space elevator fanatics ignore; this extra speed, this acceleration has to come from somewhere; and the force in this case is from the tower itself, at right angles, slowing the orbit a tiny fraction. Only a tiny fraction, because the tower masses many times what even the massive ship does, but every time it flings something out into the dark the tower needs to be sped up by a reaction motor to keep it stable. It is not free power; even the capsules climbing to orbit are sapping tiny points of orbital speed, which need to be compensated for.
Now we come to a choice point; either the ship can slow down into a Mars orbit, and use small, simple landing craft (or an orbital Mars tower, though you'll need quite a lot of visitors before that becomes economic), which means, with a reasonable power engine, starting braking almost as soon as you've finished your release of the tower, or using more sophisticated craft for landing, big enough you can probably spend the entire voyage in them, and the most massive part of the ship firing them backwards and not slowing down at all, but settling in for a nice long circuit of the solar system (if it only goes as far out as Hailey's comet that's a seventy-five year cruise) Faster, but more wasteful. And a lot more expensive. Atmospheric braking, with something the size I'm considering, is not really an option (and Mars' magnetic field doesn't lend itself to eddy current braking; you could make the engines a whole lot more powerful but this would require more reaction mass, or a brand new technology to accelerate it (not impossible).
However, even the fast trip would be several months, and the trip back home a lot more, unless there was a Mars orbital tower, too. You can't expect the round trip to be less than a couple of years, even if you don't land on the planet (which would be silly). Even with the chronicles network beamed straight to the ship, that's a big lump out of a young person's life, a long time spent with a very limited selection of company. Particularly on the trip home, so colonists would have it easier than tourists. And as light speed delays grew, virtual conversations would get more and more detached, less and less personal.
As regards your mineral eating bacteria, not impossible, but there would have to be a reason why the de-energised substance was recharged; vulcanism as in the deep ocean rifts, ultra violet light cooking the surface layer and dust convection currents carrying the newly energetic matter into the depths (not impossible that, but a bit incompatible with caves), something. Remember, their has to be enough energy to drive the entire ecology.
On the mining front, iron is at the bottom of the energy curve and is going to be cosmically common, so lifting it out of Mars' gravity well doesn't sound economic; far more efficient to seek out a nickel-iron asteroid (the number of nickel-iron meteorites suggests this would not be particularly difficult). What you need is something that will only form in a gravitational field, or in the presence of carbon dioxide, or something. Some kind of crystal, perhaps? All the elements are likely to be cheaper to obtain in free fall, or extract from seawater, or something. Think of the quantity of steel used daily on Earth; now try and work out an economically viable way of transporting even a fraction of that mass (not that iron smelting doesn't put huge quantities of cee oh two into the atmosphere, but it's important only because of the immense tonnage involved.
Sorry about the length of this; I was without internet connection for two days, and it 'just growed'
What if I say that instead of conventional rocket engines, I am using solar sailing and ion rockets to boost the speed. Also plus the space elevator. What year would be plausible for this to happen? 2100s or 2200s if humanity can survive climate change that is.
I apologize if I haven't written anything yet. I am looking at the possibilities and the artist point of view. Also I am look through much of many stories starring aliens.
One conclusion I would make is that all the aliens designed by man are too "earthly". It looks like something that given the right conditions on Earth, it will evolve. However I believe in convergence in evolution but I am not convinced that everything is going to have 4 limbs.
I apologize if I haven't written anything yet. I am looking at the possibilities and the artist point of view. Also I am look through much of many stories starring aliens.
One conclusion I would make is that all the aliens designed by man are too "earthly". It looks like something that given the right conditions on Earth, it will evolve. However I believe in convergence in evolution but I am not convinced that everything is going to have 4 limbs.
Precise Calibre
Storywright
- Joined
- Nov 12, 2007
- Messages
- 447
The idea of solar sails and ion thrusters for your space travel could be very easily implemented in the story. Ion thrusters could be used as short range mobility-and-manuever devices while a solar sail could be used for long distances. Would you be using one that primarily used the sun's solar energy or one based off of laser technology? Obviously you wouldn't be going for the speed of light, so you wouldn't need to worry about the theoretical size of the sail needed overmuch or the astronomically large(pun not intended) amount of energy needed.
Given that the working theory and even limited application fo some of these devices has already been pursued by humanity and the fact that they are backed with a large amount of hypothetical and mathematical rumination, I'd say you could expect to see something between 2100 and 2200, if conditions are right. I'm not sure complete stoppage of all mining operations on Earth is a plausible scenario unless you demonstrate a reliable income of resources from these outside sources. Also, humanity will have had to ween themselves off of fossil fuels completely.
Have you thought about using magnetic acceleration as a means to launch objects into space?
Read the "Species Imperative" series by Julie E. Czerneda or even some of her other books. She definitely does not follow the concept of four limbed aliens, though bipedal or quadrapedal is definitely an option for locomotion if there are limbs present at all.
I'm glad to see you're taking the plausibility factor of your story seriously
Given that the working theory and even limited application fo some of these devices has already been pursued by humanity and the fact that they are backed with a large amount of hypothetical and mathematical rumination, I'd say you could expect to see something between 2100 and 2200, if conditions are right. I'm not sure complete stoppage of all mining operations on Earth is a plausible scenario unless you demonstrate a reliable income of resources from these outside sources. Also, humanity will have had to ween themselves off of fossil fuels completely.
Have you thought about using magnetic acceleration as a means to launch objects into space?
Read the "Species Imperative" series by Julie E. Czerneda or even some of her other books. She definitely does not follow the concept of four limbed aliens, though bipedal or quadrapedal is definitely an option for locomotion if there are limbs present at all.
I'm glad to see you're taking the plausibility factor of your story seriously
I have looked into Magnetic acceleration but however the force involved could kill the passengers.
As for going to Mars, the solar sails can reach reasonable speeds according to what those articles said. They say it will half the time it takes to reach pluto.
As for going to Mars, the solar sails can reach reasonable speeds according to what those articles said. They say it will half the time it takes to reach pluto.
Assuming that by "magnetic acceleration" you mean a Laithwaite linear accelerator, there is no need for excessive forces; you merely make the track a bit longer (and don't forget, escape velocity doesn't have to be vertically up; horizontal will do just fine). You could start accelerating in California, with no more force than a standard train, and just never stop the increase of speed till you reached the East coast, by which time you'd be well over escape speed – at sea level, and atmospheric friction would burn you up like a shooting star. Problem with anything that achieves decent speeds at low altitudes: Verne cannon, nuclear explosion rocket, anything.
If you ran the tracks from the Persian gulf up the Himalayas, you'd gain a fair amount, but consider at what altitude your re-entering shuttle starts vaporising ablative tiles; it's not high enough.
On the other hand, Mars' mount Olympus lifts you clean out of the atmosphere, so that would be fine.
The trouble with light sails is their extremely low acceleration (thousandths of a gee) Besides, if you've got your orbital tower (space elevator, beanstalk, whatever you want to call it) you've got plenty of launch velocity; the problem comes when slowing down. And there the sun's the wrong side of you.
A quick slingshot round the planet, and brake on the way back? Have you considered tidal effects on a sail the surface area of Great Britain?
Combining ion drive (hundredths of a gee, 0-60 in sixteen and a half hours) with the lower thrust but fuel independent sail is dangerous; so easy to overtake your primary propulsion system, and if the lines lose tension – well, with fishing lines several hundred kilometres in length, you don't want to get them tangled.
Unfortunately, carrying humans, time is related to mass; unless you can build a total recycling, loss-free environment you're going to need supplies; air and food, at least, you might be able to reclaim the water. The longer the trip takes, the more you need, and the slower everything gets. Big fishing net and send provisions hurtling after you from linear accelerators on the moon, or in Earth orbit? Calculating every last gram centimetre per second, of course. You could even send reaction mass for your deceleration this way; and wouldn't it make a glorious target for terrorists?
Over decades of reading SF, I have come across aliens with a wide selection of limb techniques; it's only Hollywood that insists on anthropoid, for convenience in costuming. What is, however, generalised id the principle of bilateral symmetry (all right, Niven did a five pointed starfish. The toriod construction (basically a digestive tube with accessories slung round it, defined head and tail is not the only possible construction technique, just the one that caught on here; Burgess shales show us that, even here, other models were attempted, and were successful enough to leave fossils. Symmetry is good for speed through liquid; on land it's not really that important.
If you ran the tracks from the Persian gulf up the Himalayas, you'd gain a fair amount, but consider at what altitude your re-entering shuttle starts vaporising ablative tiles; it's not high enough.
On the other hand, Mars' mount Olympus lifts you clean out of the atmosphere, so that would be fine.
The trouble with light sails is their extremely low acceleration (thousandths of a gee) Besides, if you've got your orbital tower (space elevator, beanstalk, whatever you want to call it) you've got plenty of launch velocity; the problem comes when slowing down. And there the sun's the wrong side of you.
A quick slingshot round the planet, and brake on the way back? Have you considered tidal effects on a sail the surface area of Great Britain?
Combining ion drive (hundredths of a gee, 0-60 in sixteen and a half hours) with the lower thrust but fuel independent sail is dangerous; so easy to overtake your primary propulsion system, and if the lines lose tension – well, with fishing lines several hundred kilometres in length, you don't want to get them tangled.
Unfortunately, carrying humans, time is related to mass; unless you can build a total recycling, loss-free environment you're going to need supplies; air and food, at least, you might be able to reclaim the water. The longer the trip takes, the more you need, and the slower everything gets. Big fishing net and send provisions hurtling after you from linear accelerators on the moon, or in Earth orbit? Calculating every last gram centimetre per second, of course. You could even send reaction mass for your deceleration this way; and wouldn't it make a glorious target for terrorists?
Over decades of reading SF, I have come across aliens with a wide selection of limb techniques; it's only Hollywood that insists on anthropoid, for convenience in costuming. What is, however, generalised id the principle of bilateral symmetry (all right, Niven did a five pointed starfish. The toriod construction (basically a digestive tube with accessories slung round it, defined head and tail is not the only possible construction technique, just the one that caught on here; Burgess shales show us that, even here, other models were attempted, and were successful enough to leave fossils. Symmetry is good for speed through liquid; on land it's not really that important.
Thanks I will consider your advice but the plan is that they will not be launching from Earth but from the Space Elevator so not needing a magnetic launch from earth. Also having the elevator will help reduce fuel costs so there is no need
I think it should take the protagonist and the tourists some 4-5 mths to get to Mars. Long holiday anyone? But no children on board for now only adults with the time and money to go up there.
Right now I believe this castle in the air is more or less having a better flooring now. So this setting and backdrop is more or less believable. Now it's the characters I am planning to work on now.
One thing for sure is that you will never imagine that a character like the protagonist gets to be part of space opera. She doesn't fit the space opera protagonist archetype.
I think it should take the protagonist and the tourists some 4-5 mths to get to Mars. Long holiday anyone? But no children on board for now only adults with the time and money to go up there.
Right now I believe this castle in the air is more or less having a better flooring now. So this setting and backdrop is more or less believable. Now it's the characters I am planning to work on now.
One thing for sure is that you will never imagine that a character like the protagonist gets to be part of space opera. She doesn't fit the space opera protagonist archetype.
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