
Rocket Propellant from Lunar Soil - vpribish
http://www.wickmanspacecraft.com/lsp.html
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sethrin
I feel like the difficulty of obtaining rocket fuel on a given rocky planet is
equivalent to within the limits of napkin math. I've never heard a
particularly convincing argument for using the Moon as a springboard to the
wider universe as opposed to Mars or Venus. Perhaps someone could offer some
correction.

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ChuckMcM
The lower gravity and lack of oxygen make launching things with maglev sleds
into orbit feasible. There have been a number of studies of a launch rail with
a reusable 'bucket' carrier that would be built along an incline for a
suitable orbit. The bucket would be accelerated electromagnetically along the
rail, imparting sufficient energy to put the contents of the bucket into orbit
which would be circularized at apogee with a small rocket burn. The rail would
be powered by an array of solar panels and batteries, or possibly a flywheel
similarly to the way the EMALS[1] system was designed.

Landing is the challenge on the moon as there isn't anything to push against
or dump energy into. I don't know if anyone has considered a space elevator, I
expect keeping it in position would be a challenge given the orbital dynamics
involved.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_Aircraft_Launc...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_Aircraft_Launch_System)

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Pica_soO
You could create a semi atmosphere- by Electrically Blowing Up Sand? Sort of
like simulating Atmosphere with a shotgun blast?

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ChuckMcM
If you are asking whether or not you should somehow accelerate lunar regolith
upward and use it to decelerate an incoming lander, then yes you probably
could. Although it would no doubt cause damage to the landing craft much as an
atmosphere braked entry 'burns up' the heat shield of a landing craft. Further
the dust contains a lot of aluminum silica and that is essentially sand paper
so you would get a _lot_ of abrasion.

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52-6F-62
I found Wickman's story pretty interesting! Thanks for posting.

There was a lot of interesting info on there besides this post. Ahem -- the
post itself was really interesting -- reminds me of how little I know in spite
of my interest in space. Gotta get on that!

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curtis
You may also find LANTR (LOX-Augmented Nuclear Thermal Rocket) interesting:

[http://www.nss.org/settlement/moon/LANTR.html](http://www.nss.org/settlement/moon/LANTR.html)

LANTR is still assuming that hydrogen is supplied from earth, but it's
performance as a rocket fuel is magnified by using it in a hybrid nuclear
thermal/chemical rocket, where the the LOX is supplied from the moon.

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perilunar
"aluminum powder in gelled LOX"

Sounds interesting. I wonder if a hybrid engine would work also. i.e. solid
compressed aluminium powder with LOX.

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Pica_soO
I wonder- if a planet continuously lost atmosphere of the aeons, shouldn't
there be a small swirl of gas spiraling out from that planet?

If that is the case, wouldn't it be enough to have a ram-scoop satellite
harvesting it?

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sfifs
I assume you are talking about Mars? It's not in space in isolation. Solar
wind has been blasting away the atmosphere for aeons. So it's probably
intermingled with solar wind across the trail of the solar system.

