Space Race: Game ON!

mburn_83 · 1 Sep 2006 at 17:26

Visage said:
Considering the same figure could provide a years treatment for a million AIDS sufferers in sub-sharan africa, I disagree.

Perhaps the Africans should help themselves.

Its about time we reached further into space, esp. as aids isn't controlling our population growth, as is surely needed.

UKTopGun · 1 Sep 2006 at 17:32

Visage said:
Considering the same figure could provide a years treatment for a million AIDS sufferers in sub-sharan africa, I disagree.

That silly, not every penny can be spent on helping others. I'm not being mean or anything, I give to charity quite a bit but we can't just say that every dollar spent on stuff which isn't helping the poor is 'silly'.

JRS · 1 Sep 2006 at 20:39

Visage said:
Considering the same figure could provide a years treatment for a million AIDS sufferers in sub-sharan africa, I disagree.

*sigh* Not heard that one get trotted out for a while.

locutus12 · 1 Sep 2006 at 20:45

PsiFox said:
^ Where is the soup chicken?

you should be BANNED!

Vulcan · 1 Sep 2006 at 20:54

Radiation said:
I wonder if humans could ever get to mars or elsewhere past the moon, i heard theres a belt/sphere of radiation around the earth that can't be passed without some danger, also heard other stories about this that seem even more strange, like the fact we simply can't survive outside the earths field for some reason.

Some day. I think it's more likely to continue on with robots for the time being. Humans just aren't built to go into space.

DAVEM · 1 Sep 2006 at 21:03

ScarySquirrel said:
LOL, low cost?

Check out the prices for these babies.

"Nice rocket, John Phillips, London, I have to myself"

SteveOBHave · 1 Sep 2006 at 23:29

Hamzter said:
The belt of radiation around earth is the Van Allen Belt, it's a huge belt that holds the earths atmosphere on, without it the atmosphere would slip down to the south pole, and the earth would be laughed at by all the other planets

Seriously tho, there's not much risk by the belt, you'd be travelling in a rocket that passes through the belts in no time, it's only a problem if you're sitting in it for hours or days without shielding. In deep space there's cosmic rays, a bit more of a problem but with sufficient shielding it shouldn't be too dangerous. I think there's research being done on magnetic shielding at the moment, where a magnetic field is used to deflect the particles, which would be much better than conventional shielding which is very heavy.

LOL Ben Bova eat your heart out

teaboy5 · 1 Sep 2006 at 23:45

O great yet another waste of oil, just when we are running short of the stuff. The money being spent on this, could go into other things.

DRZ · 1 Sep 2006 at 23:53

teaboy5 said:
O great yet another waste of oil, just when we are running short of the stuff. The money being spent on this, could go into other things.

Ah yes, the oil argument. Didnt take long for the usual suspects to wheel that one out!

Think of all the oil these things burn on their way to the moon!

Do you stand about on weekends wearing a board that says "the end is nigh"?

teaboy5 · 2 Sep 2006 at 00:35

Not at all. But come on think about it, who on their right minds whats to go into space. Really this is just a pure waste of oil, these things hold around 500,000 gallons, which is just gone in a matter of minutes. Thats about 41,000 fills on your average car.

ErNciLator · 2 Sep 2006 at 00:37

space would really be that great? :S

VaderDSL · 2 Sep 2006 at 00:47

teaboy5 said:
Not at all. But come on think about it, who on their right minds whats to go into space. Really this is just a pure waste of oil, these things hold around 500,000 gallons, which is just gone in a matter of minutes. Thats about 41,000 fills on your average car.

Cool, we'll all just sit back, not bother with advancing or expading and die slowly and painfully under the many many wars.

Or we could try new technologies etc and try and expand out to the stars, the human racec will become extinct if we cannot

DRZ · 2 Sep 2006 at 01:01

teaboy5 said:
Not at all. But come on think about it, who on their right minds whats to go into space. Really this is just a pure waste of oil, these things hold around 500,000 gallons, which is just gone in a matter of minutes. Thats about 41,000 fills on your average car.

You think they burn petrol on their way to the moon?

The shuttles and newer rockets use liquid oxygen and hydrogen instead of kerosene (which is pretty crap in comparison) although lithium and flourine supposedly is the most powerful.

JRS · 2 Sep 2006 at 06:56

DRZ said:
You think they burn petrol on their way to the moon?

The shuttles and newer rockets use liquid oxygen and hydrogen instead of kerosene (which is pretty crap in comparison) although lithium and flourine supposedly is the most powerful.

Yep. The Saturn series used hyrdrogen and oxygen certainly, think the Shuttle does as well. As for the actual craft - the Apollo series used hypergolic fuels - a mix of hydrazine, dimethylhydrazine and nitrogen tetroxide - as these burn just by coming into contact with each other and tangling chemically.

Not a drop of oil there. Any more uninformed crap that you'd like to spout teaboy5?

JRS · 2 Sep 2006 at 09:04

I do beg your pardon teaboy5. Just went and checked something on the Saturn 5 - the first stage used highly refined kerosene (RP-1) + LOX as fuel, the second and third used hydrogen in place of the RP-1.

RP-1 is a refined fraction of kerosene, which is subjected to further treatment to remove unsaturated substances which polymerise when the fuel is stored, as well as sulphur-containing hydrocarbons which reduce the efficiency of combustion. Furthermore, in order to meet specific requirements of density, heat of combustion, and aromatic content, the kerosene must be obtained from crudes with a high naphthalene content.

So, the very first stage of the original Moon-shot rockets did use a petroleum based fuel, taking them 61km into the flight and using 2 million kilos of propellant (as in, RP-1 and LOX added together, I forget the ratio).