How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

I want to further detail my Nuke based space exploration idea. You can simply think of it as dropping Mentos inside a cola bottle. Instead of Mentos, a tiny Nuke is dropped. The end result is the same, pressurized carbon dioxide. Mentos rocket would not generate enough thrust but a Nuke can. Most probably during the Cold War area such miniature Nukes have been developed just to scare and panic people. Generating pulses of burst energy reliably for long durations, open up the door for human planetary missions. The most important part is that, the technology to achieve it is already available. Some of the stock piled Nukes can be converted into tiny Space Nukes reducing the Nuclear threat on Earth and increasing the success of the Space Exploration.

Pressurized carbon dioxide based thrust allows aerospike nozzles to be used instead of bulky vacuum optimized bell shaped nozzles. Bulky bell shaped nozzles can easily be damaged during landing which would end the mission. The aerospike nozzles protrude very little from the rocket bottom. The lack of combustion (compared to traditional rockets) near the nozzle, allow simpler aerospikes that do not require complex cooling schemes. Finally, the removal of bulky bell shaped nozzles, free up space in the payload area to be utilized for something useful. 

Additionally, the pressurized carbon dioxide gas can be used to turn turbines to generate high power electricity. An alternative to Peltier based nuclear batteries.

Mars Sample Retrieval

The distance between Mars and Earth varies between 55 to 401 million km. Mars is closest to Earth every 780 days. If we want to explore Mars further, planning missions every 2 years is not an option. We should be able to launch missions more frequently. In the worst case 400 million km is not that much if we want to explore the solar system further. Saturn's moon Titan is more than a billion km away from Earth.

I propose a four stage rocket for Mars missions. The first two stages would be classical rockets that launch geostationary satellites. The third and the fourth stages will have Nuclear-Thermal-Propulsion (NTP). Unlike the NTP's developed earlier (see image below), I propose a much simpler and reliable design.

NTP I propose uses tiny gun-type fission bombs that are activated by explosives. These bombs are simple in design and do not require complex timing circuitry of plutonium implosion type. The idea is to heat liquid carbon dioxide to generate high pressure gas using nuclear fission. The Nukes are more efficient, reliable, simpler, smaller and lighter in generating heat from fission compared to much complex nuclear reactors.

The mono propellent, solid carbon dioxide (dry ice) will be partially liquified and poured inside the pressure chamber. Then from a magazine, a pill sized Nuke will be dropped inside. After a chemically delayed explosion, the fission reaction will pressurize the carbon dioxide gas. Which will then be exhausted from the aerospike engines to generate thrust. In order to generate continuous thrust, two pressure chambers will be used in succession. Interplanetary missions require engines that can be fired multiple times. My design allows that.

The third stage of the rocket will put the rocket into Earth to Mars trajectory. The fourth stage will slow down the rocket for landing on Mars. After the landing, a robot will gather the samples. In the meanwhile the rocket's dry ice maker (powered by nuclear batteries) will refuel the dry ice tank from the Martian atmosphere which is mostly carbon dioxide. Partially filled tank can lift the rocket from ground and let it fly over distant terrain to collect more samples before returning to Earth. Once the sample collection ends, the dry ice tank can be fully loaded. Then the rocket can lift off and start it's return journey.

Monks for Space Colonization

As Charles Darwin had stated, those who survive are the ones who most accurately perceive their environment and successfully adapt to it. The resources of space colonies will be much limited compared to resources on Earth. The modern humans require so many things to keep them motivated and happy. With limited resources and confined spaces, the probability that the modern humans will be depressed in the long run is high.

On the other hand, the monks discipline their souls over the years. They adapt themselves to live with minimum resources. They require very little to stay motivated and happy. They also have strong relation with the nature and the plants which is important for space colonials as well.

There are astronaut training facilities in the wild. Living in such environments for several months can be enough for ISS, but not for Mars and beyond.

I propose Space Monasteries to raise future space colonials. This would take time so as the technology to establish the colonies.

Leslie Speaker in ISS

I was watching a video on Leslie Speakers and I thought. How a Leslie Speaker would sound in ISS. Creating a concert room effect in confined space. Floating around as it rotates.

Micro² Gravity Space Station and Production Facility

In the movie Men In Black, The Arquilian Galaxy fits inside a necklace. That inspired me. Does everything related with space has to be big? We have CubeSats for example.

Why don't we build a space station to make micro gravity researches that can fit inside a space capsule. We have Lab-on-a-Chip technology and advanced MEMS (Microelectromechanical Systems). Instead of making research in grams we can make the micro gravity research in micro grams scale. Reduced scale would require less power that can be supplied from nuclear batteries. 

The objective of this idea is to decrease the size of the space station so that it can be deployed with smaller rockets. Additionally smaller size (lack of large solar panels) reduces the probability of a space debris impact. The capsule design (including the heat shields) allows the station to be safely recovered after its useful lifetime with no space and earth debris. Additionally, micro gravity manufacturing and recovery would be possible at a lower cost.

Holographic Humans for Space

Sending humans to space is a very challenging task. Why don't we send holographic humans instead?

Like Arnold Rimmer of Red Dwarf

Sliding Sectioned Solid Rocket (SSSR)

Solid Rockets have many cons and pros. I thought about an idea to overcome one of its cons. As the solid propellent burns, the interior volume increases due to void of the consumed propellent. This decreases the interior pressure and the thrust. If the combustion can be kept within a confined space like the combustion chamber of a liquid rocket engine, the specific impulse of the rocket which is it's efficiency can be increased.

My idea is to divide the solid propellent into sections. Like shown on the diagram. For aluminum based  solid propellants, aluminum separators can be used. These separators keep the combustion on the lowest section of the rocket only.  As the lowest section is consumed the weight of the upper stages keeps the combustion area small. With the intense heat generated by the combustion, the separator vaporizes and ignites the immediate upper solid propellent. The thickness of the separator determines the timing of each sections burn time.

The solid rocket boosters have very thick walls because of high pressure inside. With the Sliding Sectioned Solid Rocket design, only the lowest section of the rocket needs thick walls. The rest of the stage can be much thinner while the solid unburned propellent can keep its form unlike the liquid propellants. As a result, the overall weight of the rocket would be reduced and the efficiency is increased.

During stage separation, the outer walls of the first stage would act like a barrel of a cannon which would repel the first stage (slowing it down) and transfer more forward momentum on the second stage compared to traditional rocket designs. The consumed stage would then free fall to earth with parachute attached for recovery and reuse. 

Magnesium can be used instead of aluminum as the section separator. Magnesium is lighter, stronger and has lower boiling point than aluminum.