NASA project ARTEMIS and Marching to Mars

shavedape

shavedape

Well Known GateFan
Jim of WVa said:
They would still work, but their sights would have to be adjusted.
Click to expand...

Now that I think of it the thin and/or nonexistent atmosphere on Mars could, possibly, have an affect on the combustion of bullets. I say "possibly" because I'm no physics expert. Part of me assumes that combustion requires oxygen in order happen, but, not being an expert in this type of science I can't say for sure.

Of course we have combustion of rocket fuels in space but I can't assume that the combustion of bullets is of the same physics and chemistry. Perhaps someone here would know the answer?
 
Jim of WVa

Jim of WVa

Well Known GateFan
shavedape said:
Now that I think of it the thin and/or nonexistent atmosphere on Mars could, possibly, have an affect on the combustion of bullets. I say "possibly" because I'm no physics expert. Part of me assumes that combustion requires oxygen in order happen, but, not being an expert in this type of science I can't say for sure.

Of course we have combustion of rocket fuels in space but I can't assume that the combustion of bullets is of the same physics and chemistry. Perhaps someone here would know the answer?
Click to expand...

Both the fuel and the oxidizer are present in the gunpowder, either smokeless or old fashioned.
 
mzzz

mzzz

Well Known GateFan
What Jim said, guns don't depend on the ambient oxygen presence, oxygen's already present for the firing process to work. Low gravitational effects would be good for the gun because if you're shooting someone in Mars, all you really care about is the horizontal displacement, the vertical displacement wouldn't really matter except for long distance shooting like snipers, but I'd guess that with low gravity, you can get better accuracy than you'd do on Earth. And another reason for that would be the little to no atmosphere which gives you little to no frictional forces for the bullet to travel against. Only problem I can think of is a thermal concern. If it's too cold, the firing mechanism might not discharge, might have to adjust for that.

Wonder if it's possible for a gun to be shot into orbit cause of a low gravitational field, that'd be cool. Little instant bullet satellites.
 
Jim of WVa

Jim of WVa

Well Known GateFan
mzzz said:
What Jim said, guns don't depend on the ambient oxygen presence, oxygen's already present for the firing process to work. Low gravitational effects would be good for the gun because if you're shooting someone in Mars, all you really care about is the horizontal displacement, the vertical displacement wouldn't really matter except for long distance shooting like snipers, but I'd guess that with low gravity, you can get better accuracy than you'd do on Earth. And another reason for that would be the little to no atmosphere which gives you little to no frictional forces for the bullet to travel against. Only problem I can think of is a thermal concern. If it's too cold, the firing mechanism might not discharge, might have to adjust for that.

Wonder if it's possible for a gun to be shot into orbit cause of a low gravitational field, that'd be cool. Little instant bullet satellites.
Click to expand...

According to Wikipedia, mean orbital speed of Phobos is 2138 m/s, so it would probably have to be a big "John Bull"-type gun.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muzzle_velocity
 
B

Backstep

Guest
mzzz said:
What Jim said, guns don't depend on the ambient oxygen presence, oxygen's already present for the firing process to work. Low gravitational effects would be good for the gun because if you're shooting someone in Mars, all you really care about is the horizontal displacement, the vertical displacement wouldn't really matter except for long distance shooting like snipers, but I'd guess that with low gravity, you can get better accuracy than you'd do on Earth. And another reason for that would be the little to no atmosphere which gives you little to no frictional forces for the bullet to travel against. Only problem I can think of is a thermal concern. If it's too cold, the firing mechanism might not discharge, might have to adjust for that.

Wonder if it's possible for a gun to be shot into orbit cause of a low gravitational field, that'd be cool. Little instant bullet satellites.
Click to expand...

The gun may fire once, but the thermo difference between the side of the gun in sun or shade, the oil that keep the action moving smooth, will not "flow", will turn into little spheres and float away, would make the gun useless.

A rail gun will work fine.
 
Overmind One

Overmind One

GateFans Gatemaster
Staff member
Backstep said:
The gun may fire once, but the thermo difference between the side of the gun in sun or shade, the oil that keep the action moving smooth, will not "flow", will turn into little spheres and float away, would make the gun useless.

A rail gun will work fine.
Click to expand...

So would a compressed gas gun.
 
YJ02

YJ02

Well Known GateFan
With all of the pessimism and science against it, what "glimmer of hope" or shred of science are these people-willing to privately fund the trip-looking at to support their hopes?

There must be something they are working on that someone has shown to be a possibility for getting there; new methods of propulsion? Or even old ways (nuke detonations=ride the wave)...

Anyone know what their hopeful spot may be?
 
G

Gatefan1976

Well Known GateFan
Orbital construction of spacecraft. I really think that the ability to bypass the need for escape velocity rockets will be a huge advantage in spaceflight tech.
 
shavedape

shavedape

Well Known GateFan
Gatefan1976 said:
Orbital construction of spacecraft. I really think that the ability to bypass the need for escape velocity rockets will be a huge advantage in spaceflight tech.
Click to expand...

Yes, but you're still going to have to get people and building supplies up there to begin with. This is a process that will have to be repeated ad nauseum. You'll also have to get people and supplies/payload down to Earth ad nauseum. You'll also have to spend years training a huge cadre of people to work in space -- I mean literally work in space; space suits, blow torches, rivets, etc. And of course you have theimmediate problem of addressing the health affects of living in space for extended periods of time. This isn't a minor issue, in fact, it's issue #1 to surmount more than likely. After all, if living in space has deleterious affects on our health then what's the point?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we shouldn't figure out how to surmount these issues, rather, I'm saying that we have to seriously consider them before pouring billions (trillions) into venturing out into space.
 
YJ02

YJ02

Well Known GateFan
Buzz's buzz:
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/newsmakers/buzz-aldrin-martian-dreams-142538870.html?vp=1
--- merged: May 11, 2013 at 8:53 AM ---
shavedape said:
Yes, but you're still going to have to get people and building supplies up there to begin with. This is a process that will have to be repeated ad nauseum. You'll also have to get people and supplies/payload down to Earth ad nauseum. You'll also have to spend years training a huge cadre of people to work in space -- I mean literally work in space; space suits, blow torches, rivets, etc. And of course you have theimmediate problem of addressing the health affects of living in space for extended periods of time. This isn't a minor issue, in fact, it's issue #1 to surmount more than likely. After all, if living in space has deleterious affects on our health then what's the point?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we shouldn't figure out how to surmount these issues, rather, I'm saying that we have to seriously consider them before pouring billions (trillions) into venturing out into space.
Click to expand...

this?:
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2000/ast07sep_1/
 
mzzz

mzzz

Well Known GateFan
Now I don't know how
Backstep said:
The gun may fire once, but the thermo difference between the side of the gun in sun or shade, the oil that keep the action moving smooth, will not "flow", will turn into little spheres and float away, would make the gun useless.

A rail gun will work fine.
Click to expand...
I really don't know how guns operate but isn't the oil applied onto the surfaces and wouldn't it stick to the surface rather than break up and start floating away in little spheres? I mean imagine a small blob of water in space, it's not going to suddenly start breaking up into little blobs, it'll remain in tact due to surface tension. If you imagine the original blob getting smaller and smaller, the less likely it is to break apart. With the gun, the 'blob' so to speak is really small and clinging to a more uh clingy surface, I'd imagine it'd be really difficult for it to break that surface tension and break away into little spheres. Again, I don't know how guns work so might be wrong about this with respect to guns. I mean, the lube job happens to work here on earth and the reason being the surface tension, don't see why the same principle won't extend to space where there's less external forces (no wind/air resistance, lower gravitational effects, etc.). There's no force that's constantly trying to break up blobs.

-------
Now I don't know much about economics, but for some reason, the government seems to be like a train system operator to me, redirecting money here and there while keeping some of it for continued functionality. And, personally, I'd rather see money being redirected toward science ventures rather than lining the suits of executive bank operators and just general rich scumbags. I'd rather the money go towards this whole idea of a mars mission which would involve employing the use of scientific knowledge, science related industries, engineering, and promoting space travel, instead of it going towards rich scumbags who continue to promote this hedonistic, consumerist society and promoting the related industries of luxury and just general bullshit, which just make all of our lives and theirs a meaningless, pointless existence.
 
B

Backstep

Guest
mzzz said:
Now I don't know how

I really don't know how guns operate but isn't the oil applied onto the surfaces and wouldn't it stick to the surface rather than break up and start floating away in little spheres? I mean imagine a small blob of water in space, it's not going to suddenly start breaking up into little blobs, it'll remain in tact due to surface tension. If you imagine the original blob getting smaller and smaller, the less likely it is to break apart. With the gun, the 'blob' so to speak is really small and clinging to a more uh clingy surface, I'd imagine it'd be really difficult for it to break that surface tension and break away into little spheres. Again, I don't know how guns work so might be wrong about this with respect to guns. I mean, the lube job happens to work here on earth and the reason being the surface tension, don't see why the same principle won't extend to space where there's less external forces (no wind/air resistance, lower gravitational effects, etc.). There's no force that's constantly trying to break up blobs.

-------
Now I don't know much about economics, but for some reason, the government seems to be like a train system operator to me, redirecting money here and there while keeping some of it for continued functionality. And, personally, I'd rather see money being redirected toward science ventures rather than lining the suits of executive bank operators and just general rich scumbags. I'd rather the money go towards this whole idea of a mars mission which would involve employing the use of scientific knowledge, science related industries, engineering, and promoting space travel, instead of it going towards rich scumbags who continue to promote this hedonistic, consumerist society and promoting the related industries of luxury and just general bullshit, which just make all of our lives and theirs a meaningless, pointless existence.
Click to expand...


From early on in the space race, engineers found out about lubricants in micro gravity with moving parts,

The absolute pressure outside the Earth's atmosphere (e.g. ,
above 1609 km (1000 miles) altitude) is approximately 10
torr; the absolute pressure in interstellar space is approximately
10"'* torr. Figure 2 shows pressure as a function of altitude
(Jastrow, 1960). The low-pressure environment contributes to
rapid evaporation of the liquid or semisolid grease lubricants
normally employed. Since lubrication ordinarily takes place
by means of a film entrained between sliding or rolling sur-
faces, the loss of this film due to evaporation and mechanical
working can result in failure of the mechanism.
http://www.archive.org/stream/nasa_techdoc_19900018747/19900018747_djvu.txt

If the thermo differences on the metal of the gun do not lock it up, the
thermo of the powder
http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2012/02/chris-dumm/guns-in-space-still-just-science-fiction/

I'll still rather have a solar powered pea shooter rail gun.
 
mzzz

mzzz

Well Known GateFan
Ahh, but the rest of the article goes onto say what lubricants (liquid and otherwise) that satellites employ for the same function as guns would. And all you need to compensate for thermal differences are other kinds of lubricants that insulate thermal differences. It seems to just be a matter of adjusting and/or expanding the gun slightly for space use. And you really don't have to worry about a very slight weight increase cause it's in space.

The thermal insulation could be extended to the powder, matter of different gunpowder. Also controlling the temperature of the casing for the gunpowder controls the temperature of the gunpowder itself since the casing is a barrier where heat flow would occur. You're right about those issues, but they do have solutions.
 
B

Backstep

Guest
As you work out the issues with solutions, how about the issue that has not been addressed, Newton's 3rd law.
 
mzzz

mzzz

Well Known GateFan
Usually persons in space are tethered to some large vehicle, the recoil would carry over to the whole thing, and the recoil isn't that much on earth either. It's not that much of a concern. But yeah, there are plenty of concerns, sure, but never underestimate man's self-destructive tendencies and desire to harm one other, they'll always find a way to get some form of weaponry up there once a population in space gets large enough for such desires to manifest.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top