Mining Module

[Phenix]

Part of the mobile space factory complex a mining module will be a large facility like a hangar large enough to enclose an asteroid or a piece of a large asteroid being previously sliced by a powerfull lazer beam mounted on the mining module.

Tugs will grip the asteroid and transit to the hangar. Once the asteroid is in the hangar, the hangar doors will be closed and hermitically sealed. The crushing process will be done by machines, and no, the are no regolites with this method.

The crushed content would pass through a series of filters of dedicated separators module driven by vaccum. When the hangar is empty, its doors will reopen to cycle a new crushing process.

[joertexas]

Part of the mobile space factory complex a mining module will be a large facility like a hangar large enough to enclose an asteroid or a piece of a large asteroid being previously sliced by a powerfull lazer beam mounted on the mining module.

Tugs will grip the asteroid and transit to the hangar. Once the asteroid is in the hangar, the hangar doors will be closed and hermitically sealed. The crushing process will be done by machines, and no, the are no regolites with this method.

The crushed content would pass through a series of filters of dedicated separators module driven by vaccum. When the hangar is empty, its doors will reopen to cycle a new crushing process.

What sort of development work has been done on this equipment? I've heard lots of general explanations and descriptions of asteroid mining equipment, but I've not seen anything about actual prototypes.

JR

[Phenix]

I have come up with this concept where all asteroid materials are to be reused. Even the rocks would be usefull for Mars Terraformation.

Yes, I was also digging around and I did not find any prototypes.

Suggestions are more than welcome ! I would hope that a mining expert would join PERMANENT and share his guidance.

[Phenix]

I did not find on web something that would relate to a mining module or even a drawing concept of it.

Rhys, have you seen something ?

Thanks

[Rhyshaelkan]

Nope, I have not been able to find anything very useful. But then I have not been giving it my all. I have other things that demand my attention.

[Phenix]

Thanks Rhys :)

[Phenix]

I am reviewing the mining module as the main "carrier" transport of all the mining equipment being defined by RaresH.

I would also suggest that the Pods and/or Pod Tugs are to be part of the mining module (see mass propulsion thread) would also be used to (re)deploy the mining equipment to any valuable sections of an asteroid to be harvested.

Any comments ?

[RaresH]

As I was drawing up the miner I was thinking about a carrier that would be used to deliver the miner and equipment to the target body and act as a ferry for the raw materials as well as any additional miners as needed. From what you described in earlier posts on this thread Phenix, my guess is the nodule would be very large. Enough to house a small asteroid? I was thinking more along the lines of something that could be lifted to orbit by falcon 9. The reusing of the design which will deliver the prospecting probes in earlier missions for the actual mining operation sounds like a good idea if I understood you correctly.

[Phenix]

Hi RaresH,

Excellent, and yes, you did understand me perfectly ;).

I was thinking large in the first place because I kept in mind that upon extracting/processing asteroid material there should never be any waste or dust that could perturbate any mechanical machinery parts.

[Sabion]

How about Bigelow Aerospace's inflatables? Lift one, two or three of these into orbit, lash them together and place a few largish ion engines at one end. Use this this configuration as an orbital mining base. Send the thing to a NEA or even a small co-orbital asteroid. The on-site miner is nothing more than a scoop that loads a magnetic basket with regolith or large chunks. Use the magnetic pods discussed earlier to lift the baskets off the asteroid and deposit them in the inflatable ship cores. When a the mother ship is full or even just one of the cores are full, send it back to Earth L2 or wherever the processing/fabrication unit is.

Send the mother ship back to an asteroid. Rinse and repeat.

I think all of this can be implemented with off the shelf ideas if not components.

[Phenix]

Thanks Sabion,

Could you put all the pieces together and sort out a plan with phases ?
Describe the roles and the payloads and sketch them in time for all actions.

Thanks again :)

[joertexas]

How about Bigelow Aerospace's inflatables? Lift one, two or three of these into orbit, lash them together and place a few largish ion engines at one end. Use this this configuration as an orbital mining base. Send the thing to a NEA or even a small co-orbital asteroid. The on-site miner is nothing more than a scoop that loads a magnetic basket with regolith or large chunks. Use the magnetic pods discussed earlier to lift the baskets off the asteroid and deposit them in the inflatable ship cores. When a the mother ship is full or even just one of the cores are full, send it back to Earth L2 or wherever the processing/fabrication unit is.

Send the mother ship back to an asteroid. Rinse and repeat.

I think all of this can be implemented with off the shelf ideas if not components.

The first manned mission I'm planning will use chemical engines, simply because they are available. That technology won't do for long term operations, but it's what we have available right now. Also, the inflatables are too heavy for the first mission. We can certainly look at them for later missions, though.

The main issue with moving raw materials is that it takes energy to do it. The less mass that is moved, the better. I suggest that processing be done onsite.

JR

[Sabion]

The first manned mission I'm planning will use chemical engines, simply because they are available. That technology won't do for long term operations, but it's what we have available right now. Also, the inflatables are too heavy for the first mission. We can certainly look at them for later missions, though.

The main issue with moving raw materials is that it takes energy to do it. The less mass that is moved, the better. I suggest that processing be done onsite.

JR

I propose the first mission not be manned at all. And while i mentioned the Bigelow inflatable modules I was thinking more along the line of a small inflatable bag tough enough to hold the regalith/chunks.

Send a small robotic mission to a rock such as 2006 RH120 which was close enough to earth to allow a teleoperated mission to succeed. Send a robot, carve off chunks ship them back to earth orbit. whether we sell these chunks or process them ourselves is not important in the long term. Nor is it all that important what we bring back to begin with. Just being able to bring back asteroidal material is the short term goal. No matter what it consists of (whether stony, iron or icy) the value of the early payloads will be phenomenal and allow us to attract more investors or pay for larger missions out right.

As for using ion engines, i feel that we can trade the extra time-to-object for a lowered overall cost of the mission.

This is all just opinion and conjecture on my part, so feel free to shoot my idea full of holes, but I think we start small and work up to manned missions to extinguished comets and iron rich chunks.

[joertexas]

I propose the first mission not be manned at all. And while i mentioned the Bigelow inflatable modules I was thinking more along the line of a small inflatable bag tough enough to hold the regalith/chunks.

Send a small robotic mission to a rock such as 2006 RH120 which was close enough to earth to allow a teleoperated mission to succeed. Send a robot, carve off chunks ship them back to earth orbit. whether we sell these chunks or process them ourselves is not important in the long term. Nor is it all that important what we bring back to begin with. Just being able to bring back asteroidal material is the short term goal. No matter what it consists of (whether stony, iron or icy) the value of the early payloads will be phenomenal and allow us to attract more investors or pay for larger missions out right.

As for using ion engines, i feel that we can trade the extra time-to-object for a lowered overall cost of the mission.

This is all just opinion and conjecture on my part, so feel free to shoot my idea full of holes, but I think we start small and work up to manned missions to extinguished comets and iron rich chunks.

I agree that an unmanned mission would be less expensive and less risky than a manned mission. However, look at the Apollo program versus the Mars Rovers. Apollo was risky, and they had landed unmanned probes on the moon, but it didn't have nearly the impact the Apollo landings did.

Right now, Spirit, one of the Mars rovers, is stuck because it can't work it's way out of a patch of soft sand. They've done a lot, and I'm not trying to take a grain of the credit the team deserves away, but it just isn't the same as a manned mission.

The first mission I'm planning does involve unmanned probes to pick the best target for a mining mission. Could the mining mission be unmanned, and be successful? Yes, I think it can, but I think the manned mission will really open up near Earth space and capture the public's attention in a way the robots never will. Yes, it's a risk, especially for the crew, but there will be no shortage of qualified people to fly the mission.

JR

[Phenix]

I would see a mining mission in two folds:

1) At the Eath orbit the carrier is being build as a merged payloads of international launchers. The carrier 'the mining module' will ship the necessary equipment to deploy an orbital station, 'pods', solar power plants, sat relays and on the surface the mining equipment. All of the deployment only should be automated and teleoperated from Earth.

2) An international team staff will rendezvous to a spacecraft being space habitat, mining control center and the cargo bays (inflatables) at Earth orbit. The spacecraft would then head to the attach to the orbital space station and start the mining process. When the cargo bays are full, the spacecraft will then head back to Earth and rendezvous to the orbital industrual processing / manufacturing complex.

voila :)

[joertexas]

I would see a mining mission in two folds:

1) At the Eath orbit the carrier is being build as a merged payloads of international launchers. The carrier 'the mining module' will ship the necessary equipment to deploy an orbital station, 'pods', solar power plants, sat relays and on the surface the mining equipment. All of the deployment only should be automated and teleoperated from Earth.

2) An international team staff will rendezvous to a spacecraft being space habitat, mining control center and the cargo bays (inflatables) at Earth orbit. The spacecraft would then head to the attach to the orbital space station and start the mining process. When the cargo bays are full, the spacecraft will then head back to Earth and rendezvous to the orbital industrual processing / manufacturing complex.

voila :)

I still think that a manned mining mission is needed, at least until the kinks are worked out of the mining modules. One issue that will have to be dealt with in regards to teleoperation is the availability of the Deep Space Network. At these ranges from Earth, communications is a major hurdle to overcome.

Also, transporting raw materials from heliocentric orbit to LEO or even HEEO is fuel intensive. Better to process, and then transport.

JR

[Phenix]

On the "deployment" of all (1) mining modules, transmission time for (re)programming can take more than a minute and this is really not an issue at all. Although, transmission time for mining operations taking more than a minute for an action is really not option. Reactive/proactive decisions in dangerous circumstances should take a few milliseconds to act and not minutes.

I agree that "Better to process, and then transport" is the ideal way and I was thinking the same way as you do in the first place.

But everything is new and the first mining mission will be quiet a challenge already.

The industrial complex will also be quiet a challenge to be operated as I am sure there will be glitches from the 'young implementation' that will need to be fixed while processing before being totally operational and has been proven to be efficient and then move the complex to the asteroid orbit to process in-situ.

It will come on its time :)

Although, I would suggest to process the asteroid's volatile and dedicate a mining module attached to the orbital station for the task as I do think that transferring the processed volatile to the spacecraft (2) additional fuel tanks would be usefull to head back to the industrial complex. I do also think that processing minerals is far more complex than processing volatiles, thus processing volatiles in-situ is feasible in the short term.

[Strobelix]

Talking about volatiles. I had an idea, but that might be too crazy to work though. Also I did some math on the volumes and unfortunately it seems to big for any asteroid bigger than, let's say, 50m across.

However, I was thinking about to wrap a small asteroid in a kind of greenhouse and let the sun, due to constant heating, get out the volatiles out of the asteroid.

If this foil structure has a kind of docking ring to pump out the gases produced by the sun's heat a spaceship could use it as a gas station or even compress, refine and move the usefull gases back to earth orbit or to another asteroid, where some real mining goes on. One could even think of attaching just plasma drives on that structure and gently move the asteroid with it's own gases.

The real problem here is the warpping thing and the masses involved. Also the differences of heat and cold might be a poblem, since it could damage the foil. Additionally, if the preasure of the gasses inside that "greenhouse" would grow to fast the thing might explode. But that could be handled by just let some of the gases flow to space. Regarding to the mass, I was thinking about using PET, but that seems a way to heavy and the only thing that might work is aerogel if available in such low thinkness needed. Also I couldn't find any prices on that stuff. I am afraid it might be horrible expensive. Also aerogel is a good islolator, and I have no idea if the inside get's much warmer since it's not really transparent. One would have to do some testing on that.

Real near earth asteroids might not be the right target though since the volatiles might be gone already. Except it would be a "lately" catched comet, which we don't know, I am afraid. So bodies more far, like the main belt might be the better joice.

[Phenix]

Strobelix,

You are exposing an interesting concept on greenhouse effect :)

I think the sun heat intensity has already vaporized volatiles that were exposed at the asteroid's surface and at a certain depth. I am not sure that all NEA's volatiles have been depleted due sun's heat. I think the materials asteroid's crust already provides some heat shield, the temperature would decrease proportionally deeper toward the asteroid's center.

Any thoughts :)

[Strobelix]

Yea I agree the volatiles on the surface would be gone already. On the other hand, over time the temprature would grow trhoughout the whole rock and whatever is in it. The quetions are:

1) How long would that take. Most likely too long.
2) Could the so freed gases just flow out of the rocky environment, or would one have to drill into our friend.

add 2) In case the asteroid is not a solid rock, but more like sponge this might work though. On the other hand it would be more difficult to fix the wrapping spherical greenhouse with tethers on the asteroid, if that's even needed.

I will do some more math on it, and how long it would take to heat up the thing and how deep the heat would get into the rock.

To be honest I doubt, that there would be something like a real crust covering the asteroid. There is almost no gravity and I just can't imagine how such a cover would have evolved.

[RaresH]

Very good idea exchange guys. And I'm sure they all have their merits. I'm going with Joe on this and say that a manned mission although expensive will be a better option to ensure a successful mission. Not only that but it will likely capture more attention and funding. Think about it as an opportunity to televise the very first off world mining operation. It could be a huge success and followed world wide. If done right it could pay for the mission and some. Remember, the important thing is to capture the attention and imagination of as many people as possible to the future of man in space. Ultimately once a viable mining process is proven machines may end up doing most of the work remotely. For now well have to contend with a small manned operation with small yields of material which should be enough to make the case for off world mining.

[Phenix]

Yes, I agree on the fact that a manned mission will be amazing world wide for television coverage, like the Apollo missions.

Having in prelude of the equipment deployed and used by man would also give huge advertisment on those mining equipments and processing sponsored by companies's board of directors that have the courage to go ahead for the outstanding new step for humanity !

Because of man on site, many experiments on mining operations will be conducted and followed by television live broadcast using the sat relays I have mentioned. I would like to see that happend as soon as possible :)