Mars

[Sigmetnow]

Starship has the potential to return serious tonnage from Mars within ~5 years

 
Which then begs the question:  When are the next optimal Earth-Mars departure dates?

The approximate dates for a Hohmann transfer departing Earth for Mars:
21st November - 12th December, 2024
25th January - 14th February, 2027
27th March - 15th April, 2029
29th May - 16th June, 2031
30th July - 17th August, 2033
29th September - 17th October, 2035
28th November - 16th December, 2037
30th January - 17th February, 2040

Hohmann windows departing Mars for Earth.
3rd July - 22nd July, 2026
3rd August - 22nd August, 2028
4th September - 23rd September, 2030
4th October - 23rd October, 2032
4th November - 23rd November, 2034
5th December - 24th December, 2036
6th January - 25th January, 2039

From:
Timeline of a Mars Settlement - Future Timeline
https://futuretimeline.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3013
April 26, 2023

 
The duration of the transfer flight and its departure date is variable, depending on the ∆v the spacecraft can achieve.

[nadir]

From a recently published scientific paper on Nature:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-024-54012-0

About feasibility of SpaceX's human exploration Mars mission scenario with Starship

Conclusions:
This paper has compiled a feasibility analysis for Starship based on a published mission scenario and extrapolation of existing systems, where information about Starship had gaps. Using typical analysis methods, a mass budget for the system and subsystems was established. A Lambert solver was applied to identify the minimum ToF and Δv. It has been shown that there are currently several gaps in the available technology to conduct a Mars mission as sketched by SpaceX, e.g. concerning ISRU capability, power supply and the performance of Starship itself, which based on the mass estimate presented here, is incapable to conduct the mission as proposed by SpaceX. Especially, the ToF limits published by SpaceX are found to be unrealistic and cannot be held with the current design, requiring at least further improvement of the performance, some are outright physically impossible (i.e. Mars cannot be reached within 30 days with such a transfer vehicle). The current estimate does also not allow the return flight of Starship. Even with an unrealistic 100% recovery rate of consumables, the mission was not feasible for a 12 person crew per Starship, let alone for the SpaceX published 100 person crew. Further technology development is required, to supplement this launch and transfer vehicle and enable Mars missions. This is affecting Starship itself, but also infrastructure elements needed for the SpaceX proposed mission, especially those required for ISRU-based production of propellant. With the information currently available a Mars mission with Starship is not feasible

[Sigmetnow]

From a recently published scientific paper on Nature:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-024-54012-0

About feasibility of SpaceX's human exploration Mars mission scenario with Starship

Conclusions:
This paper has compiled a feasibility analysis for Starship based on a published mission scenario and extrapolation of existing systems, where information about Starship had gaps. Using typical analysis methods, a mass budget for the system and subsystems was established. A Lambert solver was applied to identify the minimum ToF and Δv. It has been shown that there are currently several gaps in the available technology to conduct a Mars mission as sketched by SpaceX, e.g. concerning ISRU capability, power supply and the performance of Starship itself, which based on the mass estimate presented here, is incapable to conduct the mission as proposed by SpaceX. Especially, the ToF limits published by SpaceX are found to be unrealistic and cannot be held with the current design, requiring at least further improvement of the performance, some are outright physically impossible (i.e. Mars cannot be reached within 30 days with such a transfer vehicle). The current estimate does also not allow the return flight of Starship. Even with an unrealistic 100% recovery rate of consumables, the mission was not feasible for a 12 person crew per Starship, let alone for the SpaceX published 100 person crew. Further technology development is required, to supplement this launch and transfer vehicle and enable Mars missions. This is affecting Starship itself, but also infrastructure elements needed for the SpaceX proposed mission, especially those required for ISRU-based production of propellant. With the information currently available a Mars mission with Starship is not feasible

This “scientific paper” uses obsolete values for Starship capabilities, does not consider that future Starships will have improved performance, and chooses their own scenarios so as to arrive at a negative conclusion.
It’s like arguing that the first Falcon 1 will never transport astronauts to the ISS.

Points:
• The Starship of today is not the one that will go to Mars.
Paper:  “Starship can carry a payload mass of 100 MT into LEO.”  Total thrust…  Δv…
 
Starship 3 will have a capacity to land 200 or more tons on Mars.  It will be about 500 feet (150 meters) tall, about 20 percent larger than the current vehicle. This will allow for additional payload space and additional propellant to increase lift capacity.  It will have nine Raptor engines, not six like today’s Starship. 
 
Musk’s April update talk at Starbase blows away all the assumptions the paper uses for its calculations.  And that is just the Starships being planned for the immediate future, not the ones for transporting 100 passengers to Mars in the 2040’s and beyond.
 
Elon Musk just gave another Mars speech—this time the vision seems tangible
https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/04/elon-musk-just-gave-another-mars-speech-this-time-the-vision-seems-tangible/

• “Mars can’t be reached in 30 days in such a transfer vehicle.”  The usual transfer time mentioned for Starship is three to six months.  30 days has only been mentioned as an eventual possibility.  That capability could involve additional fuel depot ships or specific orbital situations, but the paper does not consider this.

• Per Musk, most of the first Starships to land on Mars will be supply ships and will not be returning to Earth.  They will remain on Mars to be used as future habitats and as sources of materials for the Mars base.  So the ISRU requirements calculations are incorrect.

• The paper arbitrarily chooses a crew of 12 people, maximizing the difficulty of life support on early flights, but a crew of 12 is not required.  When future ships for 100 passengers are built, they will be much improved from early transport ships, and they will be traveling to Mars with 1,000 other ships, some of which will have additional supplies and specialized capabilities and amenities among them.  Not everything for 100 people for six months needs to be aboard one ship.

[SteveMDFP]

This “scientific paper” uses obsolete values for Starship capabilities, does not consider that future Starships will have improved performance, and chooses their own scenarios so as to arrive at a negative conclusion.
It’s like arguing that the first Falcon 1 will never transport astronauts to the ISS.

Musk's vision for Mars colonization does seem technically feasible.  I do think he's a brilliant engineer.

However, this vision is utterly unworkable from a social, political, and economic perspective.  On some of these kinds of matters, Musk is a thundering moron.  Governments at all levels, in almost all countries, are severely cash-strapped.  They won't have the finances to implement UBI to keep masses of well-educated people out of abject poverty.  They certainly won't be funding Mars colonization, that's ridiculous.

Sure, capitalism as a whole will have sufficiently vast financial resources.  But without a huge net profit to realize, they won't be funding this, either.  That's also ridiculous. 

[nadir]

This “scientific paper” uses obsolete values for Starship capabilities, does not consider that future Starships will have improved performance, and chooses their own scenarios so as to arrive at a negative conclusion.
It’s like arguing that the first Falcon 1 will never transport astronauts to the ISS.

Musk's vision for Mars colonization does seem technically feasible.  I do think he's a brilliant engineer.

However, this vision is utterly unworkable from a social, political, and economic perspective.  On some of these kinds of matters, Musk is a thundering moron.  Governments at all levels, in almost all countries, are severely cash-strapped.  They won't have the finances to implement UBI to keep masses of well-educated people out of abject poverty.  They certainly won't be funding Mars colonization, that's ridiculous.

Sure, capitalism as a whole will have sufficiently vast financial resources.  But without a huge net profit to realize, they won't be funding this, either.  That's also ridiculous.

He’s not even an engineer. He’s been good though on hiring or using great engineers, and existing technologies like Machine Learning, Rocket Science, and Eberhart concept of EV.

[cognitivebias2]

This “scientific paper” uses obsolete values for Starship capabilities, does not consider that future Starships will have improved performance, and chooses their own scenarios so as to arrive at a negative conclusion.
It’s like arguing that the first Falcon 1 will never transport astronauts to the ISS.

Musk's vision for Mars colonization does seem technically feasible.  I do think he's a brilliant engineer.

However, this vision is utterly unworkable from a social, political, and economic perspective.  On some of these kinds of matters, Musk is a thundering moron.  Governments at all levels, in almost all countries, are severely cash-strapped.  They won't have the finances to implement UBI to keep masses of well-educated people out of abject poverty.  They certainly won't be funding Mars colonization, that's ridiculous.

Sure, capitalism as a whole will have sufficiently vast financial resources.  But without a huge net profit to realize, they won't be funding this, either.  That's also ridiculous.

He’s not even an engineer. He’s been good though on hiring or using great engineers, and existing technologies like Machine Learning, Rocket Science, and Eberhart concept of EV.

Like Steve Jobs, Musk is a visionary with the force of will to bend reality.  He will not be measured on his personal technical talents.  That would be like criticizing Bill Gates' programming skills.

Whether or not the financial incentives exist to colonize Mars, he is using that idea as part of his  vision that is building a revolutionary private space company.

I would expect the space lift capability of Starship to lead in unexpected directions. 

[Sigmetnow]

The reason SpaceX developed Starlink is because satellite internet would bring in the billions of dollars required for SpaceX’s (not just Musk’s) mission to make life multi-planetary.  Income from Starlink will be several orders of magnitude more than rocket contracts would be.  Governments will not be the primary source of funding. This is the new era of Commercial Space and reusable spacecraft.

Of course, SpaceX won’t be going it alone.  Customers will join them; NASA, ESA, JAXA etc would love to tag along and explore Mars, and universities, aerospace and private companies are also interested.  Intuitive Machines received many unsolicited mission requests after they only partially successfully landed on the Moon.

Starship is about to completely disrupt the space industry.  The ability to transport hundreds of tons to LEO, the Moon, Mars and eventually elsewhere in the solar system for little more than the cost of fuel means ideas that use to be fanciful will soon be eminently possible.

People scoffed at the Wright brothers first flights, too.  What is the use of the machine? 
Wait a few years, and you will see.

Financially and time-wise, the Mars Sample Return mission has no chance without Starship.

——
SpaceX Rideshare missions. 
 
How it started:
SpaceX:  We’re going to do regular launches to sun-synchronous orbit.  Who-all wants to come along?
https://www.spacex.com/rideshare/
 
How it’s going:
Musk, today: “To the best of my knowledge, none of the rideshare missions have lost money.”
5/30/24, https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1796049014938357932

[Sigmetnow]

China targets 2030 for Mars sample return mission, potential landing areas revealed
March 8, 2024

HELSINKI — China is making progress towards a 2030 launch for its Tianwen-3 Mars sample return mission and has narrowed down potential landing areas.
…
China’s Tianwen-3 Mars sample return architecture is a simpler approach than NASA’s, yet is still a very complex mission. Two Long March 5 launches will carry a lander and ascent vehicle and an orbiter and return module respectively. Entry, descent and landing will build on technology used for the Tianwen-1 rover landing. 

On the surface, the lander will use a robotic arm to collect surface samples and a drill to collect material from up to two meters below the surface. Either a six-legged crawling robot or an Ingenuity-like helicopter could fly on the mission to add the capacity to collect a more diverse set of samples. The mission targets delivering around 500 grams of Martian samples to Earth.

Sun outlined the main challenges as obtaining rock samples and then taking off from the surface of Mars, followed by a rendezvous and docking in orbit and the transfer of the samples to a reentry module. These require a high degree of autonomy in terms of system design. 

The technical foundation is already in place, Sun said. China has Mars entry, descent and landing experience from Tianwen-1. It has also conducted sampling and launch from another planetary body with the Chang’e-5 lunar sample return mission. Sun added that the samples could help provide answers as to whether there were ever traces of life on Mars. …

https://spacenews.com/china-targets-2030-for-mars-sample-return-mission-potential-landing-areas-revealed/

[Sigmetnow]

—- NASA asked for companies to suggest better/cheaper/faster alternatives to the Mars Sample Return mission plan.
 
List of companies that won contracts from NASA to perform 90-day studies "to examine more affordable and faster methods of bringing samples from Mars’ surface back to Earth as part of the agency’s Mars Sample Return Program."
6/7/24, https://x.com/wapodavenport/status/1799171876670828835
From the textpic:

Lockheed Martin in Littleton, Colorado: "Lockheed Martin Rapid Mission Design Studies for Mars Sample Return"
SpaceX in Hawthorne, California: "Enabling Mars Sample Return With Starship"
Aerojet Rocketdyne in Huntsville, Alabama: "A High-Performance Liquid Mars Ascent Vehicle, Using Highly Reliable and Mature Propulsion Technologies, to Improve Program Affordability and Schedule"
Blue Origin in Monrovia, California: "Leveraging Artemis for Mars Sample Return"
Quantum Space, in Rockville, Maryland: "Quantum Anchor Leg Mars Sample Return Study"
Northrop Grumman in Elkton, Maryland: "High TRL MAV Propulsion Trades and Concept Design for MSR Rapid Mission Design"
Whittinghill Aerospace in Camarillo, California: "A Rapid Design Study for the MSR Single Stage Mars Ascent Vehicle"

 
< SpaceX in Hawthorne, California: “Enabling Mars Sample Return With Starship” WINNER WINNER MARTIAN DINNER!  You want sample we’ll bring back samples!!!
< Starship: how big of an excavator can we fit
< Samples by the ton.
 
> Lots of attention to the Starship proposal, but I am more interested in how BO will leverage Artemis to get the samples and what on Mars is the Quantum Anchor?!

[morganism]

i think the Anchor is a version of a skyhook.

[Sigmetnow]

—- NASA asked for companies to suggest better/cheaper/faster alternatives to the Mars Sample Return mission plan. 

NASA is commissioning 10 studies on Mars Sample Return—most are commercial
Stephen Clark - 6/7/2024

The space agency put out a call to industry in April to propose ideas on how to return the Mars rocks to Earth for less than $11 billion and before 2040, the cost and schedule for NASA's existing plan for Mars Sample Return (MSR). A NASA spokesperson told Ars the agency received 48 responses to the solicitation and selected seven companies to conduct more detailed studies.

Each company will receive up to $1.5 million for their 90-day studies. Five of the companies chosen by NASA are among the agency's roster of large contractors, and their inclusion in the study contracts is no surprise. Two other winners are smaller businesses. …
 

Missing from the list of contract winners was Boeing, which has pushed the use of NASA's super-expensive Space Launch System to do the Mars Sample Return mission with a single launch. Boeing, of course, builds most of the SLS rocket. Most other sample return concepts require multiple launches. …

https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/06/nasa-is-commissioning-10-studies-on-mars-sample-return-most-are-commercial/

 
  🤔

Ben Weiss
 
Prediction for SpaceX proposal: Two Starships are sent to Mars. One descends and lands at the sample retrieval site, and its payload [includes] the fueled ascent stage. The second Starship aerobrakes into low Mars orbit, and its payload is the fueled return vehicle. No ISPP [In-Situ Propellant Production] required.

6/7/24, https://x.com/deepbluecea/status/1799217268121100696