Space/Science — HabitableZone

Space/Science » in reply to Space Elevator Robotic Lifter Test Run

I propose something less ambitious.

An lunar orbiting, "ferris-wheel shaped" contraption.
About 480 kilometer [300 miles] in diameter.
Consisting of girders and trusses made of light-weight, strong carbon-fibers combined with epoxy-kevlar whose rim would rotate at an angular velocity of between 1500-1600 meters per second, matching its lunar orbital speed.

In fact, skip the rim; don't need it...it's unnecessary and unwelcome mass.
You can use kevlar wires instead as suspension cables to keep the girdered spokes from buckling and flying apart.
Ok!...The spokes would have a radius of 240 km, and since its ends would rotate at around 1500-1600m/s,
the g-force at the ends would be pretty darn close to only one-gee.

As that contraption spins [ vertically & counterclockwise] in low lunar orbit, the spoke whose end is closest to the lunar surface would behave in a remarkable way.

An observer on the lunar surface would see the tip of that spoke at first swing down towards him at an alarmingly rapid rapid rate...
Then as the spoke tip begins to move closer to the lunar surface, in the opposite direction to the spinning contraption's
orbital path, the spoke tip will rapidly "appear" to slow down to crawl for a few fleeting moments [near the lunar surface[ before it swings upward at a rapidly increasing velocity relative to the observer and the lunar surface.

There is real potential for this device to literally "drop-off" tens of tons of supplies on the lunar surface with one swing
and one dip down [with its spoke tip] to within a couple of hundred meters of the lunar surface where it will be released
to land gently on large air-bags.

You could land passengers on the moon this way...
If the spoke tip dipped to within 100 meters of the surface momentarily, it could drop off an air-bag cushioned
passenger module; landing at about 18 meters/second thereabouts. v^2 = 2gh. 324m^2/s^2 = (2)100m(1.62m/s^2)
And assuming the air bags are about 4 meters [13 feet] in diameter.
The the G-force would only be: 324 m^2/s^2 = 0 + (2)(4m)40m/s^2. Only four Gees.

I'd like your imput.

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