Living on the moon needn't mean living at one sixth G

One of the many absurd things I see people saying to recommend building space stations rather than moon bases is that space stations can be rotated to provide a simulation of earth gravity while a moon base will be at the moon's gravity of one sixth of that on earth.

Have these idjits ever been to a summer carnival?

Okay, let me break it down. Nothing would keep a moon base from incorporating sections that work just like the planned residential sections of a large space station, in other words, circling on a track at some speed such that the inhabitants will feel one G of force. All that one would have to do is slant the floors to take advantage of the existing gravity and keep the whole shebang running at a slower speed than would be needed in space. Everything else would also be easier. The rotating sections could "lean into" a track made of moon rock, thereby considerably reducing the load on the system creating the rotation relative to what would be needed out in space. Repairs would, of course, be much easier. If the system needs to be shut off for a while things don't just drift off or fly away, they settle down to the ground.

Would this be a huge engineering job? Well, yes, but by definition, it would always be less of a job than doing a facility of the same size in zero g. Per person, per cubic meter of usable space, it's the same general idea but at lower speeds in a simpler, safer place to build. And not only would it be safer and easier to build, if you let go of a space station, you drift off into the vacuum unless and until you either rocket yourself back and/or somebody goes after you to get you back. You let go of a facility like this and you're standing on the moon. Worst case scenario: you fall down, you stand up.

The only legitimate counter I see to this is that building and operating anything on the moon is likely to be subject to the famously abrasive lunar dust. I've got nothing to say to that though I suspect that in the not too distant future engineers will figure out ways to treat it all as a series of problems in fluid dynamics and charged particles and it'll become nothing more than a constant annoyance. Especially since the lack of atmosphere means that once you've got an area clear of dust it stays clear, except for what astronauts track back with them. They might even find a way to, in effect, pour concrete over an area, "soaking up" the dust in that area and creating a nice, rigid platform.

One could also say that being subject to the several week cycle of sunlight and daylight is a pain in the ass and I agree. But as a former operations guy, I would gladly trade that periodic two week loss of daylight to get the nice, predictable alternation of plenty of sunlit time for things like running solar collectors and plenty of sun-free time to do things like have engineers go outside with less radiation risk or trouble dissipating heat.

Anyway, I've been reading this baloney about the evils of moon gravity for years and I just wanted, once and for all to put it to rest.

Happy days,

-Rustin

Comments

[Diana]

Well, the reason people think living on the Moon means living at one sixth G is because they grow up reading Heinlein's "The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress" in which all the Loonies live at one sixth G.

Then again people used to think that Mars meant visiting alien kingdoms full of beautiful, barely-dressed people all of whom subscribed to pulp 1912 values (i.e. eternal true love and lots of sword fighting) because of Burrough's John Carter of Mars and sequels. That fantasy world was considerably less likely than anything Heinlein ever wrote.

[Rustin H. Wright]

Diana, you're great. You've literally got me laughing out loud at that because that's so insane and yet absolutely true. You're right. Everybody "knows" that living in space can mean rotating cylinders. They've seen it in movies all their lives. And everybody "knows" what life on the moon would be because of exactly the stuff you mentioned.

Gawd. Some days I feel like there's no tech work that matters a tenth as much as creating new, improved propaganda for the clueless masses. We don't need better launch technologies. We need more toys, more comics, and more episodes of The Cape and Firefly.

*sigh*

[Diana]

no, we need better fantasy writers.
but there's just no overcoming the main problem than aliens are really not likely to be beautiful, barely-dressed, passionate humans.....

[Patrick]

Have you heard about the research suggesting that the dust can be 'baked' by shining (I think) microwaves on it? It would settle the moondust problem, and might provide something of a rigid backing for the track.

[Rustin H. Wright]

Diana, well, then, whose fault is that? I demand warranty service on the "aliens likely to be encountered" module of this universe.

[Rustin H. Wright]

Patrick, yeah, I've read about that in a few places. I suspect that once we've got people on the ground there or simply more effective "synthetic moondust", we'll see quite a few promising possible fixes turn up. Though personally, I like the microwave approach since it uses no material supplies. This would be a great job for a mobile robot. Store up electricity, heat an area a few meters wide until the charge is gone, roll onto newly flat surface, charge, heat, etc.