Northrop Grumman To Study DARPA Concept For Lunar Railroad

[tree68]

York1

Actually, I have high hopes my square foot will lie on the route of the moon train, and I can hold out for millions.

Are you calling it "Rock Ridge?"

[York1]

Overmod

York1

I own one square foot of the moon.  It was purchased for me by my daughter for my 60th birthday.

I'd appreciate it if everyone would respect my wishes and stay off my property.

And here I was thinking you could put up a cam and become as famous as Fostoria...

 

Actually, I have high hopes my square foot will lie on the route of the moon train, and I can hold out for millions.

[Overmod]

York1

I own one square foot of the moon.  It was purchased for me by my daughter for my 60th birthday.

I'd appreciate it if everyone would respect my wishes and stay off my property.

And here I was thinking you could put up a cam and become as famous as Fostoria...

[tree68]

Ed Kyle

There is no law for the Moon, no agreed upon international treaties, etc. 

I suspect there's an element of "whodathunkit" involved there.

Should someone attempt to lay claim to it, I'm not sure anyone else would respect that claim.  Something like Antarctica would probably be the end result.

That MR article was, indeed, the April issue (as I recalled when I posted that), lending a shade of "April Fools" to it.  As we can see, however, the possibility is increasingly real.

I wonder if the technology used on roller coasters might not be useful.

[jeffhergert]

tree68

Didn't Model Railroader have an article about this some years back?

Cost would be no object, as long as there's enough ink for the presses...

 

 

I remember that article. I looked up the issue date, April 1978. I was pretty sure it was an April issue, but I was thinking 1976.

April being the key indicator. 

Starting from scratch on the moon, it could provide a market for autonomous rail cars.  

Jeff 

[York1]

I own one square foot of the moon.  It was purchased for me by my daughter for my 60th birthday.

I'd appreciate it if everyone would respect my wishes and stay off my property.

[Ed Kyle]

The problem with the idea of exploiting lunar resources is the assumption that any single entity or country "owns" the resources.  There is no law for the Moon, no agreed upon international treaties, etc.  Wild Wild West.  No guarantee that if you build it someone won't take it or tear it up, etc.

 - Ed Kyle

[Overmod]

Keep in mind that the Northrop Grumman study for DARPA is part of the LunA-10 framework of development, which is being worked out by these guys:

https://lsic.jhuapl.edu/

with DARPA saying they are inspired by

https://www.pwc.com.au/industry/space-industry/lunar-market-assessment-2021.pdf

I forget how old I was when I came across Neil Ruzic's 'The Case for Going to the Moon', but I became convinced then, and still am, that sensible Lunar development ought to be undertaken... as long as it doesn't devolve into the usual kinds of finance oligarchy.  I note that the current thinking does call for 'surface construction' of a network of lines, rather than in deep tunnels or even with the overburden Erik mentions against flare or CME events.    Be interesting to see what detail design and options they come up with.

I confess I'll be eagerly watching for Don Oltmann's 'railroading in 2060' blog post about a typical day's work up there.

[Erik_Mag]

blue streak 1

For rails cannot use CWR as kinks and pull aparts due to extreme temperature changes with alternate 14 days of sun and then 14 days dark.  Miter joints every 20 feet?

I remember thinking about what it would take to build a railroad on the moon and one of the first challenges was how to deal with thermal expansion/contraction. It then occurred to me that rocks would have similar problems - repeated thermal cycles would break the surface into little pieces. My next thought was: that's why the lunar regolith is a coarse powder.

I like OM's idea of "snowshed", especially if there is a heap of lunar regolith on top. The heap of regolith would accomplish two things. First is the thermal mass would even out the temperature underneath. Second is that a meter or two of regolith would be a passable radiation shield providing some protection against the normal background radiation levels of space as well as solar flares. The earth's atmosphere is roughly equivalent to 15 feet of concrete with respect to radiation shielding.

[Overmod]

blue streak 1

Gravity or lack of gravity means cannot use earth type RRs.  Any change in direction either horizontal or verticle train goes off track.

The Moon isn't an asteroid -- it has very efffective gravity, just weaker than Earth's.  The obvious way to increase 'curving speed' is to use increased superelevation... with vacuum-cementing of ballast and so on.

... So, locos and cars must have some kind of positive contact up and down and sideways with rails at all times to prevent lift off of rails.

One approach is to use a Fell-style method on a reaction rail -- two sets of sprung wheels bearing on the web and underside of the railhead.  Provide the electromagnetic braking either side of these wheels if you want to keep this separate from the 'running' support rails...

But the rails and cross ties then would also need to be anchored for every crosstie & rail to solid moon.

Gravity would hold them adequately, presuming correct design at the ends of the 'ties' -- but I suspect that's not what would be used; it would be some kind of cast slab-track in sections, with positive anchoring as well as shims allowing the counterpart of top-down alignment of the rail structure.

No cooling available from air causes major engineering work for propulsion, friction, and braking.

Propulsion would probably be hydrogen fuel cells, with the water exhaust serving very nicely if something is needed for heat transfer.  Radiators are VERY effective in the lunar environment, where one side will always be dark at effectively hundreds of degrees below zero.  You will certainly not be using air brakes, or even hydraulic brakes, but eddy-current braking is completely adequate (even if you need coordinated inverter drive for the axles).

For tractive effort and braking best use a rack RR.

As noted, the Fell system is better than a lateral rack, and of course a vertical rack fails even worse than adhesion.  But if you are using a center reaction rail for LIM, your acceleration and braking are handled directly from the 'motor' windings in the train, so... not an issue.

For rails cannot use CWR as kinks and pull aparts due to extreme temperature changes with alternate 14 days of sun and then 14 days dark.  Miter joints every 20 feet?

The insolation equivalent of snowsheds.  Or underground construction in cut-'n-cover with some sort of reflective membrane handling the thermal gain.  The same sort of anchor to permafrost used on the Alaska Pipeline construction could quite easily be used to keep near a 'neutral' temperature for continuous rail of any necessary length, with perfectly straightforward breaks, miter ended or otherwise, between sections.

[Overmod]

NKP guy

Will they be using the same consultants and contractors as California's High Speed Rail Project?

Don't be silly; this is military-grade rocket science, involving some of the finest engineers in the world.  Of course it will be orders of magnitude less expensive than CAHSR. 

[tree68]

Didn't Model Railroader have an article about this some years back?

Cost would be no object, as long as there's enough ink for the presses...

 

[rdamon]

Will all signal aspects be lunar?

[NKP guy]

Will they be using the same consultants and contractors as California's High Speed Rail Project? And what about the NIMSSs (not in my solar system)?

[blue streak 1]

Overmod

 Backshop

With hardly any gravity, what would that do for tractive effort?

 Six times the load for a given contact patch...

 The braking inertia of course is higher, so expect magnetic track brakes.  No air for cheap braking anyway.

And if you need better physical TE, there's always inspiration from our fellow toy-train enthusiasts... Magne-Traction!

 

Gravity or lack of gravity means cannot use earth type RRs.  Any change in direction either horizontal or verticle train goes off track.  So, locos and cars must have some kind of positive contact up and down and sideways with rails at all times to prevent lift off of rails.  But the rails and cross ties then would also need to be anchored for every crosstie & rail to solid moon. 

 

No cooling available from air causes major engineering work for propulsion, friction, and braking.

 

For tractive effort and braking best use a rack RR.

 

For rails cannot use CWR as kinks and pull aparts due to extreme temperature changes with alternate 14 days of sun and then 14 days dark.  Miter joints every 20 feet?

[Overmod]

Backshop

With hardly any gravity, what would that do for tractive effort?

Six times the load for a given contact patch...

The braking inertia of course is higher, so expect magnetic track brakes.  No air for cheap braking anyway.

And if you need better physical TE, there's always inspiration from our fellow toy-train enthusiasts... Magne-Traction!

[samfp1943]

Seems likke the liky extension to what we now enjoy in our 'National CapitaL'...a plot to just dig us deeper and deeper into another hole. 

[ns145]

CSSHEGEWISCH

 

 

daveklepper

Mining the Moon may solve USA and Canadian shortages of rare-earth metals required for many communications and transpotation applications.

 

 

 

 

But the costs would be astronomical.

 

It would cost billions AND billions of dollars.

 

[zugmann]

Don't know what the job would pay, but you'd make out like a bandit on the deadhead. 

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

daveklepper

Mining the Moon may solve USA and Canadian shortages of rare-earth metals required for many communications and transpotation applications.

 

But the costs would be astronomical.

[Backshop]

adkrr64

The whole idea is sheer lunacy.

 

I see what you did there...

[Backshop]

With hardly any gravity, what would that do for tractive effort?

[daveklepper]

Mining the Moon may solve USA and Canadian shortages of rare-earth metals required for many communications and transpotation applications.

[adkrr64]

The whole idea is sheer lunacy.

[rdamon]

https://aviationweek.com/defense-space/space/northrop-grumman-study-darpa-concept-lunar-railroad

https://news.northropgrumman.com/news/releases/northrop-grumman-to-develop-concept-for-lunar-railroad

Northrop Grumman’s study will:

• Define the interfaces and resources required to build a lunar rail network.
• Establish a critical list of foreseeable cost, technological and logistical risks. 
• Identify prototypes, demonstrations and analyses of a fully operating lunar rail system’s concept design and architecture.
• Explore concepts for constructing and operating the system with robotics, including grading and foundation preparation, track placement and alignment, joining and finishing, inspection, maintenance and repair.