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NASA Needs Fake Moon Dust
crisco writes "NASA's renewed interest in lunar exploration and 'in situ resource utilization,' or ISRU, is driving the need for tons of carefully faked lunar dust and sand for testing purposes: 'We don't have enough real moondust to go around,' says Larry Taylor, director of Planetary Geosciences Institute at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. To run all the tests, "we need to make a well-qualified lunar simulant.' And not just a few bags will do. 'We need tons of it, mainly for working on technologies for diggers and wheels and machinery on the surface,' adds David S. McKay, chief scientist for astrobiology at the Johnson Space Center (JSC)."
Just take it form the Fake moon landing site.
Apparently, tons of them, mainly for working on technologies for diggers and wheels and machinery on the surface.
And, um, I made it 7.
Armstrong and Aldrin found a thin dust layer on the surface of the moon.
'I am at the foot of the ladder. The LM [lunar module ] footpads are only depressed in the surface about one or two inches, although the surface appears. to be very, very fine grained, as. you get close to it. It is almost like a powder. Now and then it is very fine. I am going to step off the LM now. That is one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.'
When he started walking on the surface of the moon he said:
'The surface is fine and powdery. I can - I can pick it up loosely with my toe. It does adhere in fine layers like powdered charcoal to the sole and sides. of my boots. I only go in a small fraction of an inch, maybe an eighth of an inch, but I can see the footprints. of my boots and the treads in the fine sandy particles.'
When he was collecting samples:
'This is very interesting. It is a very soft surface, but here and there where I plug with the contingency sample collector, I run into a very hard surface, but it appears to be very cohesive material of the same sort. I will try to get a rock in here.'
Apparently the ground was unyielding enough that they had trouble getting the flag planted.
The rock, the vulture, and the chain
You joke, but I absolutely remember hearing this same thing a few years ago. I think it was possibly more than five or six years back. Probably it was on NPR.
I haven't read TFA, but in the story I remember hearing, NASA used to have literally thousands of pounds of moon rock and dust from the Apollo missions, but over the years it's been parceled out for various purposes (including being given to school kids, etc.) and now they only have a few pounds left. They want someone to come up with a simulated sand so they can test how it gets into bearings and stuff.
What I'd like to know is why is this still an issue? If it was a problem five or six years ago, you'd think they'd have gotten around to solving it by now. And yet it's still being discussed as if it was a new problem. Then again, I guess this is NASA we're talking about.
The last time I heard about this, the closest moon-dust simulacrum was some type of pulverized volcanic ash. My immediate question was whether you could really simulate the lunar surface using Earth gravity -- even if you were using real moon dust, it seems like its effects on equipment would be radically different on the moon, than it would be here. Here on Earth you have humidity and various atmospheric effects, plus gravity, that could affect how the dust gets into bearings and other components; all of these wouldn't exist on the moon. It seems like if you want to test parts for use on the moon, you'd need something that's not the same as moon dust here on earth.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Sounds like a nearly impossible task to replicate lunar dust considering how abrasive the stuff is. This article does a good job of explaining.
They just want us to think they don't know how to make fake moon dust. :)
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
With the gravity being different, the mechanics won't fit, whether or not the dust is moon-like or not.
-- don't discount flying pigs until you have good air defense
And it's got a degree.
From what I've seen from lunar landing footage and descriptions of the lunar surface, I have about a pound of material that would make a great substitute. It's caked on my video card and motherboard inside my computer case. I'll just scoop it up into a ziplock back and mail it to NASA. Perhaps if the other two million Slashdot readers can empty theirs as well, they would have enough to complete their mission. Where should we mail this stuff to?
-- Stu
/. ID under 2,000. I feel old now.
In the erarly days of UK Channel 4 they had a documentary on the "faking" of the moon landings. For the first two segments they brought on all sorts of conspiracy theorists who showed photos of the landing and explained why the lighting and shadows just couldn't fall the way they did, how features were in front of "registration marks" etc.; pretty much the same arguments you hear nowadays.
:-)
The third segment was the memorable one, though. They brought on someone from NASA to refute their claims. Not an astronaut. Not a scientist. An airbrush artist from their "Educational Outreach" initiative.
He looked at all their "proof" and said "I airbrushed every one of those photos for distribution around US Schools in the 1970s, and the airbrushed versions are the ones that have been doing the rounds in the Public Domain ever since. I put the detail into that boot sole. I joined two photos together there, which is why you see that rock twice..." And so on.
Basically he said "If you lot hadn't been too cheapskate to pay $10 for copies from the original negatives instead of analysing non-scientific publicity materials this conspiracy theory would never have started."
That documentary was over 20 years ago now, yet still the theories continue.