Hackers! Burners!
Greetings from Mars.
More specifically, from the The Burn on Mars expo at Burning Man and Burn In The Forest (BITF),
I’m the coordinator for an expo travelling to several Burning Man festivals this year, starting with BITF, July 14-17.
In 2026 – ten years – the MarsOne Project launches its first crew to Mars, colonizing the planet. Humanity becomes polyplanetary: T-minus-Ten Years. The countdown begins! And yet… is humanity ready for this? Hackspace members have rare insights that humanity needs to know.
Collaborators Wanted
We want to present:
- Science: A “Science-World”-like exhibit of mind-blowing space science and tech that makes space colonization possible.
- Ethics: New worlds bring responsibilities that we’re not ready for… yet. Take the conch and help educate humanity using Burning Man as a bullhorn.
Specifically:
To the “Self-Replicating Technology” 3D-printer enthusiasts, especially @Lukeo, @SteveRoy, @KevMacD, @iMakeRobots, @Daniel_DeGagne, @InezG of the 3D Printer group:
LET’S COLLABORATE!
One of the tables, “A 3D Printer Printing A 3D Printer”, needs a 3D Printer guru to collaborate with me. I envision a few pieces already printed, a 3D printer pretending to print pieces but really whizzing back and forth just for show, and a placard explaining the role of self-replicating tech in a world where delta-V is a big deal. (We’ll be printing “it” THERE, not shipping “it” from Earth, especially because we can beam “it”'s digital plans to any planet in the solar system with ease.)
I’d also love to do a table on making PLA plastic from lactic acid. Mmmmmmmm.
More tables welcome!
Looking forward to collaborating,
Capt_Kükkee 
“The T-10 Mars Camp”, part of “Space Jam” at Burning Man
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Focussed sunlight can melt nearly anything, right?
So imagine an ultralight parabolic dish that unfolds on the moon and melts the dust into rock. now add a solar powered bulldozer whose job is to spread layers of moon dust over the new rock. layer, burn, layer, burn, until the base is 3D printed. bonus: the walls will already be covered with a thick layer of sand to protect against meteor impacts.
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This is one of the concepts that has been batted around for awhile now. And it has been tried and proven in theory. The dirt has a very high concentration of iron so it would make a strong bond. But it also contains even higher levels of oxygen so that means you get rust. I don’t know if they have developed a simple method for removing the oxygen from the dirt because if they could it would be a very valuable source of oxygen. Its one thing they really want to do though because then they could ship just hydrogen from earth and then combine to make water. As well it would be a source of electricity during moon nights.
Other problems that comes up with a dish or mirror is that the heating and cooling cycles on the moon place a great deal of thermal stress on the parts. Things not in direct sunlight drop to a temperature of -150C
Also include the fact that exposure to the dust is considered a risk to human health. Its very static, lacks any form of hydrogen so reacts to exposure. Has very very small but sharp edges because there is no wind to smooth the dust so would be very bad to breath as it would quite easily slice up your lungs and then enter the blood stream. Also bad for equipment.
Several more viable options have been suggested like melting the iiron out the produce near 100% pure iron buildings. Apparently at that level of purity iron becomes far stronger to what we’re used to on Earth. With no water to cause rust it would last practically forever.
Other suggestions have been created a cement type mixture with regolith as the base. You have the necessary ingredients in regolith to make lime. But how to get that out is the question.
The reason this idea has gotten some traction is that its one where bringing enough hydrogen from earth to combine with the moon oxygen is financially feasible. Or better yet now that they have discovered a possible source of water at the moon poles possible less energy needed then to send into orbit hydrogen.
Burying any buildings in dirt has been pretty much universally accepted as the best way to protect against radiation, heat and small micro meteor strikes.
As usual, Daniel and iMakeRobots - splendid. Thank you!
I need someone to help with a hack.
I want to have a 3D printer pretending to print another 3D printer.
I need someone to help hack some ineffectual printer behaviour: I want the print head to be moving back and forth, faking but not actually print anything.
Can anyone help out?
Hey @Capt_Kukkee
Very easy to do. I can lend a hand with that if you still need. Long as you already have a 3d Printer to use?
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Sweet! We put it together already, but thank you Daniel!!
Update: I’m happy to report some experimental findings at Burning Man '16.
I wanted to see that Markus Kayser’s results would work on the sand found in this desert, as it does in the Sahara desert.
It does!
Pictures and experimental findings at: https://www.facebook.com/glenn.kukkee/posts/10154637225445676
Next steps: I want to expand Kayser’s machine to
a) architectural scale,
b) robotize it so it can operate without human interaction,
c) robotize the setup and cleanup
d) collect intellectual property protection and encapsulate the project into a corporate structure.
Collaborators requested. Want to join the project?
Hi Daniel,
–are you the same person as the IMakeRobots Dan? I copied this note here, just in case -
Further to our discussion earlier,
I took Markus Kayser’s idea for a test at Burning Man '16, with great results:
https://www.facebook.com/glenn.kukkee/posts/10154637225445676
I’m interested in collaborating with you and the crew to make a prototype like Kayser’s, expanding it to architectural size. The eventual goal is to 'bot the boring parts. The implications are a self-deployable unit that can use only sun and sand to print buildings, walls, structures and the like. We’re on to something here.
Interested in collaborating?
–Glenn Kükkee
