Nanoracks just booked a SpaceX launch to demo tech that turns used spacecraft into orbital habitats

[Hamartia Antidote]

https://techcrunch.com/2019/11/18/n...-turns-used-spacecraft-into-orbital-habitats/

SpaceX is going to launch a payload for client Nanoracks aboard one of its new rideshare missions, currently targeting late 2020, that will demonstrate a very ambitious piece of tech from the commercial space station company. Nanoracks is sending up a payload platform that will show off how it can use a robot to cut material very similar to the upper stages used in orbital spacecraft — something Nanoracks wants to eventually due to help convert these spent and discarded stages (sometimes called “space tugs” because they generally move payloads from one area of orbit to another) into orbital research stations, habitats and more.

The demonstration mission is part of Nanoracks’ “Space Outpost Program,” which aims to address the future need for in-space orbital commercial platforms by also simultaneously making use of existing vehicles and materials designed specifically for space. Through use of the upper stages of spacecraft left behind in orbit, the company hopes to show how it one day might be able to greatly reduce the costs of setting up in-space stations and habitats, broadening the potential access of these kinds of facilities for commercial space companies.

This will be the first-ever demonstration of structural metal cutting in space, provided the demo goes as planned, and it could be a key technology not just for establishing more permanent research families in Earth’s orbit, but also for setting up infrastructure to help us get to, and stay at, other interstellar destinations like the Moon and Mars.

Nanoracks has a track record of delivering when it comes to space station technology: It’s the first company to own and operate its own hardware on the International Space Station, and it has accomplished a lot since its founding in 2009. This demo mission is also funded via a contract in place with NASA.

Also going up on the same mission is a payload of eight Spire LEMUR-2 CubeSats, which Nanoracks ordered on behalf of the global satellite operator. That late 2020 date is subject to change, as are most of the long-tail SpaceX missions, but whenever it takes place, it’ll be a key moment in commercial space history to watch.

 

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https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/can-we-make-space-stations-out-of-rocket-parts

CAN WE ACTUALLY MAKE SPACE STATIONS OUT OF DISEMBODIED ROCKET PARTS?

SpaceX has already proven that it makes sense to recycle rocket leftovers. Now Nanoracks, another ultracool futuretech company partly responsible for the first batch of cookies soon to be baked in space, has figured out another thing to do with used rocket parts.

NASA was actually the inspiration behind this. During the Apollo era, the space agency thought about repurposing some upper stages into a space station (a lunar outpost in this case), a concept called the “wet workshop” or “wet lab.” Nanoracks recently announced that it will be reviving this idea because they see it as part of their vision of the future. Not only that, but this will be the first time anyone will be doing the metal cutting completely in space to make that outpost a reality.

“Nanoracks will be building a self-contained hosted payload platform that will demonstrate the robotic cutting of second stage representative tank material on-orbit. Never before has structural metal cutting been done in-space,” the company said in a press release.

How will they do it? For what is now called the Outpost program, Nanoracks has joined forces with Maxar Technologies, a space technology company specializing in satellites and robotics. Maxar is developing a robotic arm that will cut with such high rotations per minute that the metal will actually melt as it is being sliced—leaving behind zero space junk. Garbage in space has become a growing issue as we keep launching more spacecraft. Just one scratch can take down hypersensitive instruments.

The Outpost demonstration mission that will take off late next year is meant to prove to NASA, which both companies are partnered with, that the maneuver actually works. There will be half an hour to an hour for the robot arm to cut all three rocket metal pieces. The pieces will all represent different types of rocket upper stages, such as the Centaur 3, the upper stage of the Atlas V rocket. Nanoracks and Maxar even plan to beam photos and videos of the cutting process back to Earth.

Outpost will take to the sky on a payload adapter ring (aka an ESPA ring), which hitches a ride on the main rocket and launches secondary payloads into our planet’s orbit.

“Nanoracks is laying the groundwork for converting upper stages in orbit,” Nanoracks’ press release said. This technology could prove so important as both industry and NASA look to find the most cost-effective vehicles and programs that will bring humans to the Moon, and soon to Mars.

Between Outpost and possibly making habitats out of billion-year-old lunar lava tubes, there may be no space junk in our future.