back then it were large ships. Today the issue is building large Starships. How many would we need to move several millions people and various equipment to Mars. May be not ice - though ice should work if building in space (or on the Moon). And ice can be oxidizer if aluminum is used as fuel, so you just burn your ship. For building on Earth - something cheap and easy to shape. Say 3D sinter-printering from sand.
jimnotgym 8 hours ago [-]
Interestingly concrete yachts are a thing. Ferro-cement is the term, but it is just reinforced concrete. You can buy very large yachts for small amounts of money with yachts made this way in the 70s.
Insurance can be tricky for no really good reason
ofalkaed 5 hours ago [-]
>Insurance can be tricky for no really good reason
It is very expensive to prove a ferro hull to be sound, which is a requirement for getting insurance.
davidjade 5 hours ago [-]
Except the steel armature inside can turn to hidden rust and if you do something and crack the ferro hull they can be a total loss. A lot were home built so finding a quality build is another issue.
You could do that today for cargodrone boats sintering or epoxy glueing beachsand?
sandworm101 7 hours ago [-]
Or melt the sand and form it into long strips, fibers, then glue the fibers together in some sort of glass-fiber-epoxy type material. Get the patent done quick because that sounds viable imho.
margalabargala 6 hours ago [-]
Glass fiber? Ridiculous, that'll never work.
cwillu 3 hours ago [-]
Imagine if someone tried making a sub from that, and then it delaminated lol
ninalanyon 7 hours ago [-]
Was this created by AI and not proofread or created by a human and not proofread? The paragraph relating to the Musgraves taking over a factory is repeated and it reads rather oddly.
Anyway, regardless of that nitpick, it was an interesting read.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pykrete
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Habakkuk
Insurance can be tricky for no really good reason
It is very expensive to prove a ferro hull to be sound, which is a requirement for getting insurance.
There’s a reason insurance won’t touch them.
Anyway, regardless of that nitpick, it was an interesting read.