You want the entire 300 million square meters constructed as one unit?

You know that's not the way the specs read on the opsite, right? It says aggregate structure not component structure. Still not impossible but I think you better be a little more specific on what you want. As far as lasers, chemical gradients, imprisoned free radicals and other fun - don't worry about it. Capturing the first snapshot of the crystal matrix was a bitch but its pretty easy after that.

No I was just thinking if it takes them 1 second to do a metre square, then provided they don't sleep/eat/do anything else and recharge 'quantum juice' instantly they might get it finished in about ten years.

I was more worried about wearing them out and the sheer number of elements that need to be produced.

Meridian,

Good idea, the only fly in the ointment is that every Nova I've seen open a warp gate, does it in a different way to what I do.

Just cos the media calls it 'warping' or 'warp gate' don't mean we all do it in the same way. As I'm sure you're aware. Maybe if some one came up with a machine that channeled the flow of 'quantum power' from the individual Novas. Or perhaps if someone was able to blend the talents by use their node in a telepathic fashion.

Thinking about it I wonder if Eric the Puppeteer could do that, he/they seem to have the right kind of mind. Eric, you reading this?

It doesn't work that way. It's not that exacting in the big picture. Whatever the size of the starting piece, it only has a kissing cousin relation to what's waiting at the quantum finish line. That puts us back to where we were - I need to know exactly what you want.

I get that you want something that can grow on its own. I did the science project on crystals back in grade school. But I'm not a chemical freak so you have to describe the structure if you want it done a certain way.

And its not one meter square per piece. Its 2500 meters square per piece. Unless somebody's having a really good and then it may be... More. Can you swing transportation?

If I might make a comment, as a new arrival to this board, a self assembling structure of this size is possible but there are a number of problems with it. If there is anyone who is overly concerned with S&T regulation I suggest you read no further.

A self-growing crystal array is a valid solution, placed in space to begin with. However, the rate of growth for any such structure is quite slow as there are few readily accessible raw materials for it to grow from. It must rely on ambient particles and theses are few and far between in the vacuum of space. For the size you require I believe a good estimate of construction time would be a little over eight hundred years

A series of automated robots harvesting asteroidal resources are a much quicker solution. With Jupiter relativley nearby, the moons and atmosphere can make useful resource bases. If you are in a hurry then the Io flux tube can provide an accelerated power source if harnessed. Of course, the programming required for their operations is of a complexity that makes it non-feasible for most who might consider it. This prject would operate on a time frame of a couple of years.

I would be interested if there is a way to make use of a device combining quantum abilities but I suspect that it would be a considerably more complex solution than either of the other two. Of course, any practical implementation of these solutions would likely be blocked by existing interest groups before the device could be constructed. Can't have people seing things they shouldn't, after all.

Cody,

OK, given that you/your friend could help out, what do you/they want in return? If I can meet the price then it might be best to have a face to face meeting to discuss all the details.

Mandrake,

Hello welcome to the mad house
You make some valid points about the builidng of said telescope, but I was more interested in your last two sentences. Who would block the building of this particular device and how could we possibly be seeing something something we shouldn't? Care to elaborate at all?

You mean in besides the entire Deadalus League owing a bigass favor?

Thank you for the welcome, it is appreciated. I will elaborate a little but only a little. I do not know any of the people on this Board well, and it is hardly a secured site anyway. No offence intended but I have learned to be a cautious individual.

Hypothetically, certain organisations with an eye for the long term might be interested in exploiting the vast mineral resources of the outer solar system. Making use of proscribed technologies they could experiment to find the means to harvest these resources and husband them against possible future need, say in the case of some disaster on the homeworld. Of course, they would have to have an intimate knowledge of all sorts of illicit technologies and be able to avoid notice by the those who police such things while they were putting their operation together. Any suggestions for this hypothetical group?

If you were to go so far as delving into wild conspiracy theories, you might wonder how effective such a telescope might be at reconstructing cross-spectrum spread discrete emanantions of coherent EM waves. Particularly, how well suited it might be to gathering such emissions from a great distance away for recording and decoding. Such a wild conspiracy nut might even wonder who might already know about these emissions and have reason to keep their existence secret for the time being.

I believe there was also an earlier mention of 'Reverse Quark Imaging' Although the terminology is unfamiliar to me it sounds similar to something I am more familiar with. If it is then it exploits certain aspects of quantum physics relating to string theory and particle entanglement. In that case, time's arrow would prevent it from being usable to view the past. That is something to be grateful for if you have ever considered yourself to have a single moment of privacy.

If I might ask a question of you what is that interests you personally in the field of space exploration and stargazing? My own interest is one tangential to matters closer to my heart but I am curious about your motives.

Welcome Mandrake. Personally I've always wondered how much of what gets talked about here is on the up and up, and how much is coded messages being passed. Sorry, I didn't mean to ignore you before but your take on the topic is just a little over my head.

Walker is the nova to talk with about somebody having fun in the solar sand box. He's tight with the Deadalus League and goes on walkabouts pretty often not to mention sponsoring toddler trip here and there. I'm just talking about some technical support so my interest in space is limited to having enough in my closet or looking up and saying, "Pretty."

Man. Don't make a dude feel stupid or nothing, eh Mandrake? Feel like dumbing that down for some of us?

Oh. Almost forgot.

Yeah a face to face is fine, Walker. If you think there's a way to arrange to transportations for the pieces anyway. I guess it will have to be a someplace in the states since I can't match your traveling style.

I just wish I could dirty up the boots on my space suit with lunar dust right now... -.-; It'd beat the headache I have right now.

Try watching the Three Stooges, Endeavor. It won't cure your headache but it will make you feel better about yourself.

Lemmy, that was the 'dumbed down' version. As for a more simple explanation still I am afraid that I have difficulty in expressing myself in any cruder terms. Communicating with those whose intellects are little greater than that of a baseline does not come easily to me. Trying to develop such skills is one of the reasons I am becoming active on this Board.

Walker, you come recommended as the man to speak to about space matters, may I ask if you or your associates are available to deliver packages to certain locations outseide of Earth's atmosphere? If you are then I might be able to offer suitable reimbursement for a favour or two.

Endeavour, may I ask the cause of your headache? If it is node/backlash related I would be curious to hear about it as these are phenomenon I am becomiing personally interested in learning more about. If not, then I apologise for the intrusion.

Cody,
Excellent, pick some nice public place near you and send me a private message, gimme a day or so notice if possible.

Endeavor,
Shame you couldn't make it on this trip, seeing how you got the ball rolling and stuff. If you're interested the League is planinng a little scientific expedition to the Eros asteriod when it makes it's close approach at the end of July this year, it'll be within a few million miles and with a telephoto lense you should get some good pictures of both Terra and Luna.

Mandrake,
A wise precaution, however there do exist certain programmes that can mask where your signal is coming from and fool the board into thinking it has logged your IP, as another precaution you could try sending from different Opnet terminals all over the world, obviously this is easy for me to say.

That may well be but I'm sure that they, whoever they are, won't miss a few million tons here and there. Just the other day one of my colleagues worked out that even a metal rich asteroid just 10.43 KM across contains more metal than the human race has mined in its entire history.

It's like a proposal that it's easy to mine water from Saturns ring system, true, but you'd destroy the ring system, few would back such a proposal because it's like vandalism on a cosmic scale.

Sounds a bit like the Teragen from the way you're talking.

Evesdropping on tightbeam comunications eh? Not designed the way this is, I'm afraid. Though one of it's uses would be for SETI.

My favourite conspiracy is that the Zushima macrobe is some sort of Nova sterilising device, this is a new one on my, if I'm thinking what you're thinking that is

I'll have to take your word for that, it's Oscar's theory and the physics and maths of his idea is a bit beyond me.

Might be nice though if you fancy watching Alaric sack Rome, or find out what the hell the beaker people called themselves, instead of boring re-runs.

As a wee kiddy, I always wanted to be an astronaut when I grew up and go to other worlds, now I can, how cool is that?! Less simply put, look at the night sky the next time you're out in the country, notice how you can see far more stars than when they're drowned out by city lights. Now consider what I can see when I use my nova eyes at full limit, I can see every star down to around magnitude 9. The whole sky seems crammed with stars, the constellations are lost amongst the wealth of stars I can see. Every patch of sky looks as dense as the milky way, seeing it like that every night since I erupted, how could I not be interested?

No weapons, no radioactives in earth orbit, otherwise sounds fine, I might even do it for free if it sounds interesting enough and you're prepared to share data.

Hey man, I know exactly what you mean. I check out the sky, I'm seeing gamma emmisions from Black Holes, radiowave frequencies bouncing all over the place, light in a dozen shades unimagined by nearly everybody, ranges of heat that blow me away, it's a total trip. I'm just not the lucky dog with the setup to be able to go traipsing along out in the big cold of space.

Ah, it's cool. I'm begining to like just watching. I can kick back for an entire day off and just look at the world.

I know what you mean, there's so much stuff that other people just don't notice, let alone appreciate.

For those that haven't already tried it I recommend looking at flowers in ultraviolet, you get to see the patterns that normally only insects do, even a pure white flower has 'landing strip' markers for it's pollenating chums.

Is that what those are for? Kewl. Yeah, just checking out a meadow is totally righteous. Seeing the windpattersn, the flow of the pollen, even the minute differences in the generations of flowers as they spread out. It's like being able to see time.

Re: Eros

Sorry, I promised someone I'd take them to Luna. Unfortunately, their soul is now no longer in our dimension. So, to complete the promise in spirit, I plan on taking the said person's ashes there.
Re: Cody:

Three Stooges? I get enough of that watching some of the patients. Fortunately in a month I will have a change of scenery as I will be discharged. That is, if everything goes well. I'm just glad now my head is fully clear for truely speaking my mind.

I'm not in any hurry to tempt vacuum. But, I'd like to test out my new spacesuit. Although I should check the design, before doing anything because I made it in a less-than-suitable frame of mind.

Oh, Be sure to send pictures! ^.^

Re: Endeavor
Do what you need to do. And don't insult comedy genius.

Re: Walker
On its way.

Cody:

Hey, don't get angry. I just see enough of it around here. I do like them. I really do.

If so then you are the only woman I have ever heard of who does.

^.^ They're funny, seriously. IT's amazing how much punishment they put themselves through. I swear, they had to be low-grade novas. O.O
But anyways, when you guys need it, I do have some gear back at the ranch. Walker knows the key code to Endeavor Point's storehouse. Although after you guy's lunar excursion and I get out of here, I'll be changing the code. Toodles! ^.^

Don't be touchy but is this the same gear made while... how did you put it... your frame of mind was less than perfect?

The stuff available has been verified and approved by several agencies. In fact, Teknokat did a lot of the debugging and checking as well. The designs are going to be available for sale soon from TKI, as well as shopped around to various space agencies. I assure and guarantee you the tech is safe and quite sturdy.

Not to mention I would not want to risk my friends lives on pride alone. I wouldn't have offered if I thought now that the stuff I created then wasn't safe.

Go ahead, knock yourselves out! ^.^ err... not literally mind you. >.<

At least you didn't ask them to sign indemnity waivers. That's a good sign.

I think...

No wories here.

Why should I have them sign off on my gear? I'm 100% confident it's safe. ^.^

Hell, if I was out of here, I'd use it myself if I was on the trip. That has to show for something.

Endeavour, I am always curious about new technology. How soon will the designs for the suit be available from TKI, and is there any way to order a set of them before general release?

They should be out in a couple of months, although if you contact the Aerospace division of TKI I'd be sure they'd accept an offer. The current "basement" of price is 1 Million dollars US. The price is sure to go down though. I'd like it for most novas who actually need air and pressure to be able to enjoy space.

And they do work as well, the first prototype was fine if you didn't go knocking it about. Even when knocked about all it developed was a little heat problem rather than catastrophic suit wide system faliure. The new design is more rugged so I hear.

That's one way to put it. :p :p

Oh this is going to make folks feel secure in their purchase...

Walker, rugged is an understatement. I've placed the temperature regulator in such a secure spot the suit itself has to be breached in order to damage it. Then... well... the person inside is screwed anyway. What's odd is when I changed it's placement in the suit, it became easier to service... Must be the application of the K.I.S.S. phiosophy. Oh, I did increase the grade of material as well. Hate to brag, but it could stop a bullet and still not puncture. Damn I'm good.

Errr... little addendum to that... only the Mil-Spec suit is that good. The civilian one is just tough enough to be spaceworthy. Don't want people to think they could buy one of these things and wade through a firefight. (Probably couldn't do that in the Mil-Spec either, one well placed armor peircing round between armor plates and it's over.)

I guess it beats making baskets as a way to pass the time.

Would have been fine if Mo had kept an eye on the heat level. Slaps Mo round back of head with frying pan making highly dubious gong like sound

n'yuk... n'yuk... n'yuk... A wiseguy, eh?