Building a Moon Base From Lunar Materials 1986 NASA

more at http://quickfound.net/

'This video looks at the testing of lunar materials as a possible building material for lunar bases. Released June 1986.'

Originally a public domain film from NASA, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.

The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization_of_the_Moon

Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Colonization of the Moon is the proposed establishment of a permanent human community or robotic industries on the Moon.

Discovery of lunar water at the lunar poles by Chandrayaan-1 in 2008-2009 has renewed interest in the Moon. Locating such a colony at one of the lunar poles would also avoid the problem of long lunar nights – about 354 hours long, a little more than two weeks – and allow the colony to take advantage of the continuous sunlight there for generating solar power.

Permanent human habitation on a planetary body other than the Earth is one of science fiction's most prevalent themes. As technology has advanced, and concerns about the future of humanity on Earth have increased, the vision of space colonization as an achievable and worthwhile goal has gained momentum. Because of its proximity to Earth, the Moon is seen as the best and most obvious location for the first permanent off-planet colony. Currently, the main problem hindering the development of such a colony is the high cost of spaceflight.

There are also several projects that have been proposed for the near future by space tourism startup companies for tourism on the Moon...

Structure

Habitat

There have been numerous proposals regarding habitat modules. The designs have evolved throughout the years as humankind's knowledge about the Moon has grown, and as the technological possibilities have changed. The proposed habitats range from the actual spacecraft landers or their used fuel tanks, to inflatable modules of various shapes. Some hazards of the lunar environment such as sharp temperature shifts, lack of atmosphere or magnetic field (which means higher levels of radiation and micrometeoroids) and long nights, were unknown early on. Proposals have shifted as these hazards were recognized and taken into consideration.

Underground colonies

Some suggest building the lunar colony underground, which would give protection from radiation and micrometeoroids. This would also greatly reduce the risk of air leakage, as the colony would be fully sealed from the outside except for a few exits to the surface.

The construction of an underground base would probably be more complex; one of the first machines from Earth might be a remote-controlled excavating machine. Once created, some sort of hardening would be necessary to avoid collapse, possibly a spray-on concrete-like substance made from available materials...

A possibly easier solution would be to build the lunar base on the surface, and cover the modules with lunar soil. The lunar soil is composed of a unique blend of silica and iron-containing compounds that may be fused into a glass-like solid using microwave energy...

In a turn from the usual engineer-designed lunar habitats, London-based Foster + Partners architectural firm proposed a building construction 3D-printer technology in January 2013 that would use lunar regolith raw materials to produce lunar building structures while using enclosed inflatable habitats for housing the human occupants inside the hard-shell lunar structures. Overall, these habitats would require only ten percent of the structure mass to be transported from Earth, while using local lunar materials for the other 90 percent of the structure mass...