Manufacturing in space

i beleive a lot of it will be made from recyled materials, melted
down (likely by robots controlled from a central console, so one man
could be responisble for building a lot of thing). also, since the
first stations will be build in earth orbit, and only gradually will
they move out that far, there will be many stations building
different things. they will possibly use light sails ships to trade
between each others. slow but steady, and realtively cheap. the main
expense of getting things from china would be defeating earths
gravity. that will not be a factor in station to station trading.

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, Darren wrote:
>
> Omar,
>
> Ignoring magic and super tech (same thing really) there aren't a
lot of
> options. At first, in small habitats, you are not going to have
enough
> people to have all the skills needed to make everything a modern
> civilisation needs (wants), interesting question by itself, how many
> people/skills do you need to have a functioning, modern, hi-tech,
space
> based civilisation? You are going to have a need for skills that
are not
> needed down here and I mean need, not want, you can survive without
pet
> therapists but try it without industrial chemists.
>
> Here is a possibility, lots of robotics and 3D printers, things
like the
> rapid prototyping, add to that advanced bio-tech that allows you to
*grow*
> many of your needs. I'm not suggesting that you will grow chairs or
cars but
> how about plants that produce plastic or micro-organisms that
produce high
> strength fibres and so on, we have already started on this track
and I can
> only see us going further down it. Peter Hamilton uses this a lot
in his
> stories (not that being in a story makes something inevitable),
growing
> *coral* into a house as an example, the possibilities are huge.
>
> We may not need a huge industrial base to maintain a habitat, just a
> versatile one and of course there is no reason why a habitat has to
be a
> solitary thing, they might be arranged in clusters, joined or just
near each
> other, this would give you a larger base to operate from.
>
> Just some thoughts.
>
> Darren
>
> On 12/6/06 12:09 AM, "Omar E. Vega" wrote:
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > I have always wonder how the products of mass consumption will be
> > produced in space. Today, from TV and chairs to cars and lamps,
all