User talk:Roleic

Re: Commentary on Seed Factories Book
First of all, you seem to be new to Wikibooks. Discussion pages should relate to the content on the page they are a tab for. Since your commentary ranged over many topics except the preface and table of contents on the title page, I have moved it to my own user discussion page to preserve the original. You are welcome to break up the comments and attach them to discussion pages for the relevant book sections.

Next, to the comments themselves, thank you for taking the time for a lengthy set of comments. I will try to address your points:


 * Systems Engineering

You are correct that it is heavy on the Systems Engineering at present. But that has more to do with the stage of the book and the Seed Factory designs. We need to know what the requirements and functions are before going deep into hardware and software details. I have every intention of doing the details, and building actual prototypes, once I have an idea of what needs to be built. There are areas I am not qualified to do design work for, and I hope once the framework of the concept is more developed, that other people with the requisite skills will contribute to those designs.


 * Automation

- Under Section 1.0 Potential Advantages, I say "We have identified a number of features of Seed Factories that we expect will be advantages, and list them below. More work is needed to prove they actually are advantages, and quantify by how much." Thus I say there is good reason to think integrated automation will contribute to making the overall concept attractive, but I cannot prove it just yet.

- The 85% figure refers to the "Personal Factory" at the end of Phase I expansion. That is a goal, I don't yet know if it can be met. One of the other design examples, section 6.0 Industrial Factory, will consider a more conventional high volume production scenario grown from a starter kit. That would be a more appropriate comparison to mass production of the conventional sort. The Personal Factory has different goals, that of self-determination and "job security" by owning their own production equipment. They are not in competition with mass production because they use the products themselves. Thus it only has to be good enough to serve that purpose.

- Re: What will they do the rest of the day? - I have been happily retired since 2005 (at age 47). There is plenty to do. Satisfying physical needs for food, shelter, and utilities does not meet all human needs. There will still be work to do.


 * Agriculture

I don't minimize the challenge of feeding people. It's more that I have not written much because I can't write intelligently on the subject. At this point I can only define the land and greenhouse space, based on caloric needs, with any certainty. I hope to find someone with an agriculture background to help with this topic. I know a fair amount about tree farming, because I used to own one, but that is quite a different subject than food crops.


 * Design is the real Challenge

Again, I don't underestimate the size of the design effort required. I simply have not got far enough in the analysis to say what needs to be designed, with a few exceptions. I disagree about sawmills being complex. There are many examples of "homemade" band saw mills. They are pretty simple devices. I don't expect to start with automated assembly. I expect to start with a conventional workshop, and some CNC type machines, hydraulic press, furnace, and foundry, and do manual assembly. Robots and automated assembly will be several expansion phases later, so the design work for them can be deferred. The goal is to eventually transform production, but I don't expect to do so immediately, it will be a gradual accumulation of improvements.

- Re: "just try to plan and develop something as simple as a table spoon for 85% self-reproduction". - Actually, the device I want to start with is a solar furnace. It consists mostly of glass mirrors and metal structure (plus some bearings and other parts). If the furnace can cast scrap glass into mirror blanks, and melt scrap metal for casting structural parts, it would be a high percentage self-reproducing.


 * Enough Land

Iron is 5% of the Earth's crust, or 50kg/ton, you used 50 grams, so your calculation is off by a factor of 1000. 300 hectares is the current estimate for sustained operation. Initial construction would require added land for example, for timber, depending on the stocking level of the permanent land. Tons of extractable lumber/hectare varies hugely by land parcel, but using southeastern US averages, there would not be enough for initial construction, so you would have to buy timber rights on extra land to get started. I expect the 300 ha figure to get adjusted as more details are developed, it is only a first estimate.


 * General Comment

The book, and the Seed Factory designs, are still very preliminary. I know things will need to be updated, but you have to start somewhere and at least make a rough estimate. Eventually the resource model spreadsheet will account for things so you know the system is in balance. The line item for solar and wind power will show a + value for electricity, and all the other items that consume power will show - values. For the system to work, the sum across all elements for the electricity column must be > 0. Apply that method for every other resource (steel, wood, concrete, labor hours, etc) and adjust the sizes of things until it's in balance.