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"People ask me how I do research for my science fiction. The answer is, I never do any research. I just enjoy reading the stuff, and some of it sticks in my mind and fits into the stories."
- Frederik Pohl
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| Lunocycle (Lunar Bicycle) | ||
| A bicycle specially adapted for lunar travel. |
A prospector's life is never easy. But prospecting on the moon?
| ...all the prospectors took bicycles along as a matter of course, just as they carried climbing ropes and spare oxygen...
The solitary prospector, deprived of his traditional burro, found the bicycle an acceptable and reliable, if somewhat less congenial, substitute. A miner's bike would have looked odd in the streets of Stockholm; over-sized wheels, doughnut sand tires, towing yoke and trailer, battery trickle charger, two-way radio, saddle bags and Geiger-counter mount made it not the vehicle for a spin in the park - but on Mars or on the Moon it fitted its purpose the way a canoe fits a Canadian stream. |
| Technovelgy from The Rolling Stones,
by Robert Heinlein. Published by Scribner's in 1952 Additional resources -
|
In his story Coventry, published in 1940, Heinlein wrote about a steel tortoise, a fascinating (and ecologically friendly) device that also substituted for burros.
If you like science fiction and prospecting, you'll enjoy Little Fuzzy, a classic story by H. Beam Piper.
Compare to the volplane from Blood of the Moon (1936) by Ray Cummings.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from The Rolling Stones
More Ideas
and Technology by Robert Heinlein
Tech news articles related to The Rolling Stones
Tech news articles related to works by Robert Heinlein
Lunocycle (Lunar Bicycle)-related
news articles:
- NASA's Electric Motor Scooter
- HyperBike - NASA-Supported Heinlein Lunocycle?
- NASA's Chariot Is Not Your Father's Moon Rover
| Cislunar Space And The Space Lanes of Golden Age Fiction |
| NASA Moonbase Update |
| The Solar Oberth Slingshot |
| 'If Anyone Is Watching Earth...' |
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Science Fiction
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'He had travelled the space-lanes of the solar system for the greater part of his life...'
'The dinner was excellent. It was completely vegetarian — grown in specially prepared gardens in this Moon base...'
'Telepaths had their sensitiveness enlarged to an immense range by the pin-sets, which were telepathic amplifiers adapted to the mammal mind.'
'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
'But he didn't get very far with it before another noise in his ear radio scattered his thoughts. George winced...'
'The vast spinning sphere of Factory in the Sky loomed above and ahead of us, gleaming white against the unfathomable jet depths of surrounding space.'
'And if it doesn’t work,' inquired Lazarus, 'what does that make us? Sunspots?'
'The Dillard people had performed a miracle and put all the works in a girl-modeled case.'
'Our study of your race has convinced us that you are not fitted to leave your planet in the present state of your civilization.'
