[Fred Hayek]

Interesting name. Any reference to an Arthur C Clarke novel?

[ClearCase_guy]

Rendezvous with RAMA?

[Byron_the_Aussie]

.. the Seed Craft would harvest material from the space rocks, then use this feedstock to construct propulsion, navigation, energy-storage and other key systems onsite ..

[varyouga]

Molecular nano-printing would allow a small craft to land on an asteroid and then convert it into a machine from raw materials already within the asteroid. Perhaps even propelled by some type of nuclear energy harvested from the rock.

The key is to prevent the machines from going out of control and building themselves non-stop...

[treetopsandroofs]

[G Larry]

45 years in aerospace....

No way this is economical.

[treetopsandroofs]

[treetopsandroofs]

[Pontiac]

The key is to prevent the machines from going out of control and building themselves non-stop...

The problem I see with turning an asteroid in to a robotic space craft is either unintentionally or intentionally turning the asteroid in to a kinetic energy weapon.

An automated robotic asteroid space craft could be hacked by terrorist and targeted at a city. Millions of deaths from space.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

What someone needs to do is put a great big giant 3D printer in space. Then they can have the 3D printer print out a great big giant asteroid. Then they can mine the asteroid they created.

This will generate a lot of money and create a lot of jobs.

[GraceG]

To hell with mining it... live in it to escape the socialist utopia of the future retarded earth...

[JRPerry]

Love this kinda stuff ... and it will happen one day. For anyone interested in the SciFi version, and it is very well done BTW, check out The Expanse. One of the best TV shows in a long time and, believe it or not it’s on the SyFy Channel. All about the feud between Earth and Mars and the miners in the Asteroid Belt. Really great stuff. You may watch it online, free of charge, if you wanna get a feel for the show. It’s fantastic TV. http://www.syfy.com/theexpanse

[DCBryan1]

If Ripley hadn't blown her up, we'd have a mining factory and towing vessel already!

[dfwgator]

Earth First!

We’ll mine the other planets later.

[butlerweave]

I watched Space 1999 , every week they ran into evil aliens out there , it’s best to stay on Earth

[SgtHooper]

The head of the project! Bill Nye.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

One of the more interesting asteroids is called 433 Eros. It is the second closest Near Earth Orbit (NEO) asteroid, about 34km x 11km x 11km in size. Data from the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous spacecraft in 1998 indicates that it could have as much as 20,000 billion kilograms of gold and more importantly, platinum group metals.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/433_Eros

It also has a substantial amount of aluminum, which while of little value by itself, could be used to create the mining infrastructure needed to collect and refine the more valuable metals.

One additional note is that, in addition to the orbits of the asteroids, a spaceship from Earth might also be able to hitch a ride on a comet, either from Earth or returning to Earth, saving a lot of fuel.