“Getting ingots back to earth might be a challenge.”
Nah not worth the fuel costs to even go after aluminum , silicon, and trace amounts of silver and gold, and even less REE in glass lens, and reaction wheel motors which could be replaced at a small mass penalty for indication REE free.machines. Laser lenses have micrograms worth.
Primary Materials Used in ConstructionBy volume and mass, Starlink V2 satellites consist mostly of base and industrial metals:
Aluminum: Accounts for up to 40% of the spacecraft’s mass, used primarily for the primary frame and bus.
Silicon: Makes up the bulk of the solar cell arrays.
Titanium and Copper: Used in structural components, plumbing, and extensive internal wiring.
Argon: Rather than traditional elements, Starlink V2 satellites use customized argon-fueled Hall thrusters for on-orbit maneuvering.
Every one of those main.elements are in the top ten in earth’s crust including titanium.
Humans have Sileach tech. That is silica leaching technology. We can use an acid like sulfuric , HCL or nitric acids and break any silica bond in any crustal materials at will and in bulk. This frees every metal atom in the silica matrix and the silicon itself. Every metal silicate forms soluble ions and also can be with PH adjustment precipitated out of solution at will or better yet using the vastly different electrochemical potentials of those solubles you can selectively plate out target metals in very pure forms. This means aluminum, silicon, iron , titanium, uranium all can be bulk solution mined from crust itself. We have unlimited HCL from ocean salts and nitric acid can be made from thin air the Norwegians did it for half a century using hydro power for explosives and smokeless powders. Huge plasma arcs make copious amounts of NOx which when bubbled into water forms very strong nitric acid. Again we cannot ever run out.
There is no economic need to recover any of the starlink materials zero it costs more to put them up than the materials are worth back on earth.
You are missing my thinking (right or wrong), which was repurposing those materials in space, having paid for refining them and getting them up there, possibly with a remanufacturing facility on the moon for Stalink upgrades. I would think the aluminum frames would still be usable, and perhaps the solar panels. If the wiring was sufficiently modular, much of that could be reused as well (certainly the DC).
Vacuum e-beam welding and casting would be obviously easier in space. I don't know for certain, but I'm guessing people living in high orbit would not do as well as on the moon. Microgravity isn't nice to the body.