Chapter 758

As for the contest between China and the United States in the field of aerospace, there has also been a lot of discussion on the domestic network. In particular, there is a heated discussion about which is the best in Mars colony or lunar orbiting space station.

Put aside some remarks that are purely due to fart. Stock issues, which are black for black, or pink for pink, there are still many people who stand on the rational point of view for evaluation.

For example, the view of those who think that the United States is more ahead of the game is that the BFR rocket uses the most advanced liquid oxygen methane engine in the world, the maximum vacuum thrust can reach 138 trillion cattle, the low earth orbit carrying capacity is 4.6 times that of Saturn V, and all kinds of data have exploded Xiangrui.

What's more, the Mars colony is tens of millions of kilometers away. The transportation difficulty and the lunar orbiting space station are not on the same level. Naturally, the United States is better.

The view of those who think that China is more in the ascendant is to stand in a pragmatic perspective. In any case, an enclave tens of millions of kilometers away from the mainland, which can wait for a launch window in two years, is far less than the "near" moon.

Objectively speaking, the views on either side are tenable.

However, for the discussion of the orbit Engineering around the moon, the land boat did not pay much attention.

At least in his eyes, none of these discussions is meaningful.

In the short term, whether it is China's exploration of the moon resources or the exploration of distant Mars, it is certain to lose money. Whether it's helium and titanium in lunar soil or rich iron ore and methane reserves on Mars, it's still a distant cake.

Just like a few centuries ago, before the pattern of the era of great navigation was determined, no one knew whether the future of the colonial era would be in the Caribbean Sea or on the spice coast even further away

Even if the moon is really closer.

Of course, from an economic point of view, the whole space program is definitely losing money, but sometimes it can't be considered completely from an economic point of view.

At least as far as China is concerned, the benefits of space program in politics, scientific research, culture and other fields cannot be simply measured by money.

Taking the Moon Palace project as an example, as the world's first country to deploy a space station in lunar orbit, other countries can only sign cooperation agreements with China in this field if they want to participate in moon related scientific research projects.

For example, Germany, as the first country to reach an agreement with China on controllable fusion technology, naturally launched cooperative negotiations with China on the Moon Palace project.

According to the negotiation results, the Chinese side promised to reserve a scientific research post for the Max Planck Solar System Research Institute after the completion of the first phase of the Moon Palace project, allowing Germany to send a national scientific research personnel to serve on the Moon Palace.

In exchange, the Max Planck Institute of solar system will cooperate with domestic research institutions of China on projects related to the development of moon resources.

There are also countries such as Britain, France, the European Union, Russia and Japan that are in diplomatic contact with the Chinese side on the Moon Palace project.

For the cooperation requests of other countries, China also shows an open and cooperative attitude. Even in the United States, which is in a rival relationship, the Moon Palace has a place for its astronauts.

No matter at any time, the competitive relationship between countries is always relative, rather than absolute.

Although the domestic public opinion guidance is often "clear-cut", in fact, the international relations are far from the black and white as people think.

Even at the most tense moment of the cold war, the United States and the Soviet Union have reached many mutually beneficial and win-win cooperation in the research of space projects and controllable fusion projects.

Now the competition between China and the United States is far from the cold war. China, adhering to the path of peaceful development, has never taken the initiative to fight for world hegemony. If the United States is willing to cooperate with China on the moon space station project, of course, China has no reason to refuse.

Of course, the premise of all this is that the United States is willing to open its outpost of Mars colony to the Chinese nation, or offer its equivalent chips in exchange

At present, the negotiation between the foreign ministry and other countries is not well understood or cared about.

Diplomatic affairs, of course, are still the responsibility of the foreign ministry.

These trivial matters have nothing to do with the moon orbit construction committee.

What he needs to worry about now is more urgent

Jinling City.

Institute of space science and technology.

A conference on the construction plan of lunar orbit is being held in the conference room of the Institute.

The meeting was attended by the leaders of the domestic aerospace industry.

Including Academician Yuan Huanmin, chief engineer of aviation science and technology group, and director Zhang, director of Yuegong core cabin project, almost all the industry's Niu people gathered here.

He announced the beginning of the meeting with a short opening speech. When Lu Zhou came to the stage, he looked around the meeting room with a serious expression and said in a concise and comprehensive way."I'm sure you've heard that the Ares program in the United States has completed its first phase."

"According to the relevant details disclosed by NASA, the BFR rocket did not adopt the traditional Hohmann transfer orbit, but adopted the way of directly hitting the orbit and directly entering the Mars gravitational system."

As soon as the voice on the road dropped, there was a noisy voice in the meeting room.

In fact, before the meeting, many people had heard about it, but when they heard it again, they were still shocked.

All the time, the spacecraft to Mars uses the Hohmann transfer orbit, which is also the route to Mars with the least fuel consumption in theory.

However, the orbit is not perfect, waiting for a window every two years, and it takes up to 180 days to fly in the air.

If it is used to launch the detector, 260 days is not unacceptable. But if it's to send passengers to Mars, it's hard to accept.

Therefore, as the main vehicle of Ares plan, the BFR rocket aiming at Mars colonization chose a faster flight orbit. Compared with the Hohmann transfer orbit, the BFR rocket in this orbit only takes 30 to 120 days to complete the journey from earth to Mars, and has a longer launch window period than the Hohmann transfer orbit, and does not need to wait for the next launch for two years.

As for the cost, more fuel is needed.

On the surface, BFR rocket seems to increase the launch cost to Mars, but on the other hand, shortening the flight time means that it can reduce the life support load of BFS spacecraft and carry less fresh water, oxygen and food resources. From this point of view, the use of this more fuel consuming launch route can reduce transportation costs

Getting rid of the launch route of Hohmann's transfer orbit can turn this seemingly crazy plan into reality. In a sense, space-x technology is really powerful and terrible!

Looking at the conference room, the boat didn't speak, and quietly waited for the voice of the discussion to subside.

In this way, about five minutes later, a professor sitting in the conference room raised his hand and said.

"I have something to say."

Nodded to the professor who raised his hand, and the boat said.

"Please tell me."

Pushing the glasses on the bridge of his nose, the middle-aged professor said thank you to Lu Zhou, and slowly stood up and spoke out his opinions in a solicited tone.

"I think the successful launch of BFR rocket can prove to some extent that the chemical rocket has not reached the bottleneck as we expected."

"Maybe we should reexamine our development path. I don't deny the importance of electric propulsion system, but it may be too early to give up chemical rockets now."

Looking at the professor who got up to speak, Lu Zhou thought for a while, and suddenly said.

"If I give you 50 years and a billion dollars a year, are you sure you can achieve the BFR level of high-powered rocket?"

It seems that I didn't expect that Lu Zhou would suddenly throw out this problem. The expert was slightly stunned, and the expression on his face became a little dignified.

After a brief hesitation, he finally shook his head and answered honestly.

“…… It's hard. "

The BFR rocket has almost marked the peak of the liquid oxygen methane engine. It is hard to find a rival on the shoulders of giants.

It is almost impossible to surpass the United States in chemical propulsion system in terms of the current situation of domestic aerospace industry.

Even if it's boasting, he can't cross the sea.

The boat didn't say much, nodded to him and motioned him to sit down.

"Yes, as you said, it's hard for us to do it."

"Maybe there is still room for the chemical propulsion system to rise. By improving our engine technology, we can build larger rockets that can fly farther, but it is almost impossible to rely on this technology to gain an advantage in the space race, or even surpass our competitors."

"Therefore, it is our only choice to concentrate all our efforts to develop the electric propulsion system and maintain our own advantages."

After a pause, the boat looked around the conference room and continued.

"Although the BFR rocket has been a great success, we don't have to make a fool of ourselves."

"We may not be their opponents in terms of thrust, but we also have our own advantages! The advantage of electric propulsion system lies in the huge specific impulse, which chemical rocket can not catch up with in any case. "

"Some time ago, I have revealed that based on the propulsion system of Xiangrui, star technology is developing a more flexible spacecraft that is more suitable for the shuttle between low earth orbit and the earth's surface. At present, the relevant research has come to an end, and now it's time to uncover the mystery. "

After that, Lu Zhou looks at the big screen behind him and presses the laser pen in his hand.Soon, a three-dimensional conceptual picture of Xiaguang appeared in front of everyone.

Looking at the picture on the picture, Academician Yuan's pupil slightly shrinks, unable to help but stand up from his seat.

"This is?!"

Academician Yuan is not the only one who shocked.

Looking at the unique shape of the spaceplane, which is different from the traditional spacecraft, the surprised voice suddenly spread throughout the conference room.

Looking at the surprised Academician Yuan, Lu Zhou nodded with a smile and said.

"Its name is Xiaguang! A new generation of spacecraft that we have designed to go back and forth into the atmosphere. "

Sitting next to Academician Yuan and staring at the spacecraft on the screen, sun Yuanpei couldn't help saying.

"This design Can you do it? "

Four engines are distributed on four fixed wings with two axles, and only one main engine is reserved at the tail

This design is too messy!

"Technical feasibility demonstration has been done a long time ago, which is absolutely feasible in theory. As for the fact... " At this point, the boat pauses for a moment and says in a firm voice, "let's try and see!"