Chapter 428 Two-way transportation needs
Chapter 428 Two-way transportation needs
Director Ge couldn’t help looking at Kang Chi with expectation: “In fact, the main reason for inviting Academician Kang to the meeting today is to get a general understanding of your plan. One is to let us have a little idea in our minds, and the other is to avoid scientific research conflicts. Everyone should try to cooperate more and compete less…”
Others also looked at Kang Chi, wanting to hear about his “moon landing plan”.
After Kang Chi pondered for a moment, he slowly said: “My temporary long-term goal is exploration and resource collection within the solar system. The medium-term goal is helium 3 and second-generation controlled nuclear fusion on the moon, but I haven’t thought too much about how to achieve it. I plan to take it one step at a time.”
After hearing Kang Chi’s plan, everyone present was stunned.
Good guy, They only considered how to send people to the moon,
Others have begun to consider developing the entire solar system! Is this something their generation dares to think about? !
Director Ge coughed dryly after a brief moment of astonishment and said, “Let’s not talk about the distant things. You should have a slightly more specific plan for the first step, right?”
”Well, since we want to develop space, the first step must be to reduce the launch cost of rockets, otherwise we will always stay in the exploration stage of space.”
Li Xinqiang immediately couldn’t help asking, “Do you want to make reusable rockets?”
Kang Chi nodded, “Reusable rockets must be made, but reusable rockets alone are not enough. I plan to combine reusable rockets with space shuttles to achieve 100% reuse of the entire spacecraft.”
Space shuttle? ! !
After hearing this word, everyone’s expression changed.
As a representative of the American aerospace industry in the last era, the space shuttle can only be said to be a bit difficult to describe.
The performance is really awesome, and it is really handsome.
It’s just too unreliable.
The space shuttle of the M country has carried out a total of 135 space missions, each time it can send up to 7 people and 29.5 tons of objects into space. Even if it is viewed today, this performance is remarkable.
But two accidents, with a total of 14 astronauts dead, make the word space shuttle a little less “auspicious”…
In fact, the accident rate of 2/135=1.5% is not high in the field of aerospace, but two of the five planes exploded, and the remaining three had to face death in every mission. Are you afraid? In addition, every time the space shuttle returns at a speed of 24 Mach, it has to be overhauled. The actual cost of use is more than ten times higher than expected, which has completely deviated from its original design intention, so its retirement is actually doomed.
But Kang Chi now says that he wants to pick up this product that has been eliminated by the times…
It is somewhat difficult to understand.
And why do we need a space shuttle when we have a reusable rocket?
After a long silence, Li Xinqiang finally couldn’t help asking: “Can you tell me the reason for your decision?”
”It’s actually very simple. The space shuttle has an advantage that everyone may have overlooked.”
Kang Chi pointed to the top of his head, ”We used to think more about how to launch things on Earth cheaply and safely, but rarely thought about how to transport things from space.”
”The space shuttle has a huge advantage in this regard. It can not only bring spacecraft that have problems or are broken in space back to the ground for repair, but also transport supplies back when we develop space in the future.” ”In the era of large-scale space development, we can’t just use parachutes to drop dozens or even hundreds of tons of supplies directly, and then go to the big “Even if we throw it directly, at least we have to prepare the necessary return cargo capsule, and we still have to find a way to transport this return capsule back to space, right?” “Instead of using this uncontrollable and worry-free method, it is better to use a space shuttle to solve the problem once and for all.” “In short, I think the design concept of the space shuttle is fine, but at that time, the space shuttle was too advanced. Whether it was the technology or materials at that time, or the demand for two-way transportation in space missions, its performance and positioning were somewhat embarrassing, but as long as we can solve its reliability and safety problems, the space shuttle is the most suitable means of transportation for two-way transportation in the early stages of space development.” “Actually, to put it bluntly, the current reusable rockets are onlyIt is just a compromised and castrated version of it. ”
Li Xinqiang nodded, somewhat convinced by Kang Chi.
In fact, apart from the high maintenance and launch costs of the space shuttle, the biggest problem of the space shuttle is actually safety.
Since the space shuttle of the United States cannot be unmanned and has no escape capsule, every failure of it will result in death, which makes NASA, which is under great pressure from public opinion, have to reluctantly abandon the space shuttle even if it likes it.
If it can be replaced with unmanned, at least the safety issue does not need to be considered, and it is too easy for Kang Chi to do this.
Even if the old American space shuttle is directly replaced with Take the space shuttle, without any improvement, and just put a few robots in it to achieve “technological upgrade”.
In fact, the Russians later built a space shuttle called the Buran, which is more advanced than the old M and can be unmanned.
Unfortunately, the Buran only carried out one mission, and the Russians suddenly disintegrated. The Buran was retired after its first flight, which is very sad.
If the Buran could have more opportunities to perform, maybe the space shuttle would still have a place in the current aerospace field.
After all, the high maintenance and launch costs can be reduced through technology. Optimized.
As Kang Chi just said, his plan is to combine reusable rockets and space shuttles to achieve 100% reuse of the entire spacecraft. If this can be achieved, at least the launch cost can be reduced, and the remaining problem is the maintenance cost.
To reduce the maintenance cost, it is necessary to optimize the materials and design of the space shuttle. Judging from China’s current aerospace technology, although it is impossible to completely solve this problem, it is definitely not unsolvable.
It’s just that the investment in aerospace research is limited after all. Since the rocket route was chosen, it cannot be easily changed, otherwise It is very likely that they will not please both sides, and eventually they will fall behind from leading.
Now Kang Chi plans to start a new business and try another route to build a space shuttle, and he has sufficient reasons, so they seem to have no reason to object.
”But starting from the research of spacecraft, Academician Kang’s steady and steady approach is a bit too steady…” Director Ge said with a complicated expression, “I thought you would first find a way to send a few robots to the moon to build a base…”
Kang Chi smiled and said, “Sharpening the knife does not delay the chopping of wood. Once the space shuttle is built, whether it is sending robots or real people to the moon, it will be easy, right?”
”That’s true… Then when are you going to build this space shuttle?”
”I haven’t thought about it yet. I don’t plan to set a time node for myself this time. It’s so stressful. I just want to build it slowly and happily…”
”…”
(End of this chapter)