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China Aims To Build World's Largest Rocket
hackingbear writes "Back in March, China revealed it is studying the feasibility of designing the most powerful carrier rocket in history for making a manned moon landing and exploring deep space, according to Liang Xiaohong, vice head of the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology. The rocket is envisaged to have a payload of 130 tonnes, five times larger than that of China's current largest rocket. This rocket, if built, will eclipse the 53 tonne capacity of the planned Falcon 9 Heavy from SpaceX. It will even surpass the largest rocket ever built, the 119-tonne Saturn V. China's next generation rocket Long March 5, currently scheduled to debut in 2014, has a payload capacity of 25 tonnes to LEO."
Trying to compensate for something China?
Anyone know the cost/weight? Absolute capacity is nice but dammit I'm not getting my trip to moon at these prices.
What's the point ? All you can do on the moon is walk around, and then leave again.
a rocket so big that it's cheaper to launch the Earth in the other direction.
SpaceX and NASA are studying the possibility of a 150 ton payload class heavy lift launcher, based on SpaceX Falcon technology. NASA Studies Scaled-Up Falcon, Merlin
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
that's made in China.... is funding this rocket
http://www.moonsociety.org/whitepapers/moonreturn_positionpaper.html
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
will the fireworks be visible from the other side of the Pacific?
A Soviet design or a US design?
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Kind of reminds me of Obama's state of the union 2011. The new "sputnik moment may not be that far off... can you say "permanent self-sufficient moonbase", and maybe with a good deal of ingenuity and ambition a dockyard for deep space exploration using moon resources?
If they actually manage to pull such a feat despite naysayers just watch the US struggle to catch up.
Been there, done that. The place sucks.
Signed,
The USA
PS. Go to Mars and you'll impress us you nouveau riche assholes.
We now get rid of 2000 dissidents one time!
This is not about a paid moon trip but about a states ambitions to power itself from a backwater nation to a world power.
So money is not counted in a way that makes sense on a small individual scale. It is not like if the claim is made that it costs 1 billion dollar that Bill Gates could buy 6 rocket developments. And as to what it is worth. Well, what is GPS worth? The US launched it with tax payers money and the research leading up to it also was payed by the tax payer, but at what total cost and for what total benefit? Even foreign benefit?
The press likes to print big numbers because simple people think money at this level still is real. But government has one advantage business doesn't have. It gets to take back a lot of your salary right at the start and then often also a large portion whenever you spend. So even a simple salary isn't exactly the same as it is for normal business.
Suffice it to say, a lot, no it won't break China's bank and no, you can't fly on it. But the real cost to the US will be that China has a manned space program and the US won't. And that is something the Chinese might find very amusing.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Cheaper than on the Moon? Using Phlebotinum I presume?
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
The Soviet Union and the United States wanted orbiting spy space stations. The manned space programs stagnated when unmanned spy satellites became feasible. Notice the United States had more advanced IC technology.
JFK's 'because it is there' was just a giant cover. Politicians were smarter back in those days.
and how many China astronauts will die in testing and how much will be covered up
Of course, just like the first race for the moon, much of this is about national pride, so maybe the Chinese want the biggest booster just for bragging rights. Some things never change.
Why is Snark Required?
Could this be China's final solution to its population crisis?
Life's a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
Not enough.
They had to have a project to use the money they saved from the (now illegal) time machine program..
-- Don't call me "Sir," I increase entropy for a living!
The Soviet Union produced th biggest rocket ever, bigger than any the US ever produced (and bigger than SpaceX's new "biggest ever"). Financing its space race in competition with the US was the final stroke that killed the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, the US is devolving launches into what will be a healthy industry serving global customers, but by US rules.
I like the way this story looks to develop. Because I'm an American who wants to beat China in a race that takes us all into space.
--
make install -not war
One small bolt at at time when I shop at Wal-tar-depot. How about you?
I really hope they set a new benchmark in lift efficiency. However I must admit I have a guilty pleasure of hoping to see some great new footage of an unmanned rocket failing spectacularly.
China's space program makes pronouncements like this all the time, but they don't yet have the ability to make things like this happen. Heck, just the other day personnel from China's aerospace organization said that they were confounded by SpaceX's price/kg and unable to compete with it:
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=space&id=news/asd/2011/04/15/11.xml&headline=China%20Great%20Wall%20Confounded%20By%20SpaceX%20Prices
Heck, SpaceX has designs for both 125 and 140 tonne vehicles, but it doesn't mean it plans on building them before it makes economic sense.
Your anti-Asian racist comment will not bring you or your country very far in the post-2012 new age.
Looks like someone wants to reverse a widely-held Asian stereotype.
It's funny hearing snide comments from USA.
While your using Russian rockets because you don't have any yourself!
Twats
Viva el Consumismo!
Besides, you have to ask yourself what kind of product you would be able to manufacture locally, that would benefit from electricity, and clean energy, and where the profit would pay for the huge setup and shipping costs.
Most likely, this product can be replaced by something that's a little easier to make - in China.
I am very glad that you are so supportive of the space conquering efforts of our new/old Chinese overlords.
There will a special place in the "consuming lines" for you and your progeny once everything starts being imported from the People's Republic of Yueliang.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
The Russians announced a feasibility study into the development of a 130-150 ton version of the Rus-M back in 2009.
The Chinese have been talking about a 130 ton version of the Long March since 2009 as well. None of this is news to those of us who follow space programs outside the US.
Today, like in the 1960's, there is no US lead. Both Russia and China are working a next gen systems to compete with anything out of SpaceX, and both the Russian and Chinese programs are very well funded now so this is not like the 1990's where the Russians were launching stuff on a shoestring budget and held together with duct tape.
... to travel back in time! :D :D
...to get the last humans to Utopia!
The USA plans to make the world's largest crater. :P
Mars is a one way / long term trip with a lot of stuff that needs to be worked on. Even for 1 way you need to have a lot stuff worked out so people are just not stuck there to die if things go wrong.
In manufacturing, there is something called the "learning curve". As you run a production line and optimize how you do things, you learn to do it faster and cheaper. But one thing Boeing learned is production below 2 units a month did not produce a learning curve. People were not doing the tasks often enough, and *forgot* between repetitions when they were more than two weeks apart.
For a conventional rocket that climbs from the ground, they all have the same amount of atmosphere to push through. The drag is produced per square meter of frontal area, so you want a certain amount of mass of rocket per unit area to keep the drag losses within reason. That's why most rockets are around 50-100m tall. Once drag is taken care of, you get more efficient by going closer to spherical tanks. So rockets tend to get fatter once they are tall enough.
So at the lower payload limit you are bound by efficient shape for the rocket, and at the upper limit you want to launch often enough to learn from experience. In between will be the optimal size for lowest launch cost.
Russians have Energia - a 100 ton payload rocket which they have successfully used in the 80's. That rocket had two more variants, with more side boosters. The heaviest one (8 boosters) was capable to lift 200 tons into low Earth orbit, but was never used.
As everyone knows, if you don't have a big penis, the second-best substitute is a big rocket.
There are no problems in China, so China's leaders needed something to do.
...from all those instructional videos from 1950s about living on Mars - weren't there supposed to be domes over human habitations for first couple of generations anyway?
You know, radiation or no radiation, Mars ain't exactly t-shirt and shorts climate.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
SpaceX has absolutely no credibility in the current discussion. They've never launched anything of note. Why the left feels obligated at hand the manned space program over to a billionaire hobbyist on a lark, I'll never know. But congress has put a stop to it. All we need is for the GOP to win back the Presidency from the Bolsheviks and the US can set matters right.
an ill wind that blows no good
Besides, you can't fix overpopulation by going to Mars. How many people are born on Earth every minute, and how many could you realistically send to Mars ? Not enough to make a difference.
Did people living in USA and Australia today all come from Europe? Are those two technologically advanced countries?
Colonization is not about exodus, you know? It is about populating an area, preferably one rich in exploitable resources.
Also, there is nothing really there to fix regarding overpopulation. You know... kinda the way nothing needs fixing about unicorns.
But you know what there is on Mars? A basket.
Not really big one, not really safe one... but a spare basket none the less. And one that we could spit-shine into a much better basket with a bit of elbow-grease.
And then we would have two really nice baskets - plus all the basket spit-shining tech we came up with in the process.
Just all the Hobbit-tech (there and back again) is worth the trip or two, not to mention A WHOLE FUCKING PLANET for us.
And by us, I mean us. Not you. You just lost your chance. Along with your Nazi friends you will have your face melted off while we go to Mars and beyond.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
China has a lot of problems that need solving, yet like Korea or Iran they spend tons of money on all this grandstanding and demonstration of useless technology or military applications.
I'd be more impressed if they could feed their people real food instead of distilled garbage water garnished with shredded plastic bags for 'soup', than some huge rocket that has nowhere to go and nothing to do.
This self-induced energy poverty is bullshit. We're no longer rich enough to indulge that sort of nonsense.
I stupidly misread the title and thought it said "Africa plans to build world's largest rocket", but that would be just ridiculous. Even though blacks are just as intelligent as the Chinese, apparently. The TV said so.
Are your children going to thank you when they are living in a third world country?
China should go to Mars. U.S.S.R. was first to be in space., U.S.A., was first man on moon, etc.. China should concentrate on Mars. However that may not be feasible, considering all of their technical achievements have been accomplished via stolen documents from hacked computers around the world.