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China Plans Superheavy Rocket, Ups Reliability
hackingbear writes: China is conducting preliminary research on a super-heavy launch vehicle that will be used in its manned missions to the moon. Liang Xiaohong, deputy head of the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology, disclosed that the Long March-9 is planned to have a maximum payload of 130 tons and its first launch will take place around 2028, comparable to U.S.'s SLS Block II in terms of capability and likely beating its schedule. The China National Space Administration has started preliminary research for the Mars exploration program and is persuading the government to include the project into the country's space agenda, according to Tian Yulong, secretary-general of the administration. Separately, China's Long March series of rockets completed its 200th flight on Dec 7. It took 37 years for the Long March series to complete their first 100 flights, but only 7 years for the second 100 flights. In addition, the programclaims (link in Chinese) a success rate of 98%, on par with E.U.'s and beating U.S.'s 97% and Russia's 93% success rates.
Although China is no more my country, I was born there. As an ethnic Chinese I understand the Chinese mentality --- that in this "space race" thing China's stance is to take one firm step at a time, no matter what others are doing
And it is evidenced in China's approach on its space program so far. China always takes its own sweet time in launching whatever they have launched. They seemed to be in no hurry at all and they seemed to be oblivious to whatever others are doing
The Japanese have launched space mission to collect comet dust
The Europeans have landed a probe on a comet
The Americans have been to many corners of the Solar System, with two of its space crafts actually outside of the perimeter already
Even the Indians have sent their space craft, and as we speak, speeding closer and closer towards planet Mars
China? Well... They tried once to hitch a hike on a Russian mission to Mars but that thing failed miserably. After that, no more mission until China can send one up by their own
So far, China prefers to stick to their space station mission and their moon mission. Nothing else matter
That's the Chinese way of doing things - gonna learn to crawl before learning to walk before learning to run
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Oh, and it also helps to have a government heavy with former engineers, rather than former lawyers.
Last I'd heard, the Long March 9 was so early in development that they hadn't yet decided on two options: either a LOX+RP1 first stage with liquid boosters, or a LOX+LH2 first stage with more powerful solid boosters.
Current Long March rockets, by the way, use N2O4+UDMH exclusively (save for the very first few, which used RFNA+UDMH). Very military design.
If you're not into rocket science, those are different enough that you can't just swap out the fuels. You'd be changing the engines, the fuel pumps, the tankage, the whole frame, pretty much everything. Normally this is one of the first things you settle. Car analogy: this is like deciding how many wheels to have when building a car. You can't really just throw another pair on there.
Then again, China's got the budget, they could design and even test both, then decide which is better and declare that CZ-9.
I currently live in Hong Kong, and I do several business trips to Chinese cities. I am not surprised that China is catching up in the space race, based on the general impresson of ambitious, intelligent and thorough workers. Indeed, they have not caught up everywhere (both as in the geography where there is a divide - but closing, and as in product categories), but it is obvious that China will only get more dominant.
A lesson for western countries (I am European btw) may be to increase school quality. Schools in HK and China can be VERY high in quality (perhaps pushing the kids too far), andI learned twice already from chinese expats in the west that their kids found the supposedly excellent local western schools too simple. Eduation is investment in the future, and I notice that China does that well.
Meanwhile, when I go back to Europe every half a year, I am saddened by the general lack of ambition. People tend to wait for th e government to do something for them. Over here, people are much more ambitious and enterprising.
I came from China, landed on the US soil as a refugee
When I left China I was in my mid teen. The last school I attended in China (regular school) was something equivalent of a junior-high of the United States, and at the time I left, China's society was in a totally chaotic state, and the schools I attended were also upside down in terms of "teaching/learning"
But still, when I landed on the US soil, at first I was enrolled in an American high school (I knew almost nothing in English, except the A-Z alphabet and simple "Yes/No/Thank you") but when it came to math, it was, to me, totally ridiculous
In the American high school the math they were doing I did it in my primary school, in my 3rd and 4th year, as a matter of fact
After I got my English straightened out, I got into a community college, and even then, in the freshman and sophomore years (the first two years of my university life I studied in community college) the math they taught there was still lower than what I had (in "junior high") back in China, and I ain't talking about simple business math course either, as I was aiming for a science stream, so the math courses I was taking were things like Calculus, Advanced Calculus, and so forth
And yes, that was back in the 1970's, and even back then, the school standard of the United States was already lower than that of China
Today, the gap between the school standard in Asia, specifically those in Korea, China, Singapore, Japan and that of the West, specifically the U. S. of A. has grown wider, much wider
If the West do not improve, in a generation or two (give or take 50 years) Asia will lead the world in Science and Math
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Are we talking about plastic molds, or high technology? I'm pretty sure my last "Chinese CPU" had "diffused in Germany" written on it.
Let me know how this cheap this "cheap Chinese manufacturing" turns out to be once their labor costs rise anywhere near American or European levels.
Ezekiel 23:20
This is going to go the same way as those maglev trains that everyone thought were so unbuildable and theoretical until the Chinese just went out and built one. Now you folks have high-speed testing underway in Yamanashi for the next generation maglev Shinkansen.
Meanwhile in California, they're still filing lawsuits over the route for the new conventional-tracked high speed rail.