Great Country Academician

Considering building a planting center on the lunar surface is actually not just for developing the moon and testing the survival and growth of experimental plants on extraterrestrial planets.

When controllable nuclear fusion technology solves the problem of energy constraints, it is foreseeable that in the coming time, both industrial development and population expansion will usher in a rapid upward stage.

Although the earth is spacious enough today, as time goes by and the global population continues to increase, it will be a matter of time before humans expand into outer space.

Perhaps in the future, countries may develop more science and technology to allow the earth to accommodate a larger population. But the arrival of that day will only be delayed.

Moreover, the curiosity and instinct engraved in the bones of human beings will also drive them to explore more distant deep spaces.

As he said before, only civilizations that look up to the stars have sufficient potential.

The planting center on the lunar surface is also prepared for the development and colonization of outer space.

Especially the development of Mars.

Among Xu Chuan's stated goals, his idea is to completely transform Mars into a second home for mankind.

But this idea is too big and far-fetched, and there are many limitations.

More importantly, transforming Mars also requires Mars to have the conditions for transformation.

Although judging from the various data and information collected by current spaceflight, Mars does have certain conditions for transformation. But this is not 100% certain.

The real determination will not be known until Xinghai arrives at Mars and conducts a comprehensive survey of Mars.

If there are conditions for transformation, then he will naturally choose this route and will fully support and unite other countries to complete this unprecedented and huge project.

But if Mars itself does not have the conditions for transformation, then he will naturally have to consider another route.

For example, a Mars colony base or a Mars city.

In the second option, how to provide the normal living needs of the population in the Mars colony base is the most important thing.

Compared with the orbit and distance of the moon around the earth, the distance and orbit of Mars from the earth are completely different.

The moon is a satellite of the earth and rotates around the earth. In this case, its distance from the earth is basically fixed.

Even at apogee, the moon is only about 400,000 kilometers away from the earth.

But Mars is completely different.

If it is apogee, the maximum distance between Mars and Earth is more than 400 million kilometers.

Even light would take up to twenty-two minutes to reach this huge number.

Even at perigee, Mars is more than 55 million kilometers away from the Earth. And it takes more than ten years for perigee to appear once.

If averaged, the distance between the Earth and Mars is more than 200 million kilometers.

With such a long distance and relying on spacecraft to transport supplies from the earth, it can be said that it is almost impossible to achieve permanent and large-scale colonization activities.

Self-sufficiency is the basic condition for colonizing outer planets.

For Xu Chuan, whether it is the planting base on the lunar surface or the series of technologies such as carbon dioxide synthesis of starch and carbon compounds that are still being developed by the Chuanhai Materials Research Institute, they are all prepared for future colonization.

On the other side, the United States.

In a conference room in the White House in Washington, a meeting was being held.

After the Xinghai successfully returned from outer space, especially the accidents and easy escapes encountered during the return process, almost everyone who knew about it fell into silence.

Faced with this special situation, they finally couldn't sit still.

After convening his own staff team and senior officials from relevant departments, the elderly president clapped his hands on the table and said with a serious face:

"I think everyone here has seen the relevant intelligence information. Our opponents have shown a considerable degree of ambition in the aerospace field, whether it is the Xinghai or the legendary electric propulsion system. It’s a huge threat!”

"Especially when the Xinghai was attacked during the return phase, it was flying at a speed of Mach 12, which even a gun could not catch up with! This is even more intolerable for us!"

"I need a solution!"

In the conference room, CIA Director William Joseph Burns stood up and said, "I don't think the situation has reached that point yet."

Hearing this, everyone in the conference room turned their attention. With everyone watching, William Joseph Burns took a deep breath and said:

"For the maiden voyage of the Xinghai, the CIA maintained its full attention and attention, and also obtained first-hand data and information."

"Although we have not yet figured out whether the power system they use is pure electric propulsion or a combination of electric propulsion + traditional propulsion, at least we have obtained a lot of useful information and data."

"Judging from the data we have obtained so far, it is quite difficult for the Xinghai to escape the attack of weapons under normal circumstances."

Hearing this, someone in the conference room frowned and said quickly: "But it easily got rid of those two weapons that came from nowhere during its return."

William Joseph Burns nodded and said: "Yes, that is indeed the case, but it is a special situation. At that node, the Xinghai was in the stage of returning at high speed, and it still maintained at least Mach 5 or above The flight speed is even higher.”

"It is precisely because of this that it can get away from the attack quickly."

"But according to our observations and radar monitoring, it took more than fifteen minutes from the time the opponent started accelerating to get rid of the attack to reaching the peak speed of Mach 12."

"This means that the space shuttle's ability to increase speed is seriously insufficient. If a weapon is launched at close range to attack, the probability of hitting it is still quite high."

After a pause, he continued: "Of course, this does not mean that we do not need to pay attention to each other. I believe that after the Xinghai matures, they will soon develop air and space fighters."

"And we need to quickly keep up with the pace in this field and find a way to shoot down the opponent's air and space fighters!"

In the conference room, there was a lot of discussion.

After listening to the numerous discussions, the elderly president knocked on the table to silence everyone.

"I will hold another meeting to discuss this matter later, as for now."

As he spoke, he turned his attention to NASA Director Bill Nelson who was sitting in the corner of the conference room, and then asked: "How are you doing with the Artemis program?"

Upon hearing the inquiry, Bill Nelson stood up quickly and replied: "The Artemis project is going smoothly. We have completed the preliminary preparations and are currently completing the assembly and testing of the spacecraft, personnel training and other aspects."

"According to the established plan, initial manned space activities will be launched around July."

"I don't care about these things. I just want to know, can you complete the manned moon landing and return to the moon before your opponents?"

Hearing this, Bill Nelson frowned slightly and quickly replied: "Before manned landing on the moon, we still need to complete the testing of the spacecraft and at least one manned spaceflight activity in low-Earth orbit to ensure that the entire manned There is no problem with the moon landing project.”

"After all, we haven't carried out a manned moon landing on this type of project for a long time, and everything will take time to adjust and recover."

After a slight pause, Bill Nelson quickly added: "Of course, I believe this is only a matter of time. No country in the world has more experience in manned moon landings than we do. Even if they develop Even if the space shuttle is defeated, it won’t be able to catch up with us.”

The elderly president knocked on the table and continued: "Our opponents are already catching up with us quickly. If we can't maintain our advantage in the aerospace field, I really don't know how to face our people!"

"I need you to find a way, no matter what means, to ensure that we can win this space race!"

Time passed like this day by day. In early April, after the Xinghai space shuttle made its maiden voyage, its test flight data analysis was completed.

In Xinghai Research Institute, Xu Chuan also obtained relevant test reports.

On top of a thick stack of report documents, there is a brief version of the report of about ten pages.

While flipping through the analytical data of the Xinghai's maiden voyage in his hand, he listened to Weng Yunzong's report.

"From the analysis of data, there are two main problems in the maiden voyage of the Xinghai, which need to be tracked and optimized in the future."

"The first part is that when flying within the atmosphere, the design stability of the wing is not enough. When climbing to an altitude, especially after breaking through 20 kilometers, encountering unstable airflow will cause the balance of the fuselage due to the relationship between atmospheric density. Breakthrough design value.”

"This is mainly because we have no experience in manufacturing space shuttles and no flight data. Coupled with the altitude of more than 20 kilometers, it is difficult for traditional turbojet aircraft, whether they are civil aviation airliners or fighter jets, to reach the height of."

"So from a design perspective, there are still big flaws, and adjustments will need to be made in the future."

Looking through the data in his hand, Xu Chuan also saw the first flaw pointed out by Weng Yunzong. There were quite detailed tables, bar graphs, line graphs and a large amount of analytical data.

Although he gained a lot of knowledge in the aerospace field when he was in charge of the space shuttle project, he was not a scholar in the aerospace field after all. He can understand most general knowledge, but this kind of detailed data analysis is still a bit unsatisfactory.

But he didn't force it. After all, there are specialties in the art industry, so just leave these things to professionals.

After staring at the analysis report in his hand for a while, he raised his head and asked, "Does this problem have a big impact?"

Weng Yunzong shook his head and said: "It's not very big. It just needs to be continuously improved through flight data. It just requires a lot of wind tunnel experiments and related test optimization."

Xu Chuan nodded and said: "This is not a big problem. Aerospace Science and Technology and Aerospace Science and Industry have related wind tunnels. Find them."

Before he finished speaking, he remembered something, and then said: "Forget it, let's find Director Yang Han of the Air Force Equipment Department. Please ask him to help arrange this matter, and I will say hello. What about the second question? "

Weng Yunzong: "The second problem occurred when we returned."

"Through various observation and detection equipment, we confirmed that when the Xinghai returned from low-Earth orbit and entered the atmosphere, the friction heat endured by its fuselage exceeded the initial design expectations."

"The reason is that after entering the atmosphere, excessive speed and air friction generate a large amount of heat. This heat accumulates on the surface of the space shuttle and causes unexpected damage to the surface insulation materials."

"Compared to the first problem, this problem is much more serious."

"If we look at the current insulation materials and design, the Xinghai will need to replace the insulation materials on the outside of the fuselage every 10-12 voyages on average."

Hearing this, Xu Chuan frowned.

The insulation tiles need to be replaced every 10-12 voyages. This data is completely incomparable with the design expectations.

In the design, the insulation materials on the Xinghai can be used repeatedly for a long time. Even if there are problems, they should only be partial problems.

But now, this service life has been drastically reduced by a large part.

Although compared with the US space shuttle orbiter, the average data of replacing insulation tiles in 10-12 flight cycles is already quite excellent.

After all, whether it is the space shuttle orbiter of the United States or the former Hong Kong, basically all the insulation tiles have to be replaced after every launch and landing.

But for Xinghai, this data failed to meet expectations.

Frowning, Xu Chuan flipped through the report documents in his hand and found the data on the return of the Xinghai space shuttle.

It can be clearly seen from the speed chart that when returning, the highest speed of Xinghai reached Mach 27.46.

After conversion, it almost reaches a speed of 9.5 kilometers per second, which is almost close to the speed of the second universe.

If it is a sunny day with good weather and a cloudless ground, and Xinghai flies by at this speed, it will be difficult for the human eye to capture the image even in a wide viewing distance.

At most, you will see a black dot passing through the sky in a flash.

Even if this is only the peak speed at the beginning of the return to the atmosphere, and will soon decrease later, the thermal barrier effect produced by such a high return speed is still a great pressure for the space shuttle.

Although relevant situations were considered at the beginning of the design and certain mitigation measures and means were taken, it is obvious that the current situation still exceeds the expected threshold.

Of course, it is not unacceptable for a space shuttle to replace the insulation tiles on the outside of the space shuttle every 10-12 flights.

Especially since most of the external insulation tiles of Xinghai can be made into standard parts, the cost is much lower than that of a traditional space shuttle.

Considering the cost, these are not unacceptable.

But apart from cost, Xu Chuan also needs to consider another point, and that is: ‘safety’!

The excessive thermal barrier effect is a great pressure on the space shuttle, especially on the external insulation materials.

Excessive friction temperature may cause insulation tiles and other materials to fall off, thereby causing great damage to the space shuttle. In serious cases, it is not impossible for accidents such as the explosion and disintegration of the space shuttle to occur repeatedly.

The cause of the Space Shuttle Columbia accident was that the heat insulation tiles were damaged, and the hot air flow burned through the aluminum fuselage, causing an explosion.

And this is not the first time the space shuttle has experienced damage to its insulation tiles.

In 1988, the space shuttle Atlantis had an identical accident.

Fortunately, it finally returned safely. Because there is a stainless steel antenna just under the fallen insulation tile, its heat resistance is much higher than that of aluminum alloy.

For Xu Chuan, the safety issues of the space shuttle caused by the damage or falling off of the insulation tiles are something he needs to avoid and overcome at all costs.