I ask you to build tractors, but you build rockets?

Before launch, Lin Ju solicited opinions internally and decided on the coating of the first rocket.

The final top three were decided in three colors: the main ones were silver, white, and dark blue.

Silver was the first to be eliminated.

The reason is unknown, but it is said that the boss personally passed the pass.

When Lin Ju saw the imaginary picture of the silver paint, he immediately felt a little bad. If he didn't look at the upper stage, this would be a starship!

The diameters are about the same, the heights are about the same, and the thrust is over 7,000 tons. The last thing I saw in my previous life was like this!

Although a person cannot be superstitious, Lin Ju still adopted the most conservative and traditional white paint in order to avoid going on a voyage to another world.

The white color looks larger, which makes Xinyuan No. 3 taller and taller.

10:55 a.m., 5 minutes countdown.

Next to Xiao Gangtian stood Zhang Chuanyong. Instead of taking the VIP seats at the launch center, they chose to find a good place on the beach.

Zhang Chuanyong glanced at the dense crowd on the beach with a red face, and couldn't help but said:

"If we were still in the island country, I'm afraid we would never see so many people so enthusiastic about rocket launches in our lifetime!"

Xiao Okada: "It's not that people are not enthusiastic about rocket launches, but that JAXA does not have the ability to build giant rockets. Maybe they are right. Small countries are destined to miss giant things."

Zhang Chuanyong: "However, the Yamato, launched 76 years ago, is still the largest ship built by Asians and the largest battleship in the world."

Xiao Okada: "Yamato was already lagging behind when it was born, but Shinyuan-3 is still the pinnacle of technology in the world, and even rice beasts don't have such a huge rocket!"

Zhang Chuanyong: "Fortunately, we are Chinese and we should be proud of it."

Xiao Okada: "Everyone in Asia should be proud of it."

The final countdown interrupted their discussion, and hundreds of thousands of people on the beach shouted together, filling the sky with their voices.

The launch center issued the ignition command, and the 19 engines began to ignite in sequence.

At the same time, the launch pad sprays water towards the bottom of the rocket. The amount of water sprayed in just ten seconds will reach 700 tons. They will take away the heat and the imitation launch pad will be burned out.

Three circles, respectively, are 12, 6, and 1 engines. From the outside to the inside, the two diagonal engines are ignited together. After the working status is determined, the program proceeds to the subsequent ignition.

There are 19 engines, a total of 10 ignitions, which consumes dozens of seconds.

On the beach in the distance, Zhang Chuanyong and Xiao Gangtian only saw a large cloud of smoke emerging from the diversion trough under the rocket after the countdown reached zero. It spread rapidly before taking off, covering the entire work station. area, almost covering 1 km of nearby woods.

If it was the first time I saw it, I would probably think that there was an explosion in a chemical plant somewhere, so that it occupied all the visible areas like a mushroom cloud.

But as the thrust gradually increased, the 19 engines exploded with a maximum thrust of about 7,600 tons. After leaving the launch pad, the strong airflow spread wildly to the surroundings instantly, dispersing the gray smoke and dust, revealing the white rocket body in the middle.

At this time, the sun has risen, but it seems that there is another sun on the ground that is igniting and expanding. For a moment, the brightness is equal to the sun in the sky or even more dazzling. People can clearly see the semicircular halo of the tail flame spreading like water. The ripples continue to spread.

Lin Ju has a strong feeling that if Xinyuan-3 chooses to launch at night, it will definitely illuminate the entire sky like the sun, with the intensity of sunlight.

Unlike Xinyuan-2, Xinyuan-3, which uses kerosene as fuel, has a bright orange tail flame. The long tail flame looks very clear and has a great visual effect.

Originally, the K380 was a high-thrust rocket engine. The tail flame was very thick, which was very obvious on the Xinyuan 5 series. However, the tail flames of 19 K380s were gathered together and actually became thinner in front of the 11-meter rocket body.

The tail flames of the 19 engines converged into an elongated cone shape, but it was still not as long as the 147-meter rocket body, which all revealed the oppressive power of the world's No. 1 rocket.

On the beach, in the launch center, and even in far-away urban areas, people can feel high-frequency vibrations through the ground, which is the roar of more than 7,000 tons of thrust.

Each of the 19 K380 liquid oxygen and kerosene engines can consume 1,130 kilograms of fuel per second. When all are turned on, 21.5 tons of fuel will pour out per second.

Each engine has a power of up to 24.6MW, and the total power of the 19 engines reaches an astonishing 468MW, nearly three times that of the Saturn V!

Xiao Gangtian felt goosebumps all over his body. A numb feeling surged from his spine to his brain. It felt like his heart had been ripped out by Xinyuan No. 3 and flown upward.

Before Xinyuan-3 was completely far away from the launch pad, the impact of the engine made him even think that there was an earthquake.

As an island native who grew up in an earthquake zone, he had no doubt how terrifying the impact on the ground was.

But even as the rocket took off, the surroundings were still crackling and shaking like constant explosions. The ears only had time to feel the rumbling for two or three seconds before they were filled with tinnitus.

Xinyuan-3 is rising like the sun!

He couldn't breathe, and the pressure on his chest was as strong as a combustion chamber.

"Miracles, miracles!"

He kept repeating Japanese in his mind, but what he blurted out was: "Long live China!"

Zhang Chuanyong was stunned and then shouted.

Among the crowd, there were two naturalized engineers who kept shouting for China.

…

Ma Yilong stared closely at the scene in the tracking camera. At this time, from the perspective of the ground, he saw 19 extremely bright orange spots burning hotly.

Just like 19 suns, these engines are as stable as the sun. Ma Yilong can't see any unexpected situation.

At the launch center, the space agency bosses were equally nervous, fearing that the tragedy of N1 half a century ago would happen again.

The main reason is that the Long March 9 that they have finalized the configuration also uses 29 YF135 liquid oxygen kerosene engines, which is the same as the B4 booster in the starship PPT drawn by Lao Ma.

Both have an 11-meter configuration, and multiple units are connected in parallel. Long March 9 is undoubtedly an extremely bold attempt. It would be great if Xinyuan 3 could test the water.

Now 60 seconds have passed, and all 19 engines are working normally. After half a century, the resonance has not destroyed Xinyuan 3 like it destroyed N1. The latter's condition is as stable as ideal conditions.

"First level separation!"

What is different from all the rockets tested before is that the upper stage of Xinyuan 3 is not all counterweight, the third stage rocket is, but the second stage rocket is actually equipped with four H240 engines, which can provide a total of 1120 in vacuum. tons of thrust, it will push the counterweight to the height of the orbit, then turn around and enter the atmosphere to burn up.

After adding fuel at this time, the separated first-stage engine still has a mass of more than 200 tons. It will rely on multiple engines in the middle and outermost rings to jointly brake and slow down together.

The diameter of 11 meters is too large, and the swing and deceleration of one engine will change too much. In order to enhance stability, during recovery, 6 of the 12 engines in the outer ring, 3 in the middle, and the core one can all ignite and brake. , only the outer two circles have smaller swing angles, and the main one relies on the middle one.

The 77-meter-long rocket body is also very challenging. In order to prevent the too-long rocket body from bearing too much lateral load, Xinyuan-3 will ignite intermittently at the very beginning of landing to maintain the vertical posture of the rocket body.

This will consume a little more fuel and increase the recovery time, but it can best ensure the strength of the rocket body.

Lin Ju fully believed in the engineers and the manufacturing capabilities of the system's B-level base. At this time, he was relieved and talked to Guo Shen.

Lin Ju: "Let's also recycle the Xinyuan-3's second-stage rocket. As for the four H240s, these four engines cost more than 100 million. They are too expensive and I can't bear to part with them."

Guo Shen:......

Although the cost of the previous second-stage rockets was high because most of them used hydrogen-oxygen engines, they only had one H240 at most. This closed expansion cycle high-thrust hydrogen-oxygen engine improved by Xinyuan costs more than 20 million yuan, which is more than 20 million yuan. K380 is still expensive.

It is really a luxury to use four units for the second stage of Xinyuan 3. There will be 16 launch missions this year, which is equivalent to throwing away at least 64 units of H240. This is more than one billion thrown out, and Lin Ju feels that it is unbearable.

Moreover, the hydrogen-oxygen engine burns very cleanly, and its reusability is very good. Lin Ju regrets that he was too aggressive before.

Guo Shen thought for a while. Since it was designed to work in a vacuum, the nozzle diameter of the H240 (vacuum version) was very large to achieve high efficiency. It was difficult to fit five units in, and even if they were inserted, it would not be easy to swing.

Not only does it require a new control system to be used for braking and recovery using four engines, but the swing angle is not large and it is difficult to control the direction.