, friends, come and see the Rocket launch! This time, the Shenzhou 15 spacecraft will be carried, which will connect to the China Tiangong Space Station, which is currently 400 kilometers above the ground.
What's the point of this? Isn’t China’s launch of rockets as easy as it is common? Successful launch is not considered a major news, or not, failure is considered rare.
, isn’t the pattern small? That's because everyone looks at it from the current level.
If everyone could get on the time machine, back 30 years ago, they would probably lament how difficult it is to go along the way.
So what kind of ups and downs have we experienced on the road to rocket launch? How did it develop step by step to the advanced level today?
History of China's rocket development
First of all, let's talk about the Long March 2 F Yao 15 launch vehicle that performs manned flight missions. Its reliability can reach 0.9895 and its safety can reach 0.99996.
What is this concept? Let’s put it this way, if 100 launches fail, no more than 2, and 100,000 launches will only lead to 4 accidents that endanger the safety of astronauts.
is meaningless to be self-promoted. Comparing foreign data, you will know what level we are at.
The Russian League Rockets have reliability and safety above 0.97 and 0.997; the retired manned rockets in the United States, such as its space shuttle , have basically the design reliability of 0.97, but their safety is far lower than 0.997.
means that this rocket in China is at the international leading level in terms of reliability and safety.
Some friends may ask, can the Rockets achieve 100% reliability? How difficult is
? To make the rocket's reliability reach 0.9999, the reliability of the parts must reach 0.99999999, which means that at most one part of the 100 million parts is unqualified.
No country can do it worldwide. It is not easy for China to achieve its current level. When China's aerospace first started, it was really called two words - sad.
Time went back to the 1980s, when the United States was busy building reusable space shuttles, which greatly reduced the cost of the research and development of single-use rockets. Think about it, it’s the same with
. How good is the reusable technology? Although it was a bit expensive in the early stage, it saves money!
But later, after two major accidents occurred in the space shuttle, the United States stopped the project. However, domestic single-use rockets were unable to keep up with the needs of satellite launches for the time being. What should we do?
So the United States wandered around the international market. When they saw that China had previous launch experience, the launch price was about 15%-20% lower than that of the international market.
So the American eyes lit up and discussed with us whether he could help me and launch my satellite over the sky. I won’t treat you badly after it is done.
Although in 1985, Chinese rockets began to enter the international commercial launch service market, the Long March 3 rocket, which had the largest thrust in my country, could only carry about 1.5 tons of medium-sized communications satellites.
And the US satellite had about 2.5 tons, and the existing rockets were definitely not good, so they need to be redesigned. But after thinking about it, I had to start with Changer bundle, which is the Long March 2E carrier rocket .
The rocket is based on Long March 2 as its core stage, with 4 liquid boosters bundled around it. Its low-Earth orbit carrying capacity is as high as 9.2 tons, which is completely enough to meet the needs of the United States.
But when we signed a contract with the United States, this rocket was still on the drawings and there was no real thing at all. But after 18 months of development, we successfully developed it.
was built, but we can't guarantee whether the performance of this rocket is good or not. However, the contract time of the United States is tight and there is no time to delay, so we can only force it.
As expected, in 1992, when Changer Bundle launched the US Australian Star B1 satellite, a failure occurred. The two booster rocket engines failed to ignite, resulting in the launch failure.At the end of
, Chang Erban launched the AoStar B2 satellite again. This time it was launched, but the satellite suddenly exploded and the launch failed again.
Later, bad things came one after another. In 1995, Changer Band launched the United States' "Asia-Pacific 2" satellite. Unexpectedly, as soon as the rocket took off, it suddenly exploded in the sky, and both star arrows were destroyed. The successive launches of
failed, making China's aerospace difficult. There is no way for anyone to tell us that our technology is not good! So I wanted to find a foreign country, but , , aerospace technology, was blocked.
even spent $130 million to order communication satellites from the US Laura Satellite Company. What happened? The United States has been refusing to issue satellite launch licenses, which has caused the contract to be unable to be fulfilled, and the money has not been returned yet.
After such a blow from abroad, if China's aerospace industry wants to develop, it can only rely on itself. So we kept laying out our skills, breaking through various problems, and finally welcoming good news.
On December 8, 1997, the Chang Er C rocket successfully launched at the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center. Two Iridium s accurately entered the predetermined orbit, and in 1998, Iridium was successfully launched for four consecutive times.
This was a very good result in the 1990s when space launch accidents occurred frequently. After the
rocket was fine, we started to build the manned spacecraft again. In 1999, the first unmanned space test spacecraft - Shenzhou-1 was successfully launched and entered the predetermined orbit accurately.
Afterwards, we continued to optimize and improve the spacecraft. On October 15, 2003, we finally ushered in a moment that was recorded in history.
was successfully sent to space by a Long March 2F bundled rocket, the Shenzhou V spacecraft and my country's first flying man, Yang Liwei , which marked that China became the third country in the world to independently master manned space technology.
In October 2005, Shenzhou VI carried two astronauts and successfully conducted multi-person multi-day space flight test for the first time. This is especially true for
space station . When the United States and Russia were building international space station , we wanted to join the study, but were ruthlessly rejected, but this did not overwhelm us, but instead promoted faster development.
In the following years, we Kakaka launched the core compartment, experimental compartment, and manned spacecraft cargo spacecraft , etc., and adopted more advanced technology, and the performance in all aspects is not inferior to the International Space Station, or it can be said to be far superior to that in the world.
, let’s give you a few examples. For example, the flexible gallium arsenide solar cell wing used on the Tiangong Space Station not only has an photoelectric conversion efficiency of more than 30%, but also has a power supply power of 100KW.
Compared with the solar panel on the International Space Station, the energy conversion rate is only 15%, and the power supply is 90KW. In terms of
power, the Tiangong Space Station uses the Hall thruster , which is equipped with a large number of chemical fuel engines than the International Space Station. It is not only more energy-saving, but also has a much longer range.
Another example is not long ago, six Chinese astronauts achieved the first "space meeting", which is a historic moment in China's aerospace.
before the Americans didn’t take us to play, but now we can play with it ourselves. The same thing is said, it’s better to have it yourself than to have it if your father has it!
ending
Looking back at the development of China's aerospace over the past few decades, how difficult it is to go step by step. The old saying is not to say, how can you see a rainbow without experiencing the storm?
It is true that this is true for a person and even more so for a country.
success is never achieved overnight, but must go through continuous failure, success, failure and success, and finally reach a level comparable to the international advanced level.
just say that, every rocket, every satellite, and even every part, behind this is the wisdom and sweat of Chinese astronauts, paying tribute to them!
