Control.

Zhu Qiqiang reported, "The height is 10,300 meters, the speed is 207 meters per second, and the acceleration is close to 0, which is very stable." ”

Wang Hao nodded after hearing this, "Two hundred meters, it's about the same." ”

The speed of the light-pressure engine at 200 meters per second is already very fast, and the maximum speed they tested is 300 meters per second, but it is only the speed of lateral flight, and the maximum speed in the vertical ascent stage is 210 meters.

This speed is not fast, just comparable to a civil aircraft, but considering that it is in the process of vertical ascent, it is already very remarkable.

The light-pressure engine is already at an altitude of 10,000 meters.

From normal take-off to the present, in fact, it is only less than five minutes, five minutes is not much, but the light pressure engine is so big, it can rise more than 10,000 meters in five minutes, and it can also give people enough shocking feeling.

From the perspective of the ground live broadcast, the light-pressure engine has become a big bright spot, and it is like an extra sun in the sky, which is very shocking.

The personnel in the control room were not in the mood to sigh about any big highlights, or to compare the light pressure engine with the sun, each of them was nervous, carefully checking the data and pictures in the computer, lest there be any problems in the ascent process.

When the engine rises more than 12,000 kilometers, the monitor reports that it is certain that the deceleration will begin.

Deceleration, that is, reduction of power.

Reducing the power is to reduce the light pressure thrust, then under the pull of the earth's gravity, the speed of the light pressure engine will be reduced.

Under the power allocation of the control system, the internal program has been constantly calculating, but the factors involved in the power control include the change in air density due to speed, altitude, gravitational force that changes from time to time, and so on.

With so many factors involved, it is natural that there will be very complex calculations, and the control system needs to quickly calculate the results and fine-tune the width of the neutron channel in time.

In this way, the engine can be guaranteed to accelerate or decelerate steadily.

In the process of continuous deceleration, the light-pressure engine rose to an altitude of 20,000 meters in one breath, and the speed slowly returned to zero, and it was smoothly suspended in the air.

At this time, the bright spots can still be clearly seen on the ground, but the bright spots have become smaller due to the change in engine height.

"Now it looks like it's smaller than the sun."

"It should be the relationship of height, the height of the ascent stage was low just now, how high is it now?"

The host also appropriately introduced, "The test data released by Spacecraft Industry Company shows that the light-pressure engine will rise to more than 10,000 meters, but there is no detailed introduction to how high it will rise. ”

"However, our satellite calculations show that the height of the light-pressure engine is now about 20,000 meters......

in the main control.

When Mr. Zhu learned that the ascent stage was over, and the light-pressure engine was levitating at high altitude, he also exhaled lightly, and he immediately asked Xiang Qiansheng, "What is the next test?" ”

"Lateral flight!"

Xiang Qiansheng said immediately.

"Is there a risk?" Teacher Zhu asked worriedly.

Xiang Qiansheng didn't know how to answer for a while, since it was definitely dangerous to do a test, he didn't dare to guarantee 100% that it would be successful, and finally he could only say, "There will be a lot of tests in the next step, and we are still very confident." ”

The next step is to make a lateral flight.

The light-pressure engine is different from the space in high-altitude flight, there is no large gravitational force in the universe, the engine can directly rotate 90 degrees, so that the main nozzle is in the opposite direction of travel, and the acceleration flight ability can be maximized.

The current environment is only high in the sky, not in space, and the high altitude is subject to the gravitational pull of the earth.

In order to ensure the smooth operation of the light-pressure engine, its main nozzle should still be facing the ground to ensure that the engine can fly horizontally at the same altitude smoothly, so several small excitation thrusters in the center of the side are used for acceleration.

Small thrusters, the power is relatively low.

The small one-way thruster can only accelerate the light-pressure engine at a maximum of eight meters per second, and it is impossible to turn on the high power in the current test, and the acceleration of the engine is only three meters per second when the engine is in lateral flight.

At the same time, the faster the engine, the greater the air resistance and the less acceleration until the small excitation nozzle thrust and air resistance are balanced.

"At this point, the engine speed is about 140 to 160 meters per second."

"When the speed is stable, we increase the thrust and then accelerate to the maximum speed of the engine 300 meters per second."

"This is already the highest speed at this stage."

"If it's any higher, there's a sonic boom that can have a big impact on the engine."

Teacher Zhu nodded and said, "Indeed, safety is the most important, and it is too dangerous to have a sonic boom." ”

This is mainly because the light-pressure engine is a big one.

For example, some fast fighter jets have little impact on a sonic boom, but the light pressure engine is too large, and the tremor caused by the sonic boom may cause unknown risks.

Live TV footage.

While many people were still discussing the issue of the second sun, they found that the second sun began to move sideways.

The vertical ascent just now is just that the light point has become smaller, but now you can clearly see the light point moving when you fly sideways, and the speed of movement is getting faster and faster, and the light point is getting smaller and smaller.

After a while, the point of light was completely invisible.

The host of the live broadcast said, "What we did just now was an accelerated flight, and the light pressure engine is getting farther and farther away from us. ”

"According to the data, the test will fly more than 1,000 kilometers, and it will normally take about two hours......"

There is no point of light in sight at the scene.

Those who watched the live broadcast could only return to the engine and continue to watch the follow-up test footage.

……

When the light-pressure engine flies laterally, the high-altitude tests begin.

When the engine flies out of about 100 kilometers, the test content changes from lateral flight to oblique acceleration and turning, and the balance system is also tested in the middle of the process, and the operation balance system is also tested, that is, the power is continuously increased and decreased, and the internal energy supply and output can be tested to maintain a balance.

If the error of the control system is larger, the output power will be too large or too small, resulting in the inaccurate control of the engine by the system, which may become a big problem.

The most difficult part of this part is the internal calculation.

When a large number of variables are involved, in order to keep the output values within the margin of error, it is necessary to have a more sophisticated approximation calculation method, and the calculation of the system is done by the theoretical group led by Paul Phil-Jones and the mathematical group.

Because the calculation problem is very critical, Wang Hao also participated in the work, and the current test is also a test of the computing system in the system.

Wang Hao, Paul Phil-Jones and others have also become very serious.

At the same time.

During the various high-altitude tests of the engines, most of the live TV broadcasts were no longer available, because they were filmed around the town 30 kilometers from the project base, and the light-pressure engines had flown hundreds of kilometers.

Some live TV broadcasts still have pictures.

They used satellite observation methods, and from the perspective of the satellite, they saw that it was still a bright spot, but the picture was very blurry, and the role of the bright spot was only to mark the position of the engine.

Of course, there are also institutions that can see it clearly, because they use the military's high-end satellites, and they can also use several satellite images in time to perform very accurate calculations and output images.

At this time, in an office of the Hexagon, more than a dozen high-level personnel are looking at the picture from the satellite perspective, compared with the satellite picture of the live TV, the picture they are watching is very high-resolution, and it is very clear, the only problem is that the picture is not continuous, but can see the jump of one image after another.

These images are taken by several military satellites from different angles and then output by complex calculations by computers.

Everyone is serious.

The people here are high-level people who know very well how important the light-pressure engine is.

The light-pressure engine is not only a space propulsion technology, but a very strategic military scientific and technological means, if it can be used to create an aerospace carrier, it will allow the flower grower to have space supremacy.

Space hegemony is a new word in the past decade.

Before the rise of cutting-edge technology, Amricon's space technology was dominant, with the largest number of military satellites, the most complete space monitoring system, and the most advanced satellite tracking technology, among other things.

Even then, they do not dare to say that they have space supremacy.

Compared to the ground, space is too large, and all the technologies involved in space are very complex and very expensive, and every research will cost a lot of money.

They have always hoped to win the battle for space, so as to grasp the supremacy of space, and thus grasp the initiative in the future.

The significance of space hegemony is too great.

When there is space supremacy, it means that it has an absolute dominant position in space, and space supremacy can bring a series of deterrence and a steady stream of benefits, and can directly hinder the development of other competitors.

But it is too difficult to have space supremacy, at least to have unique space attack and defense capabilities, otherwise hegemony is simply impossible.

Aerospace carriers can be realized.

The light-pressure engine supports the manufacture of aerospace carriers, which are very large and can also achieve self-sufficiency in energy and provide a large amount of energy to other devices, in other words, they can support the installation of weapon systems.

Although mankind has not yet mastered the perfect space weapon technology, with energy support, there is already a foundation for research in the corresponding field, and the future can be realized.

The light-pressure engine makes people intuitively feel the 'space threat', and the top management of the Hexagon is very shocked, and at the same time, they feel helpless, because they have no way to research and manufacture it.

So, naturally, they want the study to fail.

If a major accident is caused during the test, the research will definitely be suspended for many years, which is the real good news for them.

If the research goes well, they also have to understand the situation.

Now they're looking at the test process, "It looks like they're doing a lateral flight test, and they're doing other flight tests just now with a rapid drop in engine altitude." ”

"It looks smooth, nothing wrong."

"During the flight, the engine kept the main nozzle down, and it seems that lateral flight is the weak point of this big guy, and it needs to maintain a posture facing the surface all the time to maintain balance."

"Also, this big guy has propulsion vents on both sides, but the power is not high, and the acceleration is small......"

"Is it bulky?"

"Yes."

"From a technical point of view, this big guy will be very flexible in space, flying on the surface of the earth, the impact of air is too great."

"Can you knock it down?"

"If it's below 30,000 meters, you can try it with a big missile, it also depends on their interception system, if you rise above 100,000 meters, you won't have a chance, it will become more flexible, and it's too high......"

"Therefore, it has two weaknesses, one is that it has no protection ability, and the other is that it is too big and bulky."

"Maybe it's easier in space, for example, with satellite strikes? Even if this big guy is very flexible, it's not easy to dodge in space, right? ”

"That's a good idea."

"Of course, just think about it, and whether it can be done or not, the only consequence of doing so is to trigger a great war of human extinction......"

……

In more than two hours, the light-pressure engine has completed a series of high-altitude tests and has returned to the top of the base.

The ratings of those live test programs have finally risen again, because two suns can be seen again from the ground view, one is still the noon sun, the dazzling sunlight, plus the engine is constantly falling, the two suns appear brighter.

The project team didn't care about the graphics at all, they only focused on the next step of testing, one was the rapid drop test, and the other was the emergency system test.

Then, there was the second landing test.

The rapid drop test was completed quickly, and the engine dropped vertically from a height of 10,000 meters to 5,000 meters, and then slowly became stable, and the altitude had dropped to about 2,000 meters.

At this time, it is a slow landing.

The emergency system test was carried out during the landing, and the engine was only a few tens of meters above the ground.

Mr. Zhu can finally take a long breath, at this stage, there is no need to worry about major accidents, at most there are small problems that damage the engine, as long as there are no major accidents, there will be no major accountability problems.

He was finally at ease.

"Of course, it's better that there are no problems and everything goes well......"

"Hopefully!"

"It seems that there is indeed no problem in the process, and there should be no problem with this emergency test, so I still have to believe in Academician Wang!"

He thought about it carefully, and said to Xiang Qiansheng with a smile on his face, "It seems that there is no problem." ”

"Sure enough, just as I thought!"

"Yesterday I said that there will be no problems, Mr. Xu and Mr. Zhao, those two guys are still worried about ......"

Xiang Qiansheng said suddenly, "It's not over yet, there will be an emergency test soon, and the power generation device will be shut down, and that is when the risk is greatest." ”

Teacher Zhu was stunned when he heard this, "What will happen?" ”

"If something goes wrong, you might just fall?" Xiang Qiansheng thought about it and said, "Of course, don't worry too much. ”

“……”

Mr. Zhu suddenly thought that there was a pilot on the engine, and in case of a fall, it would definitely cause casualties.

He was starting to worry again.

(End of chapter)