Boca Chica, Gulf of Mexico.

The Starship spacecraft SN25 and the Super Heavy Booster B20 were erected on the launch pad, making it the fourth Starship to be ready for a full-body launch test.

According to SpecaX's latest naming standard, the whole body will be named SS (StarShip) + numbers, so this one should be named SS-4.

The first SS-1 was launched on May 28, and in the course of seven months, the SpecaX launched four combinations in a row at the most frantic speed, and the incredible efficiency was not yet at its limit.

Together with the SL-X rocket stage delivered for NACA, they have produced 301 Raptor V1 engines this year, with an average of one Raptor engine rolling off the assembly line every 29 hours.

In addition to Musk's heroic slogan of "one starship a month", more importantly, NACA has secretly continued to give technical support and a large number of orders since last year, and the starship town that manufactures starships has been completed for the second major upgrade.

It is planned that after January 15, Starship Factory will have the capacity to produce 30 SS rockets and 900 Raptor V1 engines per year, but in reality it is certainly not that much.

Even if you replace testing with launches, it will take time for Starship to improve, and with the Raptor V1 engine thoroughly stabilized during this year's continuous launch tests, Tom Mueller is looking for ways to upgrade on top of it.

The new Raptor V2 engine will increase thrust from 185 tonnes to 225 tonnes with a 20% weight reduction, second only to the bald Bezos BE-4 engine at 250 tonnes, and is expected to completely replace the V1 engine by this time next year.

If the engines of the SS rocket are replaced with Raptor V2, the thrust will increase from 6,100 tons to 7,400 tons, the take-off mass will increase from 4,800 tons to about 5,300 tons, and the upward capacity will be increased by about 30 tons.

But for Tom, the premise for all this is that the reliability of the SS rocket, at least the reliability of a one-time launch, is qualified, proving that the two-stage fully multiplexed configuration is correct.

The goal of the SS-4 complex is to successfully put the upper stage SN25 into orbit, which means that the starship can take on at least a one-time launch mission and send at least 120 tons of payload into space.

Even the launch offer for a single-use SS rocket would not exceed $500 million, which is definitely exciting news, and even with a little effort, it is not impossible to replicate the feat of XAP projecting a 500-ton payload into space in a week half a year ago.

Tom was in the control room praying that everything would be going well with the SS-4 when he suddenly heard footsteps coming from behind him.

"Thank goodness I wasn't late."

The dusty Musk has just flown back from Washington and finally did not miss the launch of the SS-4.

The news from NASA is too shocking and takes time to digest, and he has to think of a strategy with Tom.

The unaware Tom obviously didn't think so much, and told him the latest news with great interest:

"You don't know what stupid things Lockdyne has done lately, they resurrected the old F1 antique for the NOVA rocket, and they intend to develop an F1R that can throttle to 10%.

God, throttle from 700 tons of thrust to 70 tons! Yesterday they conducted their first experiment, and after throttling, they failed to ignite more than a dozen times in a row, and a friend of mine there told me that the media must have been bought!

By the time they're done, I'm afraid we'll all have SS-20s launched! Haha......"

Musk barely squeezed out a smile, and then asked rhetorically:

"Tom, what do you think is missing if we're going to land on the moons around Jupiter or Saturn?"

"Uh......"

Tom scratched his hair, and though he didn't quite understand the meaning of the question, he replied earnestly:

"Power, good and reliable nuclear engines, just like XAP's nuclear engines, their technical prowess is able to do that.

Didn't DARPA come to an agreement with us? If it could be converted to nuclear power, and then the gravity problem could be solved, ignoring the problems that were not considered in deep space navigation, it would already be theoretically feasible. ”

Speaking of this, he stretched out his two hands and waved them a few times, pretending to be afraid:

"Of course, it would take a lot of money, too much for us to imagine, and the fuel problem, if you use liquid hydrogen, it's a super bomb that can explode at any time, and it's so dangerous that astronauts can't afford insurance.

This should be the second half of the 21st century, and Mars and the Moon are enough to keep us busy for the first half of the century. ”

"Tom, Korolev used to think so."

Musk's expression became more serious:

"After Gagarin went into space, we launched the Apollo program, but the scientists of the alliance believed that the landing on the moon was not possible until at least 1980, and thought that the Apollo program was just a scary front, and it was not until 1967 that they reacted and began to catch up.

If I told you that the president asked us to land on the moons of Jupiter and Saturn within 10 years and complete the unmanned landing exploration of the moons of Neptune, do you think it can be done? ”

Tom replied without hesitation, "If I were NACA Director, I would resign myself." ”

Musk: "What if he says he can't do it and goes to the Middle East to eat sand?" ”

Tom: "Then I'll eat sand." ”

Musk: "Man, Director Robert doesn't want to eat sand. ”

“？！”

……

"The Starship failed in its fourth launch and has crossed the Kármán line."

"Musk: The failure may be caused by too strong fuel mobility."

"In 2017, Starship lost four in a row, and the prospect of full arrow reuse is bleak."

When the news reached China, it was already noon on December 31.

Lin Ju was at the ground command center in the capital at this time, and the first batch of three expert members were counting supplies on the "Black Rabbit" space station and preparing to land on the moon.

He was trying to convince Academician She to explore the meaning of deep space, but he saw a message on Twitter alerting countless Twitter netizens @ He wanted to be able to evaluate the fourth launch of Starship.

Both turned their attention to the starship, quickly reading the report after the SS-4 was launched.

"The first stage was successfully separated, and the second stage exploded during the second ignition...... Well, at least this time it flew out of the Kármán line, and it was considered to be into space.

Their old problem still can't be solved, and the local pressure changes caused by fuel shaking are still too troublesome. ”

Academician She easily found out the reason for the failure, the first two failures of the starship-class spacecraft were due to the sharp increase in pressure and center of gravity caused by the cryogenic fuel dangling in the arrow body during the attitude change, and the problem was almost unsolvable.

The first stage of the rocket can also rely on gravity and its own acceleration to push the fuel down, which is too troublesome for the upper stage to do this.

Xinyuan will of course have the same trouble, such as the Nine Chapter spacecraft, but they solved it through the zero-evaporation tank.

The internal pressure of the zero-evaporation fuel tank can be very high, and its working pressure is much higher than the normal pressure of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, which can store more fuel in a smaller space beyond the limit, and at the same time, it can completely resist the sudden pressure changes caused by fuel consumption.

Starships without this technology are much more troublesome to solve this problem, and they can only pay the price of performance.

"Starship is successful enough, it's good news for NACA just to combine it into an SL-X, one SLS can be exchanged for at least seven or eight SL-Xs, which is ...... It's amazing.

By the time Musk achieves one shot a month, he will be almost on par with us in conventional rocket technology. ”

Lin Ju's attitude is very tolerant, but he knows how much NACA has crossed in the last world line, and the NACA and the Aramco federal government in this world line are like chicken blood, which makes him impressed.

"That's right, they still don't earn the same dollars as we do......"

The Fed card reaper is still not working, and although the dollar continues to depreciate, it continues to plunder wealth from the world.

For NACA, the $250 million purchase of the first booster is as cheap as the price of a cabbage, and the exchange rate is close to 1.7 billion yuan, which is completely different in the value of space agencies on both sides of the Pacific.

"By the way, your 504 injection should be withdrawn quickly, it's better that no one knows about this thing."

Academician She turned the topic to the two injections the day before yesterday, and his expression became extremely serious.

This is the Nth time that Lin Ju has been criticized, and after he took out two injections that day, it did not achieve the expected effect, but attracted strong resistance from Academician She and He Wei.

It's not that they don't trust the effect of the injections, but they believe too much.

They know very well that the audience for this thing is not the average person, and 99.99% of the people do not enjoy the benefits of this technology.

While today's super-rich can still spend a lot of money to prolong their lives, inject millions of expensive drugs, or change their organs, these are risky, cumbersome, and restrictive.

Even if the effect of the 504 injection is reduced to one in 100, it also inherits the good adaptability of the 404 injection, and the universal effect is extremely strong, and there is almost no after-effect, which is convenient and safe.

It can allow the old guy who should have withdrawn from the mainstream order of the world to be healthy for another ten years, and invest more energy in developing better drugs, and Academician She has reason to believe that 504 injections will launch stronger 604 and 704 injections in the future.

While he is also the main audience for the technology and belongs to the small group of people who can touch the threshold of use, he remains resolutely opposed to putting it into use, even the younger He Ruo.

He also didn't want to see the 90-year-old president of the island country who still controls power appear here, and tried his best to dissuade the 504 injections from being put on the market.

Lin Ju had anticipated some of the situation in advance, but he didn't expect the problem to be so serious, so he had to postpone the process of entering the market with the 504 injection, which he was most confident in.

At the same time, he was also secretly glad that the much more effective 404 injection was still limited to "his own people", otherwise it would cause more trouble.

Therefore, he was not bored with Academician She's constant advice, and nodded very seriously.

This reaction made Academician She feel a little more relieved, and after thinking about it, he talked about the deep space exploration plan:

"I've inquired for you on the International Astronomical Union, and they can give you up to $300 million in the near future, $400 million for mid-term research at the beginning of 2019, and the final $300 million for the final $300 million and launch costs by September 2020.

They are raising funds all over the world, which is basically the limit, and it should not be a problem to arrive on time.

But you are in a hurry to toss some expedition to Jupiter and Saturn, and you have to launch a probe in May next year? It's better to wait until 19 years, and then the Aviation Development Commission should also have some arrangements. ”

Lin Ju could only smile bitterly in his heart, this wait is a year and a half, one-fifth of the time of the task has passed, and eight years is not a long time in the universe.

Now all he can think of is to put on hold on to other plans, and the base has already started working overtime to build a Saturn probe anyway.

On the surface, however, he acted as if he had listened, and vaguely echoed a few words.

……

Moon, Aitken Basin.

The Chapter 9 spacecraft once again stood silently at the landing site of Tianmu-2, the side hatches opening and the gangways extending to the ground.

Yang Xinjun, who was standing on the last step, imitated Armstrong's sentence on the radio:

"I'm here on behalf of United Mining, which is a small step for me, but a big step for the mine owner."

But at this time, there were no hundreds of millions of viewers cheering for him, but Deng Lei, who came down first, gently pulled him, so that the latter's feet jumped to the ground of the moon almost at the same time, leaving a messy trace.

"Come down, Yang Bao Foreman, when the cement is ready, there won't be so much dust on our spacesuits."

"Oops...... Let me say a few more words. ”

"Yang, you have to let me come out too."

Jamie, the second-to-last nuclear expert who came out of the cabin, muttered dissatisfiedly, and then also stood in the position of Yang Xinjun just now, took a deep breath and said solemnly:

"On behalf of North Irland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the Bahamas...... Her Majesty the Queen of the Grenadines, the Solomon Islands, came to the moon with peace...... Whew, for the common scientific cause of mankind. ”

Jamie finished the names of the 16 countries in one breath, which almost didn't make him angry, and it took him a lot of effort to find the optimal solution in order to save his strength before leaving, but he couldn't help but pause.

The other four couldn't help but twitch, and at the same time wondered why he didn't just say it about the Federation.

"Alright Stevenson, I'm coming down too."

Li Wei stood at the end to confirm that everything was set up in the transition cabin, and after Jamie, he quickly went down to the ground, and then used the intelligent terminal on the spacesuit's arm to control the door of the part-time gangway to slowly close.

Now that the first official operation of the Tianmu-3 mission has begun, the five astronauts have all undergone sufficient rest before leaving the capsule, and as long as they adapt to the gravity of the moon for a while, they will immediately start the exploration mission.

Yang Xinjun, who had been bouncing around in the spaceship for half an hour, barely mastered the range of movement after planting upside down several times in a row, first grabbed a handful of dust from the ground, and then put it in the palm of his hand to observe.

Under the light of the sun, the moon dust is mostly shiny, and the metal content is more than that of the samples on the ground.

However, this is good news for Yang Xinjun, the rich metal content can improve the hardness and protective performance of space cement, but 3D printing technology needs to rough selection of lunar soil composition.

Jamie, who was next to him, was going to do the same, but he was now busy assembling the flagpole.

Due to the special nature of the lunar blasting device, there will be a separate ground compartment for storing explosives, which will be shared by the five companies, and it is only natural that the flag will be planted.

The belt is about to become the third ...... The fourth flag-planting object, Jamie, was summoned by the queen before he left, and he paid special attention to this matter.

When the five flags are gathered, another United Nations flag will be planted, and then the meeting will be held on the moon......

(End of chapter)