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Chapter 1273 Heading to the New Frontier (Third update, please subscribe)
Moon!
Since Eisenhower made his speech in 1957, announcing "We are going to the moon", the moon has become a new frontier. The Soviet Union followed suit.

Although the United States and the Soviet Union have launched many spacecraft and achieved breakthroughs time and time again such as spacewalks in the past six years, in fact, all of this is for one goal - to reach the moon!
The Soviet Union and the United States are not the only two players in the competition for this new frontier of the earth, as the whole world is watching them.

In 1958, Southeast Asia, Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand signed the Commonwealth Memorandum of Understanding on Space Cooperation. The five countries reached a consensus on space cooperation. The five countries fully cooperated in science and technology as well as financial resources to carry out the Commonwealth's space exploration, and its goals also included the moon landing project.

Over the past nearly five years, universities and research institutions from the United Kingdom to Canada to Australia have been conducting more or less research with the support of funding from their governments. These studies are all related to space, and through several years of hard work, they have all left their mark in space.

“…through the cooperation of the entire Commonwealth, we have made people around the world see the original intention of the Commonwealth to use space for peaceful purposes, which is based on the interests of all mankind…”

The interview on the radio was an interview with Yuan Jialiu, director of the Nanyang Aerospace Administration, on Nanyang Broadcasting Station. Although it seemed to be directly related to the aerospace administration, Han Yongsheng, as an engineer, did not care about these political issues. He listened to the radio just to learn about current affairs.

Soon, the car drove into the parking lot. He did not go directly to the office as usual, but sat in the car smoking. Although the windows were open, the car was still very hot. But he just sat in the car, smoking silently.

"The key is the engine! It has to have enough thrust!"

As an engineer in Wanhujiao, Han Yongsheng has been troubled by a problem recently - the development of methane engines.

“Although the specific impulse of liquid oxygen-methane is lower than the excellent hydrogen-oxygen combination, it is still higher than liquid oxygen-kerosene, making this fuel-oxidizer combination of practical value.”

Han Yongsheng's mind once again emerged the advantages of methane engines that the teachers mentioned when he first arrived in Wanhujiao.

"Liquid hydrogen has caused many engineering difficulties due to its low temperature. If liquid hydrogen encounters air in the pipeline, the air will directly freeze and block the pipeline. Hydrogen has an extremely low density and extremely small molecules. Hydrogen can penetrate places that other gases cannot penetrate due to its small molecules, so hydrogen pipeline valves have extremely high requirements for design and manufacturing. In addition, hydrogen can penetrate metal parts and cause hydrogen embrittlement problems, which will not be elaborated."

"Because hydrogen has an extremely low density, the hydrogen tanks of hydrogen-oxygen rockets are much larger than oxygen tanks. Hydrogen tanks are large but very light, which is not very friendly to the overall design.

Compared to the combination of hydrogen and oxygen, methane has a much higher boiling point than liquid hydrogen and is close to liquid oxygen. Its molecules are large, so it is a very friendly rocket fuel! The fuel tank of a liquid oxygen-methane rocket is about the same size as the oxygen tank, which saves a lot of trouble. "

"Most of the design and manufacturing costs of a rocket engine are its turbo pumps, which are difficult to design because the density of hydrogen is so low and the speed of the hydrogen pump is required to be high. Multiple pumps are required to achieve the desired combustion chamber pressure.

The methane rocket has greatly reduced the difficulty from fuel tanks to pipelines to turbo pumps. Even the turbo pump only needs one stage. "

"Compared to kerosene rockets, liquid oxygen-methane combination engines are less prone to coking. Not only does it increase the temperature of the gas generator, but the pressure potential of the main combustion chamber is also greater."

Of course, there is another advantage - that is, exoplanets have rich reserves of methane, and fuel can be obtained on-site for future interstellar voyages.

Of course, this is just an illusion.

Entering an exoplanet?

This future is a bit too far away, the key step is to land on the moon!
If you can't even solve this step, everything else is just empty talk!
But because of this, Nanyang's rockets took a completely different path from the United States and the Soviet Union - the Soviet Union focused on kerosene-oxygen engines, while the United States focused on hydrogen-oxygen engines. The three companies each had their own technical paths when it came to rockets.

"To land on the moon, we need a high-thrust engine. At present, our engines are simply unable to meet the requirements. Our largest engine is only 100 tons! If the thrust is not enough, we can make up for it with quantity! Then we can use parallel engines!"

This was the chief engineer's final decision - to use multiple engines. This technical path is completely different from the American Mercury V.

After taking a deep puff of his cigarette and crushing the cigarette butt on the ground, Han Yongsheng spoke as if he had made a decision.

"The key is to increase the thrust. Only by increasing the thrust as much as possible can we reduce the number of engines!"

As a rocket engine engineer, Han Yongsheng is well aware that the more engines there are, the more complex the technology becomes and the more likely problems will occur during actual operation.

After making this decision, Han Yongsheng glanced at the building in front of him, nodded vigorously, and then walked towards the building.

"But, technically speaking, this is the most likely to be achieved..."

In the conference room, Qian Fukang stared at the rocket sketch on the drawing, still arguing with other engineers.

“It’s easier to achieve, but also more prone to failure.”

Eugene said from the side.

"From the perspective of probability theory, if the stability of an engine can reach 99%, after 30 engines are connected in parallel, the overall reliability will drop to 74%, which will greatly increase the probability of abnormalities in the rocket.

In addition, multiple engines “in parallel” will also lead to coupling resonance problems, which will further induce rocket launch failures. And the control of multiple engines also has a series of problems that need to be solved.”

After Eugene finished speaking, Han Yongsheng said.

"Therefore, we need to increase the thrust of the rocket engine as much as possible and reduce the number of engines as much as possible, so as to improve the reliability of the rocket." Qian Fukang nodded to Han Yongsheng and said:
"That's a good suggestion. What's your goal?"

"The methane engine we have just completed testing has a thrust of only 100 tons. My goal is to increase it by 30%, which means more than 130 tons!"

"If it's more than 130 tons..."

Qian Fukang immediately picked up a piece of paper and started calculating. Although Wanhujiao had more than 300 computers, it was not convenient to calculate anytime and anywhere. Therefore, at this time, pen calculation was the best choice. His plan was not thrust, but another plan.

"If there are 30 of them, the total thrust will be 3900 to 4000 tons..."

After another simple calculation, Qian Fukang shook his head and said:
"This thrust is too large. The rocket thrust required for the moon landing is about 3400 tons. As long as we can send a spacecraft weighing more than 100 tons into space, we can complete the moon landing mission. Well, in this case... that is..."

After finally figuring out a result, Qian Fukang raised his eyebrows, first made a few strokes on the note, and then said excitedly.

"Okay, that's it, we don't need to bother with a rocket."

"what?"

Eugene looked at Qian Fukang with some doubt. Although Qian Fukang had replaced his position long ago with his extraordinary talent and ability in the past few years, Eugene did not feel any discomfort. After all, the other party was indeed a very talented engineer.

"We can consider three rockets!"

"Mr. Qian, do you mean to launch three rockets and then dock them in space?"

This was obviously not realistic because the structure of the lunar module was already there. Amidst everyone's confusion, Qian Fukang walked to the side of the drawing and directly drew a longer rocket on the paper with a ballpoint pen.

"This is a main rocket, and it weighs about 1500 tons."

Then he drew two more shorter rockets and said:

"These are two booster rockets, and they weigh 1000 to 1100 tons. Then they are connected in parallel to form a three-finger rocket."

As soon as Qian Fukang finished speaking, someone said:

"Mr. Qian, in this case, we are developing a main rocket and a booster at the same time. We also need to develop a new booster engine."

"Do not!"

Qian Fukang shook his head and said:
"This is not a booster. It is essentially the main rocket without the carrier cabin. Of course, it has slightly less fuel. It is equivalent to connecting three rockets with nine engines in parallel. In this way, compared with connecting 27 rockets in parallel, its reliability is higher and the problem of coupled resonance will be further reduced. At the same time, if a problem occurs with one of the booster rockets, the two booster rockets can be directly abandoned in advance. This can at least protect the safety of the crew to a certain extent..."

After describing his idea, Qian Fukang turned around and drew the layout of the three rocket engines on the drawing board, while explaining:

"However, three rockets means that its weight will increase greatly. 3400 tons is definitely not enough. Its weight is probably around 3800 tons. In other words, we need a more powerful rocket engine!"

Turning his gaze to Han Yongsheng, Qian Fukang spoke directly.

"A 130-ton rocket engine is definitely not enough, so I need an engine of 140 tons or more. How about this? Can this problem be solved?"

Faced with the questions raised by the chief engineer, several rocket engine engineers including Han Yongsheng first had a brief communication there, and after a moment, they gave a positive answer.

"We need a year!"

"I'll give you ten months. Don't forget that the Americans' Saturn V rocket will be tested next year!"

Qian Fukang specifically mentioned the progress of the United States - the United States is in the leading position in this competition. The progress of their development of super-heavy rockets is astonishing. Of course, the cost is also astonishing. Just this year, the United States has allocated $5 billion to develop the Saturn V rocket.

In comparison, the cooperation of five countries including the United Kingdom has only provided a grant of 12 billion pounds for the lunar landing project, and this has been from to the present. Compared with the investment of the United States during the same period, it is simply a drop in the bucket.

"The problem now is that we need to balance their thrust and rank the engines. This requires complex calculations, as well as rocket control. After all, the attitude control of the rocket is achieved through thrust difference, which places higher demands on computer performance. This requires better electronic computers..."

Fortunately, Nanyang’s electronic computer industry is very developed!
This is also the fundamental reason why Qian Fukang chose to connect multiple rocket engines in parallel. Nanyang's electronic computer industry gave him the confidence to realize this idea.

After all, advanced electronic computers can solve many control problems, which is an advantage that other countries do not have. It is also the inevitable result of Nanyang's promotion of the development of the electronics industry over the years.

(End of this chapter)