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

Class B base.

The Laser Laboratory obtained control of the "scrapped" Explorer 7 and parked it on a high ground to facilitate the targeting of the laser.

Launching a laser beam from 380,000 kilometers away to hit an object traveling at a relatively few kilometers per second is almost as difficult as hitting a hole-in-one in golf ten kilometers away.

Qianjun Bang No. 1 has never stopped testing in space. This is the farthest one. The purpose is to test the limits of its positioning and sighting system. Attacks at this distance cannot even use mechanical structures to mediate the deflection of light. They rely on Small changes in the prism launch angle for aiming.

At the same time, close cooperation between lunar orbit and low-Earth orbit satellites is required. The atomic clock must be corrected in advance, and then the precise orbit with extremely low error must be continuously measured to provide correct guidance for Qianjunbang-1.

The beams excited by the seven lasers take about 1.2 seconds to reach the moon, and the excitation time does not exceed 0.9 seconds. When it ends its attack, the photons still need 90,000 kilometers to reach the moon.

In the field of view of the infrared remote sensing satellite, the temperature of the lunar surface that has entered the sun ranges from 140 degrees to more than 200 degrees, and the temperature in the target area is close to 180 tons, but at that moment, an area of ​​about 30 square meters briefly rose to Above 500 degrees Celsius, it is like a wave in the tide, fleeting.

The light spot with a diameter of about 3 meters only covered half of Explorer 7's body, with an error of about 1.5 meters. The exposed part of the body continued to overheat for nearly 7 seconds. Multiple sensor signals were offline, and a large area of ​​​​error was sent back. , but the antenna part is intact and has not been disconnected for the time being.

Spanning 380,000 kilometers, under the exquisite adjustment of the control system, the light spot only spread to 3.1 meters in diameter, with a deviation of 1.5 meters, which is a 50% hit rate.

For Qianjun Bang No. 1 of the first machine, this result is quite satisfactory.

Zhao Xiaowen concluded the experimental process of Qianjun Bang No. 1 with satisfaction. In the past three months, the laser laboratory was like a child with an infrared pen, wanting to take a photo of everything he saw.

A less important backup satellite? Destroyed, anyway, one No. 5 rocket can replace more than a dozen; accidentally discovered space debris? Take a photo and clean the low-Earth orbit; an abandoned satellite of a certain country? Free processing.

Half of the 79 tests of Qianjun Rod were aimed at the ground, and the other half were various gadgets that can be found in space. Now they can finally stop.

…

Kazakhstan, Baikonur.

Miklin Yevgeny and Alexander Maksimovich stood together next to Yubireny Airport. The former picked up the telescope and looked at the horizon and frowned.

"It's almost time, why hasn't it come yet?"

Alexander: "We have to trust our automatic control technology. The booster of the 'Hurricane' is a big guy, and it needs to land as smoothly as possible. The computer should still be hovering."

It has been three months since the "Hurricane", the Energy 2 rocket project, was resurrected.

This project team may have the oldest average age in the world, with an average age of over 70. They are basically all old people who have held important responsibilities since the league.

What they did was to let the Federal Security Service search for old scientists who were still alive, and at the same time continue to reopen those long-lost materials.

All the technical data of the RD0120 hydrogen-oxygen engine are still there, but resuming production requires a lot of missing equipment. Domestic manufacturers are currently being mobilized or ordered from abroad, and production is expected to resume within a year.

The RD170 is not bad. After so many years, there are now two of the latest generation RD171MV. Engineers from Ermao modified it based on the Energia 2 booster model that Lucia made before - it was originally an independent launch used to defraud the international community. The funding project has now become a reality.

RD171MV is a four-combustion chamber engine with a weight of 10.8 tons and a thrust of about 800 tons. It is the single largest thrust liquid rocket engine in the world.

The "Hurricane" booster equipped with it has a square bulge on one side that is almost as long as the rocket body. It deploys after the booster falls to a predetermined height, and then glides all the way back to the landing site, using the three wheels on its belly. landing.

Compared with the space shuttle, the dry-to-mass ratio advantage of the "Hurricane" booster makes its descent rate much smaller, and the landing will be smoother and safer.

Although the folding wings and landing system increase a lot of dead weight, the advantage is that there is no need to reserve fuel for return, at least Maozi thinks it is acceptable.

In order to increase the priority of the project, it took two months for the first "Hurricane" booster to be successfully erected in Baikonur and conduct the first launch and recovery test.

Not long after Miklin finished his complaint, a small black spot appeared on the horizon. When he picked up the telescope, he saw that the surface of the rocket body had been ablated into an irregular gray-black "hurricane."

Automatically controlled landing is a simple technology. It entered smoothly at high speed, put down the wheels, and started taxiing on the runway. Just when Micklin was about to smile, he suddenly tilted and the left wing scraped the runway. Then, under the action of friction, it turned sharply to the left and lay down on the lawn at a 180-degree angle.

"..."

Alexander: "Yevgeny, the landing gear is too fragile."

He could tell at a glance that one side of the landing gear was crushed, causing it to yaw. This was actually expected. In order to reduce the dead weight, the landing gear of the booster was designed to be small and light, so the reduction in strength was inevitable.

Fortunately, the wing did not scrape the lawn, otherwise the rocket body would rotate and break. But now it seems to be in good condition. The speed is low when it tips over. The wings and landing gear can still be used after replacing it.

Compared with the landing system, he is more concerned about the carbon residue issue of RD171MV reuse.

Micklin soon figured it out. This experiment was successful. The route was correct. Self-gliding recovery was no worse than vertical recovery, and it was much easier.

He looked at Factory 112 in the distance. The space shuttle factory that had been abandoned for 20 years collapsed 15 years ago, crushing the last Energy rocket and the Buran space shuttle. Then this mess was left there. At most, Internet celebrities sneak in and have a look.

Last month, Director Borisov secured a budget to begin repairs to the plant and clean up the debris, hoping to put it back into use in a year.

"Evgeny," Alexander suddenly called his name.

"We should be able to finish Hurricane as planned, but what about the lander and spacecraft? Why hasn't it been planned until now?"

Micklin: "This is the director's job and has nothing to do with us."

Alexander: "The Kremlin doesn't want to spend money on landing on the moon, right? I can't hide that from me. I can see that the bureaucrats actually don't have a long-term plan for the moon."

Miklin: "How could it not be! It's just..."

Alexander: "I have heard that the Kremlin has reached a deal with the capital and will wear Lucia astronauts on the Dawn 6 spacecraft. The future of the 'Hurricane' is just to deliver supplies to their scientific research station, right?"

Miklin was a little angry, but his expression remained unchanged:

"We can get enough money from the Indians, the funds are enough, and those cooperation have nothing to do with us."

Alexander: "But will the big guys invest these dollars in the space program?"

This time Miklin was finally unable to refute. They were all old men who had seen all kinds of ups and downs. How could they not understand the current situation of the Kremlin?

The hurricane is already the last dignity that Borisov and he have won for Lucia, symbolizing that they have not given up on the new round of competition.

"Maximovich, no matter what, let's just think that we have completed the alliance's legacy. The "Hurricane" plan is over and it is time for us to end it."