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

The successful development of the energy production system has made many experts involved in lunar construction very excited. It can synthesize hydrogen, oxygen and water, so the production of many industrial raw materials will be much more convenient.

There is no shortage of other elements on the lunar surface, but these basic raw materials consume the most. Now that they can be obtained systematically and on a large scale, their work difficulty is greatly reduced.

The most excited among them is Yang Xinjun, who is competing for the lunar highway project. The biggest difference between his space cement solution and Zhu Bingguang's 3D printing solution is that it consumes a lot of water, but its performance is much higher.

He couldn't help but look at Zhu Bingguang, but the latter remained calm, obviously very confident in his plan.

Counting them, the first batch of lunar expeditions included 11 teams. Each team has roughly 3 to 4 people. Most of them are one team corresponding to one project. It is rare for them to compete with each other like them.

Of course, this has to exclude the demolition team that has a separate area. There are teams from five bidding companies. They are just bystanders and do not participate in public speeches, which makes them extremely mysterious.

Soon it was the turn of Yang Xinjun's team. Instead of drawing pictures as usual, he started to introduce the equipment directly.

In the past few months, with the financial and technical support from the base, he has successfully developed preliminary usable paving construction machinery.

Although space cement is called cement, its actual application method is very different from that on the earth. The biggest problem is the environment of the moon.

The lunar surface is either ultra-high temperature or ultra-low temperature, both above 100 degrees, and even higher in extreme environments. For ordinary cement, even if nothing is done, it will explode into pieces due to thermal expansion and contraction.

Space cement must not only be able to withstand the expansion and contraction problems caused by such an extreme environment, but also must think about how to solidify.

The way on earth that you add water, stir it and pour it on the road to wait for natural condensation will definitely not work. If the temperature is too low, the fresh water will directly condense into ice crystals and destroy the solidification process. If the temperature is too high, it will not solidify for a long time.

So the solution that Yang Xinjun came up with is prefabrication + environmental high temperature solution: the space cement is first stirred inside the equipment to a semi-solidified state, and then extruded when the construction is facing the sun, and spread flat like a roll of paper on the path of the laying machinery. .

The special space cement is extremely sensitive to ultraviolet rays. It will solidify within a few seconds under the strong ultraviolet rays of space and is firmly bonded to the compacted foundation that has been cleaned by a road roller. It is expected to have a theoretical life of up to 15 years.

Now their team has been able to solve the problem of paving machinery with a width of 3 meters, and has produced a prototype with a total weight of 5.2 tons. Both the weight and the width of the construction road can continue to be optimized in the future.

And it is not only used for paving roads. The space cement he developed can also be used for lunar construction. Because the rich metal elements in the lunar soil are deliberately retained, this kind of space cement is also very good at resisting space rays, but it may affect the construction. Internal communication, but it is also a small problem that is easy to solve.

In his vision, although space cement requires slightly more supporting machinery and raw materials than 3D printing, its application is more convenient and the output is larger. It can become an ideal material for the construction of lunar bases in the future.

It sounds fine to domestic experts, as they have had a lot of exchanges in the past few months, but it is surprising to the foreign teams participating in the conference.

This includes Bill Nelson, who was secretly observing. He received a doctorate in law from the University of Virginia, later entered the military, and later entered politics and gradually served as a Florida congressman. In 1986, he flew the STS-61C mission aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia and became the The second senator to go into space.

Lawyer, soldier, congressman, and astronaut, Bill, with multiple BUFFs, is a solid traditional elite. He has a profound understanding of economy, technology, and culture. He became the director of NACA after a few years in the original world line.

Lin Ju did not recognize that this 70-year-old man turned out to be the future director of NACA, but Bill himself did not look old and was in excellent physical condition.

In the end, the American Council still obtained the same five astronaut quotas. After excluding three technical experts and one astronaut, the remaining one was obtained by Bill, who had been in space and had excellent qualifications.

His main mission is not to go to the moon, but to take this opportunity to deeply observe the technological development and institutional lines behind United Mining.

There is a large group of elites in Ami - including himself, it is difficult to understand why the other party's aerospace technology has developed by leaps and bounds within two years. This time, the lunar ticket exchanged for the hydrogen bomb can just allow them to get closer to the world surrounded by fog. China Aerospace.

And now that various Chinese teams came up to report their results in turn, he got a glimpse of the clues:

In just a few months, from United Mining's request to the completion of the technical solution and prototype, they completed the task with an efficiency that was almost impossible in NACA's opinion.

At NACA, the cycle of a project is measured in at least years, but here, the units are days and months, and even the speaking speed is faster than that of NACA's research team.

He poked Jon, who was still listening carefully, and whispered his thoughts, but the latter looked helpless:

"Dear Mr. Congressman, if you can approve funds as quickly as they do, our speed will never be slower than this. Before 'China speed', the term that represented speed in the world was 'America speed'."

Bill: "But the federal budget for you will only be larger. Even this year's NACA expenditure I'm sure is twice theirs!"

Jon: "You know, I've come here to talk to many ADC researchers, and it's completely different from what you imagined.

This is a country that respects science very much. More than 60 years ago, they appointed scientists as senior leaders of the country. Those who know the most about science are in charge of the operation of the entire scientific system and never succumb to political needs.

And they don't need to battle wits with Congress to get funding, and they don't need leaders to have to deal with questions from farmers and congressmen during their busy schedules. Once they decide on something, they will mobilize the power of the entire country to do it regardless of whether it succeeds or not. .

Look at that young man named Lin. Two-thirds of the team here was donated free of charge in advance and he never interfered with the project process.

With all due respect, this is the place that respects science the most. As we speak, there are still a group of scientists flying in space on a space plane. "

Jon recounted his summary with a serious face. Although it sounded reasonable, Bill always felt that something was not right, as if he had heard it somewhere.

But he thought about it for a while and didn't think of it. In the end, he could only frown and nod in approval, and decided to write it down when he went back.