Great Power Heavy Industry: Rise

Chapter 403 Reaching the pinnacle of planetary civilization
10 month 15 day.

Zhong Cheng and other high-level personnel of Red Star Company went to the large aerospace terminal of Tiangong City to see Zhou Hu and others off, and also cut the ribbon for the maiden voyage of Xuanwu-[-].

The Xuanwu-[-] spacecraft has flown from the starship base below Tiangong City to the side of the docking platform of Tiangong City's space port.

Standing in the spaceport, the huge hull of Xuanwu No. 20 can't be seen at a glance, only the huge entrance 30 meters high and [-] meters wide can be seen in front of you.

On the 30-meter-wide conveyor belt, teams of engineers from Red Star Company stood on it and were continuously transported to the engine room of Xuanwu No. [-].

There are two cargo conveyor belts above and below this conveyor belt. 60 tons of materials and equipment are being sent into Xuanwu-[-], most of which are packed in giant containers and fixed on the back or abdomen of the spacecraft.

The 100-meter-thick interior space of the Xuanwu spacecraft is divided into 33 floors, each with an area of ​​about 160 million square meters, which can theoretically carry tens of millions of people.

But in fact, this is a spaceship for both passenger and cargo, and most of the space is still used to carry cargo. The maximum carrying capacity of the design is 100 million.

However, there are only 10 passengers on this first voyage, and there is currently no room for more people on Mars.

Taking advantage of the loading time of personnel and cargo, Zhong Cheng and his party visited the interior space of Xuanwu No. [-].

The interior of the spaceship is too big, and everyone only focused on visiting the command and control center at the head and one of the eight power centers.

Because the Xuanwu spacecraft is a civilian spacecraft flying in space, except for the five main keels made of Taiyi alloy 201, the overall frame is mainly composed of soil building materials.

Of course, the Taiyi Alloy 401 is widely used in the main activity compartment of the personnel to generate artificial gravity.

But the super-large nuclear fusion engine used in the power center of the spacecraft uses the most advanced technology.

Most of the 200 million kilowatts of power generation will be used to accelerate charged ions. The 1.5-kilometer-long acceleration channel runs through almost the entire hull, and can accelerate charged ions to about 3.5 kilometers per second, a breakthrough of one-tenth. speed of light.

If this new type of nuclear fusion engine is used on the Star Reacher, it only needs more than 200 tons of propellant to accelerate the 1-ton Star Reacher to a speed of 1000 kilometers per second, and it only takes 4 days to reach Ceres. They took 83 days.

However, to accelerate the 80-ton Xuanwu spacecraft to 1000 kilometers per second when used on a Xuanwu spacecraft, theoretically 2.28 tons of propellant is required, but in fact 2.56 tons of propellant is required due to the loss of energy and working fluid. tons of propellant.

Eight such new nuclear fusion engines are installed on the four long sides of Xuanwu-8, 4 forward and 4 backward, respectively accelerating or decelerating.

As for the adjustment of the direction, it is left to the large Zhurong electric pusher.

Yang Xi is the chief designer of the new nuclear fusion engine, and he introduced the performance and design of the engine.

Zhong Cheng asked him to find a way to reduce the size of this engine, mainly the length, which was too long.

Yang Xi explained that most of the length of 1.5 kilometers is used for the acceleration of charged ions.

If the length is shortened, in order to ensure the injection speed of the working medium, the energy input will be greatly increased, which is not cost-effective.

Zhong Cheng said that military ships don't need to think too much about economy, and they can design the plan first in case of emergency.

Finally, a group of people came to the command and control center of the spacecraft. The layout was similar to that of the Star Reacher, but much larger, but not as large as the command center of the Qinglong aircraft carrier.

Because the command center of the Qinglong aircraft carrier is more of a combat command function.

Thinking of the Qinglong aircraft carrier, Zhong Cheng couldn't help but think of his old comrade-in-arms Deng Yongxing.

Since he left the Xuanyuan Qinglong aircraft carrier, he has never met Deng Yongxing again, but only greets each other on social software every year.

Zhong Cheng persuaded him to return to work on the ground, but Deng Yongxing said that his mission had not been completed, and if human society did not eliminate the possibility of civil war, he would not leave his post until he retired.

Counting the time, Deng Yongxing has not returned to the ground for 14 years.

This made Zhong Cheng admire and feel ashamed!

We can only step up our efforts to bring these soldiers back to the ground as soon as possible and lead a normal life.

At 10 am, the side entrance of Xuanwu-[-] was closed, the nuclear fusion engine was ignited, and it slowly drove out of the space port, accelerating towards the sun.

In fact, this time point is not suitable for going to Mars, because Mars is currently at the farthest position from the earth, on the other side of the sun, about 4 million kilometers away.

It's just that the speed of the Xuanwu spacecraft doesn't care about this distance anymore, and the 4 million-kilometer voyage is only 6 days, because it can't go straight through the sun.

The advent of high-speed and high-load spaceships means that the inner regions of the solar system no longer have the problem of distance for humans.

Starting next year, the Xuanwu spacecraft and the spacecraft of Solar System Dynamics will come out like dumplings.

The industrial revolution turned the earth into a global village, and now the solar system will soon become a solar village. Human civilization has finally reached the pinnacle of planetary civilization.

The planetary civilization is only the lowest level civilization in the universe civilization division, and the second level civilization is the star civilization.

Stellar civilizations have been able to carry out preliminary exploration of interstellar systems, and can send manned spacecraft of scientific research nature to other stars.

Judging from the current development, it is not too far away for human civilization to enter the primary stage of star-level civilization.

When exploring across star systems, there will be a certain probability of encountering alien civilizations and intersections.

Are humans ready?

Zhong Cheng knew that he didn't have it yet, but he was preparing for it.

……

Watching Xuanwu-[-] disappear into the starry sky, Zhong Cheng and the others returned to Tiangong City from the space port.

The 12 districts in Tiangong City's planning have been completed and 3 have been put into use. Each district is a pearl on the sky ladder, with a diameter of 10 kilometers and an average height of about 3 kilometers. It can accommodate 30 people for work and living.

However, the housing prices here are generally unaffordable, and most houses provide short-term rentals to satisfy people's curiosity.

The ladder project and the Kunlun City on the ground have all been completed. Except for this group of people who went to Mars, most of the engineering personnel are on vacation to make up for the vacations of the past few years.

However, at most around the National Day next year, the great development of Mars will start, and more people will be sent to Mars, and even bring their families to settle on Mars, becoming the first batch of Martians.

But before that, Zhong Cheng will solve the problem of long-distance communication and realize the dream of networking on Mars, otherwise it will be extremely unfair to these Martian pioneers.

As for whether to solve the problem of Jupiter and Saturn at the same time, it depends on the situation at the time and the attitude of the European and American Federation.

Otherwise, it is normal to delay for two or three years, and no one has any reason to blame Red Star Company.

(End of this chapter)