China's Space Program Thread II

[by78]

The 50-ton 1st-stage Cangqiong engine for the Pallas-1 rocket has accumulated more than 20,000 seconds in test runs, confirming its performance and reliability. Galactic Energy plans to produce 24 Pallas-1 per year.

Galactic Energy has successfully completed a cold flow test on the second stage liquid oxygen delivery system of the Pallas-1 reusable rocket.

 

[by78]

Different payloads and configurations for the various Chang'e (CE) lunar exploration missions. From left to right: Chang'e-5 (CE-5) mission payload, early CE-7 payload plan, the current CE-7 payload plan, and CE-8 mission payload.

 

[by78]

Tiandu-2 has successfully separated from Queqiao-2/Magpie Bridge 2. Tiandu-2 features China's first 3D-printed aluminum propellant tank for satellites, which is currently operating as designed, marking a minor milestone.

Infrared images sent back by the Tiandu satellites.

 

[huemens]

High-resolution images of earth taken by Shenzhou-17 taikonauts.

Where's this place?

 

[Taiban]

A paper by US Author on "ASYMMETRIC WARFARE IN SPACE Five Proposals from Chinese Strategic Thought"

 

[tacoburger]

China is busy investing billions into mass producing satellites and rockets but there doesn't seem to be the same investment going into launch site infrastructure. China's payload demands and rocket supply is going to skyrocket in the near future. It's clear that launchpad availability is going to be the bottleneck in China's launch market going forward. Does anybody know why the commercial launchpad in the Wenchang commercial launch site can only support 16 launches a year? That's one launch every 3 weeks, by comparison launchpads in America are capable of launching weekly.

Also why not build more coastal launch sites? Especially in Wenchang, the supporting infrastructure is already there, is there any technical reason why you can't build launchpad-3/4/5 a few kilometers apart? Landspace and Space pioneer are building new launchpads in Jiuquan, but this doesn't seem preferable for their reusable rockets, they will need to build multiple landing sites depending on mission profile and this will limit their flexbility in launching any payloads into weird orbits that will not line up with existing landing sites. And the TL-3 and ZQ-3 are all too large to be easily transported inland anyway. Reusable rockets seem like they will work best with coastal launch sites and barges.

So why don't a couple of companies just pool their money togethor and build more launchpads in Wenchang or an entirely new coastal launch site?

 

[tiancai8888]

When it comes to infrastructure and technology, newer is better. There's a reason why there's there's terms for "newspace" and "oldspace". I'm just asking why the brand new Wenchang launch pads have lower launch rates than decades old launchpads in America, I'm legit just curious.

By this logic, you cannot criticize anything. Haiti literally being run by gangs and eating people? Cannot say anything because it's not my country, I'm too demanding by asking failed states to stop eating people because I don't live there.

Anyway, this is clearly an issue within the chinese space sector, even the private companies have talked about how the lack of launchpad availability is gonna to be a bottleneck. Again, I'm just curious, you see billions being poured into satellites and rockets production but not launchsites? Even when the private companies are investing into new launch sites, it's for the inland sites, and not the existing coastal launch site or brand new coastal launch sites, even though reusable rockets would work better using coastal launch sites. Again, why?

Hainan is a populated province, especially at the coastline. It needs the Gov to clear the land and find new place to relocate the local villagers first before anything could happen. It's expensive. The land is the one of most scarce resource at costline areas. It won't be a smart decision for the private LSPs to spend billions to buy lands with their current financial state. Jiuquan doesn't has such problem.

 

[lcloo]

Hainan is a populated province, especially at the coastline. It needs the Gov to clear the land and find new place to relocate the local villagers first before anything could happen. It's expensive. The land is the one of most scarce resource at costline areas. It won't be a smart decision for the private LSPs to spend billions to buy lands with their current financial state. Jiuquan doesn't has such problem.

True, the average property price on Hainan island in 2024 is RMB16,156.74 per sq metre. or 2,231 USD per meter square. in Jiuquan property average property cost is RMB3,050 per sq metre, or USD421 per meter square. The desert where the Jiuquan space launch site is located, the land prices would be much much lower then the average of USD 421.

Beach front property are premium lands because of tourism and would cost even much higher than the average price, and the space launching sites are always located near sea front for safety reason.

If the need for more frequent launches arises, sea based platform off the island of Hainan may be a better choice. However, there is a problem of annual typhoon season in South China Sea, which makes Hainan island not an ideal all year round all weather launching location.

 

[tiancai8888]

True, the average property price on Hainan island in 2024 is RMB16,156.74 per sq metre. or 2,231 USD per meter square. in Jiuquan property average property cost is RMB3,050 per sq metre, or USD421 per meter square. The desert where the Jiuquan space launch site is located, the land prices would be much much lower then the average of USD 421.

Beach front property are premium lands because of tourism and would cost even much higher than the average price, and the space launching sites are always located near sea front for safety reason.

If the need for more frequent launches arises, sea based platform off the island of Hainan may be a better choice. However, there is a problem of annual typhoon season in South China Sea, which makes Hainan island not an ideal all year round all weather launching location.

Yes, and most of the constellation missions are aiming towards SSO. Most of south area of JSLC that first stage could reach are also deserts. It's also simlpe & cheap to build the first stage landing area at there. The first stage won't travel that long when these private LSPs start reusing them. They could build refurbish factory at JSLC and only transporting the fresh second stages.

 

[by78]

The Chairman of Galactic Energy revealed in an interview that his company plans to build a rocket testing facility in Wenchang to inspect and maintain recovered reusable rockets and to prepare them for their next flights.

In a sign that private launch providers are quickly coalescing their infrastructure around Wenchang, i-Space/Interstellar Glory also announced that it plans to build a rocket assembly and testing facility in Wenchang, which will have the capacity to inspect and recycle 40 recovered reusable rockets annually.

Yet another private launch provider is building a launch vehicle assembly and testing plant in Wenchang.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

near launchpad no.2 of the Hainan Commercial Spaceport, which will be used to inspect recovered rockets and prepare them for their next flights.