Share the QR code < / P > < p > with wechat scanning code to friends and circles of friends < / P > < p > < / P > < p > on December 2. Last Friday, when most Americans woke up from the Thanksgiving Carnival and went to the mall to participate in "Black Friday" shopping, Elon Musk, founder of American space exploration technology company SpaceX, was still working. Instead of searching for what he likes, he is busy sending e-mails to the company's employees < p > musk told employees that SpaceX was facing a "production crisis of Raptor engine". This means that it is difficult for the company to produce enough high-tech rocket engines to support the plan to test starships and super heavy rocket boosters in 2022 < p > musk wrote: "I planned to take a holiday this weekend. This is my first leisure weekend in a long time, but in fact, I have to stay on the Raptor engine production line all night and even all weekend. Unless you have very urgent family affairs or can't go back to Hawthorne headquarters, we all need to go all out to recover from this production disaster." If the plan does not succeed, "we will face a real risk of bankruptcy," he added No < / P > < p > Figure 1: the first ignition test of SpaceX Raptor rocket engine flight version < / P > < p > for outsiders who see this email, if they don't know much about musk or its space exploration technology company SpaceX and don't have a strong demand for rockets, they may think that the world's richest man is crazy, or a big bastard, or both There is no doubt that this will confirm those who think "musk is a terrible person" People's point of view. < / P > < p > Why did he send overtime email on Thanksgiving? < / P > < p > but there is another side to the story. It is true that musk is a demanding boss. But he is not crazy. Many of his employees appreciate his leadership. < / P > < p > Why did he send this email during Thanksgiving? Because SpaceX does face difficulties in raptor engine production Some kind of crisis. This is a powerful methane liquid oxygen rocket engine, which will power the Starship and super heavy rocket being developed by SpaceX. Moreover, in the coming Thanksgiving weekend, the situation is obviously worse than musk thought. < / P > < p > the development of Raptor engine is very important for SpaceX because the company undertakes two unprecedented huge projects at the same time Space technology projects. Each project will cost billions of dollars to achieve its goals and provide some return on investment. Ultimately, the success of SpaceX also depends on these two projects because they are interdependent to some extent. < / P > < p > SpaceX is developing a starship launch system with the ultimate goal of launching enough personnel, materials, power, technology and more resources to fire Build a self-sufficient human base on the planet. This may sound like a crazy plan for a private company, but it is undoubtedly Musk's goal. < / P > < p > according to Musk's own estimation, the payload to be transported is "no less than 1 million tons" In contrast, the United States, Russia, Europe and China's space agencies have launched far less than 10 tons of payloads to Mars in the past 60 years. In order to help raise funds for the entire huge project, musk ultimately depends on the income from the star chain program. < / P > < p > for the development of interstellar spacecraft, SpaceX undertook a capital intensive project in southern Texas A new spaceport and manufacturing plant will be built near boccachica beach, and a large Raptor engine production facility will be built in central Texas. It is reported that SpaceX will spend about $1 billion a year to develop a Starbase At the same time, SpaceX is building a giant Satellite Internet in low earth orbit to provide broadband Internet around the world. The company has operated more than 1600 satellites in space, more than the total number of satellites currently operated by any other company or country in the world. The satellite chain Internet has About 140000 customers, but this service is far from reaching its limit and profitable. < / P > < p > in order to achieve truly global coverage and reliable services, SpaceX needs to complete its satellite Internet layout. This is the "satellite chain V2" mentioned by musk in his email . it represents about 12000 second-generation satellites of SpaceX. These satellites are slightly larger than the original version, so they also have more capabilities. < / P > < p > to put these satellites into orbit, SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket needs to be launched about 300 times. Although this rocket is currently the lowest cost and most efficient rocket in the world, it is still expensive. Assuming that each launch The internal cost is $25 million, which means $7.5 billion. Moreover, these launches may take 7 to 10 years to complete, which is unacceptable for musk. Finally, these launch costs do not include billions of dollars for the construction of the satellite itself and the ground terminal for customers to receive signals. < / P > < p > SpaceX solves these problems by designing a larger and complete space Fully reusable starship. Each starship launch may send about 400 star chain satellites into low earth orbit. Therefore, starships that can be put into practical use can help solve many problems faced by SpaceX. At the same time, rockets used to launch starships can put star chain satellites into orbit faster, at a much lower cost, and create Commercial and government launch revenue. < / P > < p > therefore, musk and SpaceX's biggest focus in the near future is to put the Starship into orbit, prove that the aircraft and its boosters have the ability to land, and then reuse them. The company hopes to conduct an orbital test flight of the starship in early 2022. < / P > < p > Raptor engine is very important < / P > < p > this is the purpose of Raptor engine In the initial test flight, SpaceX will use 29 Raptor engines to power the super heavy rocket booster and 6 engines on the Starship. Therefore, when the Starship and booster cannot be reused, each launch means that the company will lose 35 Raptor engines. This is an amazing number, both in cost and cost This is true in terms of production time. < / P > < p > Figure 2: This starship prototype uses only three Raptor engines to provide power during suborbital test flights < / P > < p > in contrast, NASA provided $1 billion to Aerojet Rocketdyne a few years ago to restart the main engine of the space shuttle ?
2023-03-22 10:04:47