In recent years, with the rise of the lunar exploration boom, the heavy rockets necessary for manned lunar landing and deep space exploration have received more and more attention. According to recognized standards, a launch vehicle with a carrying capacity of more than 50 tons in low-Earth orbit is considered a heavy rocket, but it is not easy to build such a “big power weapon” that integrates the most advanced aerospace technology.
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Two U.S. super rockets battle it out
After several delays, the “Space Launch System (SLS)” heavy rocket tailored for the U.S. “Artemis” manned lunar landing program finally stood on the launch pad(The following figure). The BBC said that the “largest, most expensive and longest-delayed super rocket in American history” is about to undergo the most crucial “wet dress rehearsal” before its official launch on April 3.
At present, the combination of the SLS rocket and the new “Orion” lunar exploration spacecraft has been prepared on the launch tower. According to the report, the SLS is a behemoth with a height of nearly 100 meters. Its thrust is 15% greater than that of the “Saturn V” heavy rocket used in the “Apollo” moon landing program during the Cold War, enough to send a 95-ton payload into the low earth orbit. The upgraded model can increase the carrying capacity of low-earth orbit to 130 tons.
According to NASA’s plan, the April 3 test will rehearse the full launch process, including the actual injection of propellant, and will not stop until about 10 seconds before ignition. Assuming all goes well, NASA will conduct the first launch of the SLS rocket as early as May of this year. It sent the “Orion” spacecraft to lunar orbit 450,000 kilometers away from the earth. The spacecraft went around the far side of the moon and returned to the earth, landing in the Pacific Ocean near California.
But the SLS Rockets are facing huge controversy. The assessment submitted by the U.S. Office of Inspector General, which audits NASA programs, said the average launch cost of an SLS rocket was a staggering $4 billion, so much so that the report described the SLS program as “unsustainable.”
As NASA prepares to test the SLS rocket, the larger heavy rocket has also been erected on the launch pad. This is the “Starship” of SpaceX. The latter consists of two parts: a first-stage booster called a “super-heavy rocket” and an upper-stage spacecraft called “Starship”, which together reach a record height of 118 meters.
According to SpaceX’s plan, the future “Starship” will also be used to land on the moon and Mars. The maximum thrust of the “Starship” combination reaches an astonishing 7,500 tons, and it can easily send a load of more than 100 tons into low-Earth orbit. Both the “Super Heavy Rocket” and the “Starship” are designed to be fully reusable. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk announced that within the next two or three years, the launch cost of the “Starship” will drop to less than $10 million.
According to the US “Space” website, Musk recently revealed that the “Starship” will conduct its first space test as soon as May, and its flight altitude will exceed 100 kilometers and circle the earth before landing in the Pacific Ocean near Kauai, Hawaii. .
In addition to the “Starship”, SpaceX’s previously launched “Falcon Heavy” rocket is the largest launch vehicle in service, which can send about 64 tons of payload into space. But SpaceX has determined that the rocket is not intended for manned missions.
Experts interviewed by the “Global Times” reporter said that in terms of technological maturity, the current SLS rocket is even better. It adopts a large number of mature technologies of the space shuttle, and its reliability has been verified. Therefore, the SLS rocket only needs to complete one unmanned verification launch, and it will carry astronauts to actually advance the “Artemis” manned lunar landing project. The current completion of the “Starship” project is very low. Even if the first space launch is successful, it does not mean that it will be put into use soon. Musk said that the current “Starship” is still constantly updating the design and has not yet been finalized.
Russian heavy rocket still in planning
The Soviet Union has competed fiercely with the United States in the field of space exploration for decades. As the main heir to the Soviet space heritage, Russia has successively proposed multi-type heavy rocket designs. But as far as the current progress is concerned, they are basically in the planning state.
In the 1970s, in order to compete with the United States for manned landing on the moon, the Soviet Union developed the N1 heavy launch vehicle, but it was forced to give up after four consecutive failed launches. In 1987, the Soviet Union successfully launched the “Energy” heavy rocket for carrying the “Blizzard” space shuttle for the first time, and its low-Earth orbit carrying capacity reached 100 tons. But with the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the dismantling of the “Blizzard” space shuttle program, the “Energy” heavy rocket withdrew from the stage of history.
For a long time, Russia had to rely on Soviet-era Soyuz and Proton rockets to maintain space launches. Since 1994, Russia’s Khrunichev National Aerospace Research and Production Center has proposed the “Angara” rocket project using clean energy. This series of rockets includes three levels of “light”, “medium” and “heavy”. The “Angara-100” rocket proposed by the United States and Russia during the “Honeymoon Period” has the highest thrust, and its low-Earth orbit transport capacity exceeds 100 tons, which is enough to meet the needs of the manned moon landing “Space Exploration Vision” proposed by then US President Bush. However, due to various reasons, the progress of the “Angara” rocket has been slow, and Russia has abandoned the planning of this series of heavy rockets, and instead prioritizes ensuring the use of the “Angara-A5” large rocket to perform manned space missions.
In 2009, Russia began to develop the “Ross M” series of carrier rockets, and it is planned to be put into use in 2015 to carry out manned and cargo spaceship launches at the Vostok Launch Site in the Far East. Depending on the model, the Ross M can deliver payloads ranging from 6.5 to 50 tons to low Earth orbit. But in 2011, the Russian government announced that it would stop the development of the rocket.
In 2016, Russia proposed another heavy rocket design, the “Yenisei” rocket. It has become a key vehicle for Russia’s manned moon landing and the construction of a lunar base. Its low-Earth orbit capacity is not less than 80 tons, and subsequent models can be upgraded to 100 tons, and the lunar orbit transportation capacity is at least 20 tons, to meet the requirements of 2030. The demand for a generation of “Eagle” manned spacecraft (20 tons) into lunar orbit. Russia also plans to develop the “Don” heavy rocket on its basis, with a low-Earth orbit carrying capacity of 130 tons, which can be used to launch Russia’s moon base module. However, due to the excessive cost of the entire project and the failure to consider the application of the latest aerospace technologies such as reusability, Russia announced in 2021 that it will suspend the technical design of the “Yenisei” heavy rocket. Russia’s manned lunar landing project may instead be carried out jointly by multiple “Angara-A5” large rockets. They will send the manned spacecraft, the lunar landing system and the space tugboat into low-Earth orbit respectively through multiple launches, and then perform on-orbit docking before landing on the moon.
China’s heavy rocket is in the development stage
After the successful launch of China’s Long March 5 series of large-scale launch vehicles, the outside world has paid great attention to “China’s heavy rocket project for deep space exploration”.
According to the US “Space” website, China’s current rocket with the strongest carrying capacity in low-Earth orbit is the Long March 5 series rocket, which has a carrying capacity of 25 tons in low-Earth orbit. According to the report, China began to propose the Long March 9 heavy rocket with a carrying capacity of up to 140 tons in low-Earth orbit since 2018, and is expected to launch around 2028. Foreign media also speculate that the core stage of the Long March 9 heavy rocket will be 10 meters in diameter, more than 103 meters in height, and have a take-off thrust of more than 4,000 tons. In addition, it adopts reusable rocket technology to reduce launch costs.
According to public reports, Luan Enjie, the first commander-in-chief of China’s lunar exploration project in 2021, confirmed in an interview that the demonstration stage of China’s 100-ton heavy-duty launch vehicle has been basically completed and has entered the follow-up stage of project approval. The five” period was launched to meet the needs of China’s aerospace industry to go deeper into space.
Jiang Jie, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and chief designer of the First Academy of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, also revealed in an interview with a reporter from the Global Times during the two sessions this year that my country’s heavy-duty launch vehicle with cross-generational significance is under development, and the development process requires eight to eight ten years. This heavy-duty launch vehicle can leapfrog our country’s ability to enter and utilize space. Its low-Earth orbit carrying capacity reaches 100 tons, and the Earth-Moon transfer orbit has a carrying capacity of 50 tons. It has a wide range of tasks and strong adaptability. It can be used for large-scale launch missions in low-Earth orbits such as space modules and space power stations, as well as deep space exploration missions such as manned moon landing, manned Mars/asteroid exploration, and solar system marginal exploration. This rocket will enable my country’s space activities to enter a new stage of large-scale detection and safeguard my country’s dominant position in space exploration and space development.