Musk and Space Exploration Technologies
Speaking of Dragon Spacecraft, we have to start with Space Exploration Technology Company and its founder elon musk. Musk, 49, was born in tshwane. He holds a bachelor's degree in economics and physics, and made his first fortune by learning programming languages by himself at a young age. At the age of 24, Musk and several other partners founded three Internet-related enterprises. Musk, who could have succeeded in the Internet field, was not satisfied with the status quo. In 2002, he sold the company and invested 1 100 million dollars to set up American Space Exploration Technology Company, which is also known as Space Exploration Technology Company.
Knowing nothing about rockets, Musk can only spend a lot of money to dig people from space agencies around the world. When he was down and out, he even bought intercontinental missiles from Russia. Although all parties were not optimistic about the commercialization of space at that time, Musk did not give up. After many failures, in 20 10, Falcon 9 of Space Exploration Technology Company successfully sent a dragon spacecraft into space, which was the first time in history that a private enterprise launched it into space and successfully returned to the spacecraft, successfully shaking the world space community. Space Exploration Technologies received a huge order from NASA to deliver materials to the International Space Station. At present, only four countries in the world have mastered the technology of launching and recycling spacecraft: the United States, the Russian Federation, China and elon musk.
There may be tens of thousands of words about the legend of Musk. In addition to aerospace, Musk also vigorously entered the fields of clean energy, electric vehicles and Hollywood entertainment. The role of Tony Stark (the movie version of Iron Man) in Marvel comic films is based on Musk. To know that Tony Stark's father is based on the famous American figure howard hughes, Musk's image in the hearts of Americans can be seen. In 20 17, Musk put forward a more ambitious plan to colonize the big rocket and Mars, claiming that 654.38+0 million people will colonize Mars in the future, and this plan is progressing steadily at present.
Falcon 9 and Dragon Ship
After talking about Musk, we will enter today's topic, Falcon 9 and Dragon Ship. Falcon 9 originated from the famous vehicle "Millennium Falcon" in Star Wars. As a fan of Star Wars, Musk also brought his childhood dreams into reality. Because the first-class rocket has nine engines, it was named Falcon 9. As a medium-sized launch vehicle, Falcon 9 can send more than 9 tons of payload into geosynchronous orbit. Due to its late appearance, this has become a major advantage of Falcon 9, which can be integrated with more advanced technologies, including the recovery and reuse of launch vehicles.
20 15 12 2 1, Falcon 9 rocket was launched for the 20th time, and the first stage rocket successfully landed at the first landing site of Cape Canaveral Air Force Base. However, this success did not come easily. After three failures (including a first-class rocket explosion accident), Musk completed the first rocket recovery in the world, greatly reducing the cost of space launch, and a large amount of funds and orders began to flood in. But in fact, the completion of recycling is only the first step to start a low-cost space launch, and how to truly realize the reusable rocket engine is the key.
Since 2008, space exploration technology company has received billions of dollars worth of launch orders, and its biggest customer is NASA. Since the space shuttle 20 1 1 retired, the United States has invested heavily to buy 70 seats on the Russian Soyuz for American astronauts to travel to and from the International Space Station. The successful launch of the Dragon manned spacecraft not only saved hundreds of millions of dollars for NASA, but also provided a new idea for the global low-cost commercial manned space launch.
Except Falcon 9, the most critical part of the whole mission is the dragon manned spacecraft. The manned dragon spacecraft project is a new generation of American manned spacecraft funded by the US government and developed and produced by Space Exploration Technology Company. Due to the high cost and poor safety performance of the space shuttle, the United States abandoned the design of the space shuttle and turned to a more traditional direction.
The "manned dragon" spacecraft adopts a two-cabin design scheme, including a crew cabin and an unsealed cabin. It can carry up to 7 astronauts, and can work 1 week when flying independently and 2 10 days when docking. The spacecraft has a diameter of 4m, a height of 8. 1m, a sidewall inclination of15 and a pressurized volume of 9.3m? , the pressureless volume is 37m3, the dry mass is 9525kg, the loading capacity is 6000kg, the downloading weight is 3000kg, and the garbage disposal capacity is 800kg.
The dragon manned spacecraft is equipped with two sets of super dragons and two sets of dragon engines for the orbital maneuver of the spacecraft. At the same time, the surface of the spacecraft's unsealed cabin is covered with a layer of solar panels, which makes the dragon spacecraft unnecessary to install additional solar wings, reducing the complexity and cost of the system. Dragon spacecraft can rendezvous and dock with the space station in both manual and automatic modes. Landing depends on two guide umbrellas and four main landing umbrellas, and it is accurately recovered by parachute deceleration-splashing.
Another revolutionary breakthrough of Dragon Spacecraft is that it abandoned the complicated instrument panel inside the spacecraft and upgraded to a fully vitrified cockpit display system. It only needs a few control buttons and a few big screens to complete a series of manipulations of the spacecraft. I don't know why, I saw that these screens are easily associated with Tesla's center console, and I don't know if Musk transplanted the concept of building a car to the spacecraft.
With the successful launch of the Dragon Spacecraft, Russia also offered an olive branch to the space exploration technology company. In the future, Russia is likely to choose Musk's low-cost manned space flight to meet the needs of Russian astronauts to and from the International Space Station.
The first year of space commercialization
The success of space exploration technology company will undoubtedly inject a shot in the arm for private space enterprises all over the world. In the future, more low-cost space projects will spring up like mushrooms after rain, and the cost of human space travel will become lower. Manned space flight is only a small step, and it is also the first step for Musk to establish a space empire. At present, its Falcon heavy-duty launch vehicle has an amazing low-earth orbit carrying capacity of 63 tons and the ability to carry planetary mining-related equipment. In 20 18, it was successfully launched with a Tesla sports car, which is currently the rocket with the strongest carrying capacity in the world. From obscurity to many firsts, it took Musk less than 20 years, and the "arrogance" slogan that once colonized Mars 1 10,000 people seems to be no longer so sci-fi.
With the leap of new materials, 3D printing and other technologies, the production cycle and production cost of aerospace products are gradually reduced, and the entry threshold is also reduced. At present, China's private aerospace enterprises have also ushered in important nodes. Private enterprises such as Zero One Club Company and Blue Arrow Aerospace have developed rapidly, and the training of aerospace researchers is also moving towards systematization and diversification. It is believed that in the near future, private space enterprises in China will also join the manned space club and make contributions to human space exploration.