China successfully launches new Long March 7A rocket
The new colonial movement: China today successfully launched for the first time its new Long March 7A rocket, likely designed to replace its Long March 3B.
The Long March 7A is a 60.1-meter-long, 3.35-meter-diameter kerosene and liquid oxygen launch vehicle with four side boosters, capable of delivering up to 7 metric tons of payload to GTO [geosychronoous transfer orbit]. The launcher draws on new kerosene engine technologies along with a stage modified from the older Long March 3B series, China’s current workhorse rocket, boosting China’s launch options to GTO.
The Long March 7A is more capable than the Long March 3B, which can launch 5.5 tons to GTO. By launching from the coast, it also does not incur the cost and hazards of the inland 3B launches. [China] plans to carry out 3-5 Long March 7A launches a year by 2025. The first launch of the Long March 7A failed in March 2020. A loss of pressure occurred after first stage separation, which led to engine malfunction.
The 2021 launch race:
7 SpaceX
5 China
3 Russia
1 Rocket Lab
1 Virgin Orbit
1 Northrop Grumman
1 India
The U.S. still leads China 10 to 5 in the national rankings.
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The new colonial movement: China today successfully launched for the first time its new Long March 7A rocket, likely designed to replace its Long March 3B.
The Long March 7A is a 60.1-meter-long, 3.35-meter-diameter kerosene and liquid oxygen launch vehicle with four side boosters, capable of delivering up to 7 metric tons of payload to GTO [geosychronoous transfer orbit]. The launcher draws on new kerosene engine technologies along with a stage modified from the older Long March 3B series, China’s current workhorse rocket, boosting China’s launch options to GTO.
The Long March 7A is more capable than the Long March 3B, which can launch 5.5 tons to GTO. By launching from the coast, it also does not incur the cost and hazards of the inland 3B launches. [China] plans to carry out 3-5 Long March 7A launches a year by 2025. The first launch of the Long March 7A failed in March 2020. A loss of pressure occurred after first stage separation, which led to engine malfunction.
The 2021 launch race:
7 SpaceX
5 China
3 Russia
1 Rocket Lab
1 Virgin Orbit
1 Northrop Grumman
1 India
The U.S. still leads China 10 to 5 in the national rankings.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Bob:
GTO is an intermediate orbit used to position satellites for Transfer to geosynchronous orbit, not a true geosynchonous orbit itself. As such some of the GTO mass must be reserved for transfer propellent, so the total paylod that can be placed in a to true geosynchronous orbit will be lower.
MDN: Yeah you are right. I had left out “transfer” and have added it.
“The launcher draws on new[ly] [aquired] kerosene engine technologies, . . “
They could have had an HLLV had they stuck with hypergols with RD-27O in a nine engine R-56 monoblock design. Easier re-start.