China tests vertical landing of small rocket from barge at sea
A commercial division of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) has successfully test flown its own a very small version of SpaceX’s Grasshopper, doing a vertical lift off from a barge at sea and then landing vertically on that barge.
The rocket prototype flew at an altitude of more than 1,000 meters, descended in a smooth hovering fashion and then decelerated thanks to the engine reverse thrust. The landing speed was reduced to less than two meters per second at the final stage before the rocket touched down steadily with a landing precision of under 10 meters.
The landing test took about 10 minutes, the CAS institute revealed.
The small scale of the rocket, as shown by the screen capture above, taken from the short video CAS produced of the flight, shows that CAS is a long way yet from using this technology in an orbital flight. Nonetheless, it demonstrates that at least two Chinese pseudo-companies are working hard to copy SpaceX’s reusable Falcon 9 first stage. With this test CAS has demonstrated it now has the software and fine engine control for vertical rocket landings. Based on the image of its proposed rockets at this tweet, this prototype will eventually lead to the development of larger orbital versions that look remarkably similar to what SpaceX produces.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
A commercial division of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) has successfully test flown its own a very small version of SpaceX’s Grasshopper, doing a vertical lift off from a barge at sea and then landing vertically on that barge.
The rocket prototype flew at an altitude of more than 1,000 meters, descended in a smooth hovering fashion and then decelerated thanks to the engine reverse thrust. The landing speed was reduced to less than two meters per second at the final stage before the rocket touched down steadily with a landing precision of under 10 meters.
The landing test took about 10 minutes, the CAS institute revealed.
The small scale of the rocket, as shown by the screen capture above, taken from the short video CAS produced of the flight, shows that CAS is a long way yet from using this technology in an orbital flight. Nonetheless, it demonstrates that at least two Chinese pseudo-companies are working hard to copy SpaceX’s reusable Falcon 9 first stage. With this test CAS has demonstrated it now has the software and fine engine control for vertical rocket landings. Based on the image of its proposed rockets at this tweet, this prototype will eventually lead to the development of larger orbital versions that look remarkably similar to what SpaceX produces.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
As Robert suggests, “this [reusable, vertical landing] prototype will eventually lead to the development of larger orbital versions that look remarkably similar to what SpaceX produces.”
As do China’s moon and Mars rovers with respect to JPL’s robotic explorers, lol. Imitation remains the sincerest form of flattery, but it is nice to have someone else do all of the laborious, test to destruction and then try again R&D work for you proving that, yes, it can be done.
I notice the test article is topped off by a scale model of a proposed manned capsule design we first saw pictures of some months ago, so these tests are presumably being run by the same faux-commercial outfit that produced those renderings. The capsule design is noteworthy for being essentially a Crew Dragon look-alike except for the large viewports – those being equally obviously a straight steal from Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital vehicle.
Hopping and landing vehicles of roughly the size of the one pictured – and some that were bigger – was pioneered two decades ago by the late Masten Space and Armadillo Aerospace companies. The Masten vehicles,, at least, are still in service as research testbeds, though now owned by lunar lander company Astrobotic. The one new wrinkle in these PRC tests is using a floating barge from which to perform the launching and to which the vehicle returns for landing.
All of this being said, one hesitates to indict the PRC for being so far behind the times as few in Western aerospace have done anything even comparable to these tests either, though it seems that may change in the next couple of years if Relativity Space and Stoke Space manage to do what they intend. Recoverability of even the booster stage of a vehicle large enough to put a significant payload into orbit is still very much TBD in the PRC. Given the growing demographic and economic disintegration of the PRC, time, in this endeavor, is very much not on the PRC’s side.
I wonder how much in US dollars this test vehicle cost the university?
But we all know things are way cheaper in cost controlled China.
“…but it is nice to have someone else do all of the laborious, test to destruction and then try again R&D work for you proving that, yes, it can be done.”
It saves you from all those dead-ends, since you know that everything you try CAN work, as long as you just look over the better student’s paper very carefully.