Chinese Space Program

[TheKutKu]

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It seems this failure will be tolerated, or at least that there won't be some intense government backlash against it, this is what an article published by main state-media Xinhua says, some excerpt:

"However, the path to the peak of scientific and technological innovation is never smooth; setbacks and failures are inevitable and should be seen as opportunities to learn and correct mistakes."

"Although this test failed, fortunately, there were no casualties, and only some property damage occurred."

"From another perspective, although this incident has sparked much discussion, occasional setbacks are hard to avoid in scientific research and industrial exploration. Some criticisms on the internet may be overly harsh. If we abandon innovation due to fear of failure, many innovations might lose their breeding ground. On the contrary, believing in professional strength and creating a moderately tolerant environment might further stimulate innovative vitality."


"It is believed that, taking this incident as a warning, commercial space-related companies will be more rigorous in safety control. In the exploration of the scientific world, failures should not become "roadblocks." With enough tolerance and support, these failures could turn into "stepping stones" for moving forward together. With eyes set on the stars and the sea, nothing can stop the steps of progress."

 

[Michel Van]

Let face it the Chinese Government not care about "mishaps" either under State or private Launch provider.
So long they launch Hardware into orbit, and stick to rules: no fraud, embezzlement and corruptions.
if get catch, if lucky they get execution.
allot to those Chinese kickstarter in Launcher will go bankrupt
but the surviver can rule the Chinese Market, so long not fall victim of conspiracy
Since the State launcher will defend there market shares at any price
here depend if Chinese Government interviene in favor of private Launcher if they on SpaceX level...

 

[Flyaway]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1808752625891856695

View: https://twitter.com/aj_fi/status/1808752625891856695

Xinhua responds to the Tianlong-3 incident. Seems like full steam ahead. It states safety is paramount but: "the process of climbing to top of the sci & tech industry is not a smooth journey. It is inevitable that there will be setbacks or even failures." ce.cn/xwzx/gnsz/gdxw…

"We must also be given the opportunity to learn lessons and correct mistakes."

-- stifling commercial space because of one incident seemed very unlikely, given the recent strong backing from central government. But rhere's more to this & let's see how Space Pioneer isn treated

https://twitter.com/x/status/1808752631340294488

View: https://twitter.com/aj_fi/status/1808752631340294488

"Although the test failed, fortunately, there was no danger, and only some houses were damaged."

-- hmmm. As others have concluded, this fully fuelled stage could've caused a catastrophe.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1808677737915371981

View: https://twitter.com/raz_liu/status/1808677737915371981

With the leaked pic + TL-3 launch release mechanism patent. I don't think they didn't run simulations with the engine bay when launching & static fire. One thing they didn't have is the vibration data. So IMO may be vibration helped to cut the hook points off like a bone saw.

 

[Archibald]

Quick list of Chinese "Falcon-like" next generation medium and heavy launchers:

Government projects: these are serious, sanctioned projects by the CASC, the traditional missile/launcher-making SOE with over 50 years of experience, which launches 50 rockets a year, including manned launches, these are as certain as Vulcan, H3 or Ariane 6 were certain, if not more.
SNIP

How do you keep track ? Thanks for the detailed summary. China has tons and tons of money, a powerful rocket industry backed by the government and military, and a colossal number of talented rocket scientists. And obviously, they are not incumbered by things like a democratic parliament, a balanced budget, or human rights. When they say "we GO" they "GO", whatever the cost.

If SpaceX Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy and SH-Starship are the new space paradigm, you can bet that the PRC will throw at his space industry whatever money, human resources, and engineering needed to get similar vehicles ASAP.

"Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead !"

 

[TheKutKu]

won

How do you keep track ? Thanks for the detailed summary. China has tons and tons of money, a powerful rocket industry backed by the government and military, and a colossal number of rocket scientists. And obviously, they are not incumbered by things like a democratic parliament, a balanced budget, or human rights. When they say "we GO" they "GO", whatever the cost.

If SpaceX Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy and SH-Starship are the new space paradigm, you can bet that the PRC will throw at his space industry whatever money, human resources, and engineering needed to get similar vehicles ASAP.

"Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead !"

Keeping track of the flashy launchers is easy, keeping track of the satellite industry, especially beyond the few major naviguation observation and LEO Internet constellation, is much harder.

@Closertospace on twitter made a non-exhaustive chart of the Public chinese space sector... And beside that, he could count 51 private chinese companies currently operating satellites.



Preliminary work on a "chinese starship" has definitely been ongoing, with the main project being the CZ-9 (for the lunar program) by CALT, who announced some progress (hot fire of their FFSC engine, 10.6m diameter tank prototype) a few months ago, and a few other organisations (such as SAST and Landspace) have also announced interest/early work on such a heavy launcher.

But I think there's a general awareness not to skip steps and that the "Falcon 9/Heavy copies" are sufficient for the near term Lunar Project and constellation deployment. After all, that's also all that Starship will be doing in the near term... And maybe some large station deployment and mars sample return, but the Chinese already have their plans for that (Tiangong's extension plan and Tianwen 3).

And well, there's also that point-to-point military cargo use of Starship that the USAF is interested in, this is one thing that could cause a kneejerk reaction from the chinese into rushing an equivalent, not unlike Buran for the soviet, but we're not yet sure how serious the USAF is about this, the announced funding do not cut it so far.
Curiously a few of the chinese launch startup are also interested in point to point rocket travel (notably Space Pioneer and Space Epoch)

 

[TheKutKu]

These are the stated launch goals for the two "Chinese starlink", Guowang and G60/Qianfan. Qianfan raised the equivalent of almost one billion USD in funding earlier this year and has its first launch planned on a Long march 6C for Early august.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1725626182975057962

View: https://x.com/DongFangHour/status/1725626182975057962

https://twitter.com/x/status/1808467935041651095

View: https://x.com/tphuang/status/1808467935041651095


So between the two, 2024-2025: ~850 satellites to be launched
2026-2027: ~1,650 satellites to be launched
2028-2030: ~17,650 satellites to be launched

For comparison, Amazon's kuiper need to launch 1,618 satellites by July 2026, so we're looking at a roughly comparable (or slightly smaller) launch campaign for the next few years.
And also for comparison, SpaceX launched about 1,850 Starlink v2 Mini over the past year (+about 40 Starshield)

Worth noting that at least G60/Qianfan's satellites are smaller than the Starlink v2 Mini, and closer in size to the earlier Starlink: Looking at the CZ-6A's capabilities (4.5 to SSO, probably a bit higher to a Starlink altitude and inclination) and the upcoming batch of 18 satellites, they likely are no more than 250kg per satellite (vs ~730 kg for a Starlink v2 mini, and 260 kg for an early Starlink),

G60/Qianfan still represents as much as 3000-3750 tons to launch over the next 6 years and a half. Including about a thousand tons per year from 2028 to 2030 included. For comparison, from Q2 2023 to Q1 2024, SpaceX launched 1,406 tons to orbit (mostly starlink, so skewed toward LEO and full capacity), while China launched 140 tons to orbit (mix of various orbits, not always to full capacity, this number could probably be doubled with the same launchers if they did and were launched to LEO*).

A roughly 10x launch mass ramp up is needed to launch these constellations, a challenge, but it's also not much more than what SpaceX is currently launching, so it looks achievable with "F9 copies"", as long as they are both numerous enough and matured.

EDIT:* Quickly estimated: The cumulative LEO launch capability (number of launches * payload to LEO of launcher) over that period is about 360 tons for Chinese launches, and about 2,100 tons for SpaceX)

 

[NMaude]

This is the dumbest rocket failure since July 2, 2013, when a Proton rocket decided to fly like an idiot and went KABBOOOOM thereafters.

Emphasis on those two words as IIRC the Proton rocket crashed due to an idiot technician who insisted on inserting the IMU's accelerometers the wrong way around despite it being designed (Including "Insert this way" arrows on them) to be inserted one way only. Hopefully the witless fool not only lost his job was jailed for criminal incompetence resulting in the destruction of a multi-million dollar rocket and its' payload.

 

[Josh_TN]

Keeping track of the flashy launchers is easy, keeping track of the satellite industry, especially beyond the few major naviguation observation and LEO Internet constellation, is much harder.

@Closertospace on twitter made a non-exhaustive chart of the Public chinese space sector... And beside that, he could count 51 private chinese companies currently operating satellites.

View attachment 733658

Preliminary work on a "chinese starship" has definitely been ongoing, with the main project being the CZ-9 (aimed at the lunar program) by CALT, who announced some progress (hot fire of their FFSC engine, 10.6m diameter tank prototype) a few months ago, and a few other organisations (such as SAST and Landspace) have also announced interest/early work on such a heavy launcher.

But I think there's a general realisation not to skip steps and that the "Falcon 9/Heavy copies" are sufficient for the near term Lunar Project and constellation deployment. After all, that's also all that Starship will be doing in the near term... And maybe some large station deployment and mars sample return, but the Chinese already have their plans for that (Tiangong's extension plan and Tianwen 3).

And well, there's also that point-to-point military cargo use of Starship that the USAF is interested in, this is one thing that could cause a kneejerk reaction from the chinese into rushing an equivalent, not unlike Buran for the soviet, but we're not yet sure how serious the USAF is about this, the announced funding do not cut it so far.
Curiously a few of the chinese launch startup are also interested in point to point rocket travel (notably Space Pioneer and Space Epoch)

Fantastic post. Something I’ve been very curious about.

 

[Josh_TN]

Emphasis on those two words as IIRC the Proton rocket crashed due to an idiot technician who insisted on inserting the IMU's accelerometers the wrong way around despite it being designed (Including "Insert this way" arrows on them) to be inserted one way only. Hopefully the witless fool not only lost his job was jailed for criminal incompetence resulting in the destruction of a multi-million dollar rocket and its' payload.

Well to be fair, a TItan II once blew a ten megaton warhead into the air because someone dropped a wrench…

 

[NMaude]

Well to be fair, a TItan II once blew a ten megaton warhead into the air because someone dropped a wrench…

Firstly, nine megaton warhead, secondly that was an accident, the incident with the Proton rocket was wilful incompetence.

 

[Michel Van]

This is the dumbest rocket failure since July 2, 2013, when a Proton rocket decided to fly like an idiot and went KABBOOOOM thereafters.

USA: hold my beer...

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PS6z9P9nqs

 

[publiusr]

@Closertospace on twitter made a non-exhaustive chart of the Public chinese space sector...

View attachment 733658

Preliminary work on a "chinese starship" has definitely been ongoing, with the main project being the CZ-9 (for the lunar program) by CALT, who announced some progress (hot fire of their FFSC engine, 10.6m diameter tank prototype) a few months ago, and a few other organisations (such as SAST and Landspace) have also announced interest/early work on such a heavy launcher.

And well, there's also that point-to-point military cargo use of Starship that the USAF is interested in...

Now I thought what hobbled the Soviet Moon Program was all the competing Chief Designers--each pushing for their own bureau to come out on top.

Is China just pushing for overall spaceflight competency with this many players?

We have football teams--they have engineering teams to raise excitement levels...