CSGO Unboxing Streamer: A Charity-Driven Tycoon

Chapter 359 Rocket Recovery
【Ding! 】

[Congratulations to the host's team for winning the professional major league championship! Reward: 300,000 points!]

Golden rain falls.

RSS lived up to expectations and won the 2021 Spring Season Championship with a score of 3-0.

They had taken the first step towards their goal of a grand slam. That evening, Lu Yiming booked a local private restaurant to host a banquet for everyone from the RSS Alliance Department.

Since RSS won the S-series championship last year, the economic value of the RSS e-sports club has soared. Before the championship, many companies invested a lot of advertising because of Lu Yiming's reputation. After the championship, even more companies in the e-sports industry flocked to it.

The CSGO division is not yet profitable, but the league division has already started to break even.

Lu Yiming originally planned to stay in Jiangcheng with the team for a few days, since they would be participating in some official activities during that time, and his presence would likely have a positive impact on the team.

But during dinner that evening, he received a phone call, and then said with a serious expression, "Okay! I understand! See you in an hour!"

The originally joyful atmosphere was frozen under his serious expression. Lu Yiming rarely showed such an expression, which made everyone present start to wonder what had happened.

At this moment, Lu Yiming stood up and said, "I'm so sorry! I have some business to attend to at the company and I have to go back! You guys continue eating, drinking, and having fun! All expenses tonight will be on my personal tab!"

Fanxing Aviation Research Base.

All the original staff have been relocated, and the empty base has been taken over by Starlight Airlines. However, in order to avoid suspicion, no changes have been made to the exterior of the building; only the interior has been renovated to a certain extent.

Chen Shiping.

Lu Yiming obtained the reusable engine technology from the system. Chen Shiping is the head of the technology team and also the current chief engineer of Fanxing Airlines.

He holds dual master's degrees in aerospace engineering and aircraft design and engineering, and worked at NASA for three years. He suffered a minor disability in his left hand due to a car accident.

This level of disability wouldn't actually affect his work, but he couldn't tolerate the discrimination in the work environment, and the company's special regulations were starting to discriminate against Chinese people like him.

He resigned immediately after receiving the compensation and returned to China to start a small rocket model company. He led his team to achieve good results in domestic and international model aircraft competitions. Later, he was noticed by investors and led his team to overcome the challenges of large rocket reusable technology.

The phone call Lu Yiming received was related to him.

After saying goodbye to RSS and the others, Lu Yiming arrived at Jiangcheng Airport. His helicopter was already in place, the rotors still running. After Lu Yiming boarded the helicopter, it took off directly to the Fanxing Aviation Research Base.

"Mr. Lu!"

On the plane, Liu Zhenyun looked at Lu Yiming and smiled, "I'd appreciate it if you could come along! Has the wedding date been set? Remember to let me know in advance!"

Upon hearing this, Liu Zhenyun's face showed an embarrassed expression.

He immediately assured her that he would let her know once he had made up his mind.

It takes two hours to get from Jiangcheng to the Fanxing Aviation Research Base. The helicopter pilot was someone Lu Yiming borrowed from He Haijian. Now that the helicopter is suddenly needed in an emergency, Lu Yiming is wondering whether he should keep it.

of course.

We will still send them to the hospital. Zuoyou Fanxing Group is going to cooperate with local hospitals, and sending one or two units isn't a big deal.

As we approach our destination.

The pilots said they were locked onto by fire control radar. Compared to the captain, whose hair stood on end, the two men behind him did not react much to being locked onto by fire control radar. It was not because they were not afraid or did not understand, but simply because they trusted the people on the ground.

The plane eventually landed smoothly.

The Starry Sky Aerospace Research Base has runways for not only helicopters, but also large transport aircraft. It is a well-equipped aerospace research base, not just a site for developing rockets.

I stepped off the plane.

A group of people had been waiting for a long time by the tarmac.

Lu Yiming looked Chen Shiping up and down, examining his left hand and smiling, "Not bad! It's not shaking anymore! Looks like it really works!"

Upon learning that Chen Shiping's hand injury was not congenital, Lu Yiming had the idea of ​​helping him heal. The medicinal bath formula given to him by the system could slowly cure some stubborn old ailments.

Since the Chinese medicine prescription didn't involve any prohibited herbs, it was arranged for him directly. Hearing this, Chen Shiping smiled and nodded, saying, "Thank you so much, President Lu! My hand injury has been going on for seven or eight years, and I never thought it would heal completely. That medicinal bath must be very precious! Thank you so much, President Lu!"

Lu Yiming smiled and shook his head, saying, "Compared to talent, a little money for medicine is nothing. What time do you plan to start the experiment?"

Say something.

Lu Yiming was really surprised by how fast it would go, considering that when Chen Shiping joined the team, the handover process had only just begun.

However, the timeframe is reasonable when you consider it carefully. Although the system states that it takes six months to produce results, there is also a requirement that there should be breakthrough progress within two months.

In addition, his spending money will halve the time required, so it is indeed possible to make breakthrough progress in just one month.

However, it's unclear whether the system also factored in the resources that Fanxing Group could access. After all, Liu Zhenyun gave a brief report to Lu Yiming along the way, stating that the rapid progress was mainly due to the artificial intelligence Bai Ze.

Lu Yiming never inquired about the progress of the projects being carried out here. After all, they were classified projects, and he sometimes just couldn't control his mouth, so it was best for him not to know.

That's why they only contacted Lu Yiming just before the experiment began.

Upon hearing this, Chen Shiping indicated that everything was ready and they were just waiting for Lu Yiming to press the button. Lu Yiming shrugged and said, "Then what are we waiting for! Let's go! I can't wait to know the results of the experiment!"

The team led by Chen Shiping achieved its best historical result by sending the rocket to a height of 300 meters with a recovery accuracy of 7 centimeters.

Before Lu Yiming arrived, several experiments had been conducted, pushing the altitude to 3,000 meters with a recovery accuracy of 1 centimeter. This time, the plan was to ascend directly to the stratosphere for recovery. If the accuracy difference was no more than 3 centimeters, it would mean that the project had made a breakthrough.

The reason it was conducted at night was to avoid leaks.

Rocket recovery and reuse is not the goal, but a means to save costs. It will inevitably come at the cost of lost launch capacity. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully weigh the cost-effectiveness of the design scheme, meet certain benefit standards, and shorten the rocket reuse launch cycle as much as possible.

If the overall performance of the rocket is poor or the configuration is poorly chosen, resulting in reduced benefits from recovery and reuse, then such a "purely technological achievement" lacks practical significance.

However, Chen Shiping's plan is primarily focused on cost-saving, as the current international approach to reusable rockets mainly focuses on recovering the first-stage rocket.

The first stage of a rocket shuts down at a speed of approximately 2000 to 3000 meters per second. It is not subjected to severe aerodynamic heating, and its large structural size and numerous high-value components make it relatively inexpensive to recycle and reuse, potentially leading to greater benefits.

During the high-speed orbital insertion of the second stage of the rocket, the aerodynamic heating is intense and subject to stricter mass restrictions, making recovery and reuse far more difficult and costly than the first stage.

Chen Shiping's plan is somewhat crazy! He plans to recover and reuse all the first and second stages of the rocket. The result would be that if the cost of a rocket launch is one hundred yuan, the cost of recovering it for a second launch would be reduced to thirty percent. Due to the limitations of materials, the current theoretical number of times a rocket can be recovered is no more than twenty.

Let's take twenty times as an example.

The normal cost for 20 launches is 2,000, but if Chen Shiping's research and development project is successful, the cost for 20 launches will only be 670.

Looking at this data alone, it doesn't seem like much.

But when you scale up the cost from 20 billion to 6.7 billion, or from 200 billion to 67 billion, the importance of this technology immediately becomes apparent.

Launch center.

Standing in the huge floor-to-ceiling window, you can vaguely see some red lights flashing in the distance; that is the launch pad, which is two kilometers away from the launch center.

The plan is to push the first and second stage rockets to the stratosphere, 30 kilometers away, for recovery. The first stage rocket will separate from the second stage rocket when it reaches 20 kilometers away.

Having already received approval and with relevant staff present at the launch center, Lu Yiming pressed the ignition button after the three-second countdown ended, following the instruction to allow launch.

"Ignition at 12:07:06 AM on April 12, 2021!"

This is a recorder sent from above, noting down the time.

The fireball could be seen rising in the distance, and the light instantly illuminated the launch center.

The scene of the rocket launch was quite impressive. In the enclosed environment of the launch center, you might not feel much movement, but you could see the trees swaying.

As the rocket lifted off, the entire launch center fell silent. The numerous devices at the front monitored the rocket's ascent, while the staff observed the various data displayed on them with serious expressions.

The time has reached 127 seconds.

The recorder shouted, "Booster separation!"

Upon hearing this, Chen Shiping's expression turned serious. It wasn't that something had gone wrong, but rather that they had now reached the most crucial step.

The time has arrived 147 seconds after the rocket ignited.

"First stage rocket separation!"

"The relevant data shows everything is normal!"

"First-stage rocket separation successful! Initiate first-stage rocket recovery!"

"Signal reception normal! Backup power activated!"

"Backup power successfully activated! Recovery operation proceeding normally!"

At this moment, Chen Shiping said in a low voice, "Currently, all the work on rocket recovery commands is done manually, but the actual operation is carried out by artificial intelligence."

The original plan was to recover the rocket, which was a very complicated task. After all, the rocket could only be recovered to a designated location. The uncontrollable rocket recovery meant that the landing point could only be the ocean, and the salvage cost was simply not worthwhile.

Hearing this, Lu Yiming nodded.

At this point, the second-stage rocket was still ascending. As the fairing separated, the second-stage rocket shut down its engines and began freefall.

The reason for shutting down the engine was to attempt to restart it in mid-air. In reality, the actual recovery process involves directly igniting the retro-rockets after separation to send the separated rocket near the landing area, and then starting the free fall after engine shutdown to prepare for a second engine restart for deceleration and descent.

Throughout the process, the engine needs to ignite multiple times to decelerate in order to achieve a smooth landing. However, Chen Shiping's plan is to add electronic fuel injection boosters to the first and second stage rockets. Don't underestimate the power of the electronic fuel injection boosters. Thanks to solid-state battery technology combined with the electronic fuel injection power system obtained from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, this is the key to enabling the first and second stage rockets to land accurately.

Apart from the tail booster, the rocket is equipped with eight small electronic fuel injection boosters around its perimeter. With solid-state batteries as energy reserves, the electronic fuel injection engine can ditch its original bulky power source.

At 332 seconds, the second-stage rocket shut down its engine, and the first-stage rocket was about to reach the designated landing site for vertical takeoff and landing recovery.

Normally, the best way to recover a traditional rocket is by using a parachute to land it on a designated water surface.

However, the downside is that the landing location is uncontrollable, which increases recovery costs.

Vertical take-off and landing recovery is a development trend that has gradually emerged in recent years.

Simply put, the first stage of the rocket reserves some fuel after separation, and the main engine restarts during descent to ensure that the first stage lands on a sea platform or land landing site.

This design enables the rocket's first stage to be recovered over a wide area, facilitating rapid refurbishment at the factory and offering good economic benefits.

However, most rocket vertical takeoff and landing recovery schemes do not have hovering capabilities and rely on landing legs with strong load-bearing capacity to withstand the landing impact, which carries considerable risk.

Currently, some ground-based landing aid systems are under development, attempting to apply technologies such as rope net capture to replace landing legs, which is expected to improve the reliability of recovery.

However, Chen Shiping has prepared a specially designed recovery platform for rockets that can take off and land vertically. Using this platform, rockets that do not have hovering capabilities can land smoothly.

of course.

The requirements are also very high; the landing error cannot exceed three centimeters. The ability to achieve this technology mainly relies on the technical support provided by the artificial intelligence Bai Ze.

There are two large screens at the launch center, each displaying eight images, but they are all black and you can't see anything on them.

But soon.

One of the displays shows a light spot approaching. When the light spot appears in all eight cameras simultaneously and then disappears, the staff member in charge of controlling the scene presses a button.

At this point, the black in the image disappeared, but it was all smoke and the specific situation could not be seen until three minutes later when the figure of the pen and paper on the recovery platform of the second-stage rocket gradually became visible.

At this moment, a staff member looked at the various data displayed on the screen in front of him, then turned to Lu Yiming and the others behind him and said happily, "The first-stage rocket was successfully recovered! The error was less than one centimeter!"

Upon hearing this, everyone's expressions brightened, but they didn't immediately start cheering.

five minutes later.

On another screen, a point of light appeared. After the point of light disappeared, the black faded, and as the smoke dissipated, the main body of the second-stage rocket was revealed, standing upright in the middle of the recovery platform.

"Second stage rocket successfully recovered! Error within one centimeter!"

As soon as these words came out.

The crowd immediately erupted in cheers!
(End of this chapter)