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Chinese Space Program (CNSA) & Ch. commercial launch and discussion


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3 hours ago, YNM said:

Well yeah. I was saying in context of what they could possibly achieve and stuff. A large population is still a large population, even if they don't reach the bleeding edge they still carry more potential to change things.

Yeah, well, China has a massive demographics problem. The population is aging, and isn't being replaced. This has effects on the economy, as Japan can attest. Further, women are only ~48% of the young population, thanks to the one-child policy. Here's the relevant population pyramid: 

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/74/China_single_age_population_pyramid_2020.png/797px-China_single_age_population_pyramid_2020.png

What are all those young guys gonna do? *cough* Taipeng rebellion *cough*

China has actually done something ingenious with the Belt and Road policy. By selling to younger populations in Africa (where the average age is, I think, 18) and Central Asia, they establish a younger "virtual" population. Still, they're set to be surpassed in population by India in 2026. They've gotta do something.

In addition, with most low-end labor already exported to places like Bangladesh, China is coming up on the middle income trap. It's apparently not easy to overcome.

So, I think there is some basis for the claims that Russia and China are on downward slopes. Unless they suddenly reverse their population decline, they'll lose a lot of economic influence. Out of all the major world powers, the USA is the only one with an okay-ish birthrate. 

Edited by SOXBLOX
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59 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

ISS is.

And that's ending in 2024... then it's up to commercial ventures, if anyone is interested. (sure yeah commercial venture competition w/o politics is a lot better.)

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4 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

What are all those young guys gonna do?

Moon is.

6 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

Out of all the major world powers, the USA is the only one with an okay-ish birthrate. 

So optimistic.

2 minutes ago, YNM said:

And that's ending in 2024... then it's up to commercial ventures, if anyone is interested. (sure yeah commercial venture competition w/o politics is a lot better.)

They will compete. Then join. Then compete again. That's how systems evolve.

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16 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

China has actually done something ingenious with the Belt and Road policy. By selling to younger populations in Africa (where the average age is, I think, 18) and Central Asia, they establish a younger "virtual" population. Still, they're set to be surpassed in population by India in 2026. They've gotta do something.

That's why they're upping their game level. They're not doing just the produce-in-mass-by-brute-force-if-necessary stuff anymore, they're now establishing brands that can be seen in high respect of it's own. They stop take stuff that uses merely the advantage of dirt cheap labour, like MRF waste plastic, and is now selling things out like cars or high-end brands of their own. I live in SE Asia, I know enough of their products that reach here, thank you.

I'll admit that this conversation is waay beyond the scope of this topic, but the same stuff can be seen for the advanced population situation countries as well. Japan is still doing more and more construction of their own, and they're aiming higher and higher on the tech level, sure yeah there's a lot to be questioned about whether or not they'd ever make sense financially but they're doing it. And that's with them hitting the crown at 110 million, that crown being reached a decade ago.

China would be posed to hit the crown at more than 1.6 billion. That's at least 15 times what Japan did. It's still something to be beckoned with in the few coming decades, even if the demographic layer growth is stopping. India might be posed to get it in the future sure but to me seems like they're having problems politically (unless if the whole thing with their party works to consolidate stuff to scary levels).

Edited by YNM
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Just now, kerbiloid said:

So optimistic.

Well, it's true...

In the US, births/woman is 1.6. In China, it's exactly 1, and in Russia, it's 1.5. Not far behind the US, but they also don't have huge immigration of younger populations.

6 minutes ago, YNM said:

China would be posed to hit the crown at almost 2 billion.

True, but the problem is that they're all gonna be old. Not that I have anything against that; it just doesn't work long-term.

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1 minute ago, SOXBLOX said:

True, but the problem is that they're all gonna be old. Not that I have anything against that; it just doesn't work long-term.

Well Japan is still enough to be beckoned with 1.5 decades after hitting their peak. Why doubt something that hasn't even hit the peak yet ? This goes back to what @DDE said. Don't think your "enemy" is going away.

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2 minutes ago, YNM said:

Well Japan is still enough to be beckoned with 1.5 decades after hitting their peak. Why doubt something that hasn't even hit the peak yet ? This goes back to what @DDE said. Don't think your "enemy" is going away.

Of course. But if a young China and a young Japan made such tremendous progress in the last century, what will a young, say, India do this century? I don't think they'll go away, just that they won't be able to keep up.

Anyway, it's kinda OT. And yes, I know, I brought it up...

Edited by SOXBLOX
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10 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

what will a young, say, India do this century?

They're stabilizing too.

Spoiler

1275px-India_single_age_population_pyram

Nearly every single developing country with a prospect in this world has been stabilizing their demographic strata in the past decade.

Spoiler

My own country. The big plans had always been centered about 2045 - we'll see if anything turns up by then.

1275px-Indonesia_single_age_population_p

 

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There is a proposal for a Neptune orbiter. It would launch on a Long March 5 (not B, probably).

It would be powered by a  10-kw nuclear reactor and use electric propulsion. It would use Earth and Jupiter gravity assists to get there. It would have a design lifetime of 15 years.

Bit about the communications-

Quote

In order to overcome the communication challenges posed by Neptunes large distance to Earth, Ka-band is proposed, to be supplemented by larger antenna apertures and new data encoding techniques to achieve timely communication with home base and sufficient bandwidth for transmitting scientific data.

 

Spoiler

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Apologies for the low resolution. It is unclear whether this is official or not, so take it with a grain of salt, but this is apparently the schedule for the CSS through 2022. Wikipedia "confirms" the dates, so it seems to be somewhat reliable.

April 19th, 2021- Tianhe launch

May 29th, 2021- Tianzhou 2 launch (carried EVA suits to the station, among other things)

June 10th, 2021- Shenzhou 12

September 2021- Tianzhou 3

October 2021- Shenzhou 13

March-April 2022- Tianzhou 4

May 2022- Shenzhou 14

May-June 2022- Wentian launch (on Long March 5B)

August-September 2022- Mengtian launch (on Long March 5B)

October 2022- Tianzhou 5

November 2022- Shenzhou 15 (on Long March 7, construction of the initial phase station will be complete. It is possible it will grow in the future)

Shenzhou 16 will be the first long duration crew onboard, launching in 2023.

The station is designed to accommodate future modules despite being "complete". In 2019 Italy proposed their own module, and China has stated they are open to cooperation with other nations for the station (although they kind of slapped Russia in the face in regards to the orbital inclination). However, so far there is no other space agency apart from ESA that has shown any interest.

An Orion-Shenzhou Test Project would be cool though.

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7 minutes ago, SunlitZelkova said:

There is a proposal for a Neptune orbiter. It would launch on a Long March 5 (not B, probably).

Will have to be the with-upper-stage version. Honestly I'm wondering what's their C3 is supposed to be with LM-5, kinda thinking they might need additional stages...

8 minutes ago, SunlitZelkova said:

An Orion-Shenzhou Test Project would be cool though.

If Orion is even going to fly with any frequency. More like Dragon, or maybe Starship...

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14 minutes ago, YNM said:

Will have to be the with-upper-stage version. Honestly I'm wondering what's their C3 is supposed to be with LM-5, kinda thinking they might need additional stages...

If Orion is even going to fly with any frequency. More like Dragon, or maybe Starship...

Yes. But not Starship, as it may become a military asset lol.

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7 hours ago, YNM said:

Plenty of space to return home objects, sure...

I think the worry is what can be attempted with thousands of tons of upmass per year. The ability to return finicky prototype tech back home for maintenance is just a bonus.

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The gigagrams per year is currently just a dream even for SpaceX.
The station currently being built is a 40-year old Mir. A half of it.

But that what inspires is that the inclination stays below 40°, so we don't take part in the next rounds of the upper stage lottery.
Especially if they will be launching gigagrams per year.

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On 6/4/2021 at 10:00 AM, insert_name said:

Looks like they sent up a GEO weathersat last night out of Xichang, wonder what the boosters are going to hit.

https://spacenews.com/china-launches-fengyun-4b-meteorological-satellite/

Interestingly, the Long March 3B rocket they used had a parafoil on one of the boosters to control descent after separation. It "reduced the possible landing zone" by 30%. Parafoils will be installed on all rockets (at least uncrewed launches) going forwards.

It is circled-

51232631744_4266259437_o_d.jpg

Spoiler

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The Chinese commercial space company i-Space's Hyperbola III rockets have passed the design review process. Prototypes will now be built and tested. They are hoping to start commercial launches in 2024.

We all know what happened with SpaceX, even if they don't meet that goal, I'm sure they will get it eventually.

Assuming there have been no leaks at SpaceX, the Hyperbola III is a Falcon 9 analog.

IMO, as long as they did not literally steal SpaceX design documents, I don't see anything wrong with using a superficially identical design. Why waste time reinventing the wheel? The goal of a company is profit, not pleasing internet space fans with a completely original configuration.

A similar thing happened with Buran. There was no reason why they should have built MTKVP over the design with the same aerodynamic configuration as the Americans.

Spoiler

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51232631449_76bbfde9a4_o.jpg

51231854271_b96bffdf67_o.jpg

 

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