Chapter 183 Commercial Praising
Musk’s flattery is not unreasonable. Currently, only Xiaomi’s Ultra has obtained the second-generation perovskite battery technology. Tesla also wants to obtain it and apply it in the next generation of updates. On a wide range of Tesla models, unlike now, only the Cybertruck uses perovskite batteries.
At the same time, he also hopes to promote cooperation on topological semimetals. In a sense, he comes with the entire Amerikan mission.
Big shots in Washington are under election pressure, and everyone must speak harshly.
At this critical time point, the federal business leaders need to play the role of lubricant.
As a key figure with a large number of interests in China, Musk is regarded as one of the best lubricants. You must know that this role was previously played by Bill Gates.
"Oh? Wright, tell me, I am worried about SpaceX." Musk became interested. In his opinion, Chen Yuanguang, who has single-handedly managed the Light Armor Aerospace, is qualified to offer opinions.
Unlike Bezos, who is only responsible for investment and management, Chen Yuanguang’s identity as a scientist provides extra credibility to his rhetoric.
“At present, no one can get rid of fossil fuels and enter the era of electric drive, and starships are extremely large spacecraft.
Then you shouldn’t want everything.< br>
At this time it is necessary to give up some thermal efficiency of the fuel. "Chen Yuanguang said.
"To put it simply, don't always think about igniting the upper stage when the launch vehicle separates. Before complete separation, the upper stage should ignite to prepare for the subsequent flight. ”
Starship is an absolutely crazy plan. As crazy as Falcon 9 is, Starship is more than three times as crazy.
Because its first-stage rocket has enough Composed of 33 engines.
There was once a starship that was so crazy, that was the former Damao N1.
Before Starship, N1 had always held the record for the most engines fired on a rocket, with a total of 30 engines.
All four launches of N1 in history ended in failure, because in the field of aerospace power, the engine essentially means failure points. The more failure points, the greater the probability of failure.
Even if the probability of a single engine failure is 95%, 95% to the 33rd power is less than 20%.
In reality, young space enthusiasts remain cautious about the arrival of starships. With great enthusiasm, however, they have forgotten the disastrous consequences of the N1 and so many engines, let alone as many as 33 engines.
What’s worse is that in order to pursue extreme thermal efficiency and reduce costs as much as possible, SpaceX’s starship is still pursuing the limit, and performs a secondary ignition after the first and second stages of the rocket are separated.
"Wright, you are right." Musk quickly thought of the key point after hearing this (because this is a strategy SpaceX itself used in the process of upgrading starships, so I borrowed it).
“Yes, SpaceX’s choice means that there are many potential faults that cannot be eliminated.” Chen Yuanguang continued.
“We should consider switching the starship directly to the hot stage, and install a heat shield and ventilation valve room on the super-heavy aircraft that will fly next, and then add a steel plate under the orbital launcher. By spraying water to dissipate the destructive power of the Raptor engine."
This time Musk was not flattering, he said sincerely: "Wright, I should have given you half of SpaceX's shares to let you stay in SpaceX. If SpaceX had you, I think we would have established a base on the moon by now.”
When Musk communicates with some academic people, he often talks about Chen Yuanguang, almost all academic people. He admired Chen Yuanguang endlessly, thinking that his wide span and keen sense of smell were rare in the world, and no one could even compare with him.
Now he finally knew what smell was.
Musk did not expect that the other party could deduce such key optimization points just through detailed reports in the news.
If the design of Trailblazer 2 still relies on future technology, then the optimization suggestions for the starship are completely reflected by Chen Yuanguang’s own level in the aerospace field.
Standing on the shoulders of taller giants, he naturally has a keener vision to see through the loopholes in the current design of super-heavy spacecraft.
“If I worked at SpaceX, I’m afraid we would have a huge quarrel because of our different opinions on how humans should go into space.” Chen Yuanguang said.
Musk is an out-and-out tyrant at work and is known for being harsh with his subordinates. Even if he tolerates you in the short term because of your talent, he will still be difficult to work with in the long term.
“You hope to go to Mars as soon as possible, and hope that through continuous financing, you can draw a wonderful blueprint for investors and ultimately realize your desire to go to Mars. In the process, humans will gradually get rid of fossil fuels.”
To put it nicely, it is a wonderful blueprint; to put it badly, it is just a pie in the sky.
This group of entrepreneurs is more successful than the other. Musk succeeded by relying on his past experience in PayPal and NASA's favor.
“But in this process, it is easy to collapse due to the break of the capital chain. Compared with space mining, it will be easier to build a complete positive cycle.
What's more important is that it will operate automatically after achieving its goals, and no longer needs to rely on financing to exert external force on the project. ”
Musk’s plan is so exaggerated that 10% of the world’s GDP and more than 10 trillion U.S. dollars will be invested in the Mars project for an entire year. This is unrealistic.
More importantly Yes, once American loses its current status, its financing ability will plummet.
“Wright, I don’t think mining in space is any easier than going to Mars.
In a sense, space mining is even more difficult. "Musk shook his head.
Chen Yuanguang replied: "No, no, no, it depends on how you define space mining.
If it is just to go to an asteroid and bring some materials back, then Neon has already done it. If it is to be truly meaningful It is also not difficult to mine metal substances
It is not easy to generate income and the income can cover the expenditure.
But we do not need to achieve the latter, we only need to be able to mine. Metal materials are enough. After achieving this, all that is left is to wait for the technology to mature.
I think it is difficult to go to Mars. The biggest key point is that the current rockets will be affected by Ziolko. It is governed by John Fsky’s rocket kinetic energy equation, and our subjective will cannot change this.”
Simply put, the rocket kinetic energy equation contains three momentums. After two of them are determined, the remaining one will also be determined.
The three momentums are the change in rocket speed, the total energy of the rocket fuel, and the mass fraction of the fuel.
The fuel mass fraction refers to the specific gravity of the fuel required compared to the total weight of the rocket.
“We relied on hundreds of tons of fuel to suddenly escape from the Earth’s thick atmosphere. There was no other way to enter space except for this.
However, until today, rockets are highly Relying on Newton's three laws, this results in a very high risk for a manned spacecraft to transcend the earth's orbit within a certain period of time. Like the Apollo missions that went to the moon, its success rate is already high in my opinion. It’s a miracle.”
It was a very, very grandiose thing for the Federation to achieve manned landing on the moon in the 1960s, and to be able to come back in the end. This was a small probability event among small probabilities.
Some netizens compared it to saying that the probability is the same as if someone sat on a log and crossed the Pacific Ocean. To be honest, the probability of success may be even lower than this.
After Chen Yuanguang finished speaking, Musk nodded: "Yes, unless we turn fossil fuels into other energy sources, but this is not realistic in the short term, and we will not even see it in our lifetime.
Humanity can only rely on fossil fuels without batteries
The biggest problem with current spacecraft using fossil fuels is that they are too bulky and cannot be controlled after takeoff.
We need to add a new source of power to the spacecraft after it enters space to make it maneuverable. "
"In the short term, solar cells or small nuclear fission reactors can do this. "Chen Yuanguang said.
Nuclear fusion is not realistic in the short term. Even if it is realized, its size cannot be applied to spacecraft, but nuclear fission can. While scientists are exploring nuclear fusion, they are also studying Small nuclear fission.
Like nuclear submarines and nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, they all use small nuclear fission reactors.
"NASA has been doing related explorations. The problem is that the risk of nuclear fission is too great. Fossil fuel rockets explode in the air, causing limited damage.
Once the rocket powered by nuclear fission explodes, it will cause The entire ecology has been irreversibly affected.
I once talked about this matter when discussing this matter with NASA experts. He joked that once we use nuclear-powered rockets, every launch will take place. The federation will lose a rocket launch base." Musk laughed.
This refers to the explosion caused by the nuclear fission rocket, which will cause the nuclear pollution in this area to exceed the standard and make it unusable.
“So let’s look forward to a breakthrough in photovoltaic technology. Perovskite cells are far from enough.” Chen Yuanguang said.
After talking with Musk, Musk wanted to sign a strategic cooperation agreement with Guangjia Aerospace, but Guangjia Aerospace was a Chinese company and was on the White House list, so he had no choice but to give up.
And he hoped that some SpaceX engineers could come to Guangjia Aerospace to exchange and learn, but Chen Yuanguang declined politely, saying it was for study, who knows what they were here for.
“Sorry, Guangjia Aerospace has a large number of commercial secrets, and it is difficult for us to distinguish which ones are insensitive. When SpaceX engineers come, they probably won’t gain much, except for a trip to China at public expense. "Chen Yuanguang is very straightforward.
"I think we can cooperate on electric vehicles. I think building cars is very interesting, so I plan to acquire a car company. Are you interested in playing with me?" Chen Yuanguang asked.
It wasn’t that he was interested, but that Lin Jia was interested. Lotus Auto executives who were backed by Geely came to see her several times.
After having an in-depth understanding of Lotus cars, Lin Jia also felt that this was an opportunity.
After Chen Yuanguang found out about it, he felt that it was okay, but there was no need to get together with them. If he wanted to do it, he would just do something big and directly acquire Lotus as a wholly-owned subsidiary. It was not expensive anyway, with a total market value of 3.8 billion. US dollars, a premium of about 30% is more than enough to initiate an acquisition.
LaMarsk, on the other hand, feels that if he and Musk work together to build a luxury sports car, it will cause a sensation around the world and help Lotus' brand image be established faster.
Of course the partners are not only Musk, but also need to find some partners.
If you only plan to play domestically, then there is nothing wrong with wholly-owned holdings. But if your goal is the global market, then cooperation is definitely required.
After hearing this, Musk became interested, "What do you mean?"
"Lotus is currently owned by Geely. I hope to acquire it and see if I can bring Lotus back to life." Chen Yuanguang said.
Musk has heard about Lotus, "I think I'm very interested."
The target customers of Tesla and Lotus do not overlap at all, so he will not be interested in the specific customers at all when he invests in Lotus. Silla made an impact.
And Lotus can also enrich Musk’s career territory.
"I think if you join, some of Tesla's technologies can be given to Lotus through licensing." Chen Yuanguang said.
“No problem, can the audio and video system used by Xiaomi Ultra be licensed to Tesla? That is really incredible. If Tesla has the blessing of that technology, the user experience will usher in a leap forward. "Musk asked smoothly.
After he experienced Xiaomi Ultra in Yanjing, he has been coveting the audio and video technology. His original purpose of developing Tesla was to make driving as easy as driving a racing game. With that thing, The immersion is immediately full.
And in his opinion, Xiaomi’s training is not good enough. If Tesla does it, it can be trained better.
“From my point of view, I don’t mind. The problem is that we previously signed a five-year exclusive technology licensing period with Xiaomi, which means that even if I fully acquire Lotus, this technology will not be available. Used on lotus.
We can only wait until five years later when the contract is re-signed. "Chen Yuanguang said.
Musk shook his head helplessly: "Okay, but I am very interested in jointly building a luxury sports car. We can talk in detail later. When I am not in China, we can also Let Tom communicate with you.
He is my plenipotentiary. "
Chen Yuanguang said: "Okay, this matter needs to be kept secret first, because it is still in the planning stage. You must know that the shareholder structure behind Lotus is very complicated, and it is not easy to buy it. ”
Musk’s purpose of coming to see Chen Yuanguang this time was not achieved. He just came to look familiar.
The acquisition of Lotus remains only on paper.
Except for one thing, that is the patent authorization of the second-generation perovskite battery. However, this was originally going to be open to major car companies, and it made no difference whether Musk came or not.
However, Musk still happily posted on Twitter, and attached four photos of him and Chen Yuanguang meeting:
“It’s great to meet Wright Chen, we are in business There is an amazing consensus in the aerospace field, and there is also a lot of consensus in replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy.
In the future, we will cooperate in many aspects that no one can imagine.”
"Wright helped me find one of the important reasons for the failure of the starship launch. I was surprised by his attainments in aerospace technology."
(End of Chapter)