Chapter 116 First Launch in 2023
"Okay, Yuan Guang, I understand what you mean, I will help you convey your demands when I go back.

Guangjia Aerospace has done a good job, which has put a lot of pressure on various research institutes and aerospace industry groups.

It is really not easy for a private institution to achieve the level of light armor aerospace.

We will definitely provide convenience as much as possible." said the middle-aged man.

Seeing that the other party agreed so readily, Chen Yuanguang said the request he had originally wanted to make:
"Director Wu, if that's the case, then I'll also mention some things that require official cooperation?"

Director Wu looked at the huge launch ship that was docked steadily on the sea. On the deck, a rocket much larger than Pioneer 1 stood there, ready to challenge the sky. He felt much better.

"You tell me."

Chen Yuanguang said: "You should also know that the Wassenaar Arrangement will be an obstacle when buying technology from Europe, so during the transaction process, the country may need a little help."

Chen Yuanguang told Director Wu about the cooperation methods he had discussed with Frank and Wolfe.

Director Wu was in a bad mood. This was not something he could decide: "I will help you react, Yuanguang, you are still impulsive. The transaction method should not be discussed so early.

If they want to do it, they will naturally find a way to circumvent the Wassenaar Arrangement.

The agreement was circumvented.

Don't leave the deal under the table. We have already confronted America head-on. If we want to do business with Europe, we have to see its sincerity.

Let’s put it on the table. Iceland is not a member of the Wassenaar Arrangement. If Europe wants to make a deal, let Iceland make the deal.”

Director Wu sounded very hawkish: "I will help you coordinate, this matter is out in the open.

This is a small matter. The Vulcan engine is such an old technology. We are willing to sell them reusable rockets, so they make money.

These Europeans want to gain benefits but don't want to bear any pressure. How can such a good thing happen?

Yuanguang, you are still young and may feel that the rules cannot be circumvented, so think of some under-the-table solutions.

What I want to tell you is that rules are meant to be broken when they are made, but the means of breaking the rules require skill, and before doing so you have to judge whether you can bear the consequences of breaking the rules.

Light Armor Aerospace has been put on the list by American, which means you have already borne the consequences before you even break the rules, so what are you afraid of? Just go for it.

In addition, when doing business with foreigners, you have to take the initiative into your own hands.

If it was 04 when the country was far less prosperous than it is now, didn’t they buy back the high-speed rail technology back then?
Now Europe is in an unprecedented low point in its space industry and they need technology to boost confidence.

Reusable rockets are much more valuable than their old Vulcan engines, and if you don't want them, I think you'll have to pay them a little more."

After listening to this, Chen Yuanguang said, "I understand."

He thought, since Director Wu said so, he naturally had a way, he just needed to wait for news.

Sometimes it is beneficial to have the support of an organization. Organizations may have better ways of doing some things, and they are much more experienced in this area.

Of course, I have suffered a lot, and I have gained experience from these losses.

In the distance, the Pioneer 2 rocket was shining in the sun, and its surface was flashing with little lights, making it look particularly large. People were worried whether the launch ship below could really withstand the thrust of the rocket launch.

As the launch time approached, the crew on the deck was busy and orderly conducting the final inspection. The sea breeze could not dispel the tense atmosphere.

Spectators watching the launch held up binoculars for fear of missing any details.

The entire observation deck gradually became quiet.

The first Guangjia Aerospace rocket launch attracted a large number of viewers to watch the live broadcast, so this rocket launch also cooperated with platforms such as Bilibili, Douyin, and Weibo.

The entire event was broadcast live on these platforms, and several sponsors were found, including Huawei and Xiaomi. Huawei sponsored with its own brand, while Xiaomi sponsored in the name of Xiaomi Auto.

The video of Li Xiyin's interview with Chen Yuanguang actually served as a warm-up for the rocket launch.

In addition, since this time it is a sea launch, the size of the rocket is much larger than last time.

So this rocket launch attracted far more spectators than the last one.

After a long wait, a roar resounded through the sky, and hot flames spewed out from the bottom of the rocket.

The huge thrust allowed the rocket to slowly rise into the air, and its trajectory drew a beautiful arc in the sky.

"Yuan Guang, when will we know whether the launch of Luojia II was successful?"

After he finished his private chat with Director Wu, President Shu came to Chen Yuanguang and asked.

This time, the rocket launched five satellites in one go. In addition to the small satellite launched to help Tim and his team, the rest were satellites for scientific research purposes of universities.

Chen Yuanguang said: "It depends on the rocket's orbital performance. As long as it doesn't explode in the air, there shouldn't be any problem."

Dean Shu is the dean of the School of Life Sciences. He has now been promoted to a higher level. He is also the vice president of Jiangnan University, and his rank is the same as Director Wu.

After all, Director Wu is also a deputy.

As the rocket flew higher and higher, it finally disappeared into the blue sky.

The staff of Guangjia Aerospace finally put their minds at ease.

Lin Tianmin thought, "Not exploding is the greatest success."

The biggest problem facing a multi-engine strapped rocket is the multiple engines. It is necessary to balance the forces between them. If the balance is not good, the rocket will tilt, which can cause an explosion or a crash.

SpaceX's Falcon rocket often encountered problems during the research and development stage, and the launch was abandoned when a problem occurred. This was because the main problem was engine imbalance. The B engine corresponding to the A engine could not be ignited. After launch, the AB engines, which should have been balanced, only had force on one side.

After the rocket is launched, it will tilt and deviate from the intended direction. In more serious cases, it will explode or crash.

Wolf and Frank were both former astronauts. When they saw that the rocket entered the second-stage orbit without any accidents, they thought it must have been successful.

"Next it depends on whether the rocket can be recovered and fall to the designated location," said Wolfe.

This time when he came to China, he had a completely new understanding of China. The China he had previously come into contact with in the German media and the China in reality are not the same China at all.

The Chinese people's progress in aerospace technology was previously only seen in the media, and the local media would more or less make malicious speculations, such as saying that the source of China's technology was unknown.

After seeing it with his own eyes this time, Wolf thought that Europe couldn't even develop a small reusable rocket, so how could they possibly have stolen your technology when their strapped rockets were far more powerful than Europe's existing reusable rockets?

He would think that these media outlets are the main reason why European aerospace technology has fallen behind.

The "setting the tone" here not only refers to setting the tone for China, making Chinese technology either worthless or of questionable origin, but also means that the propaganda content does not respect the spirit of seeking truth from facts at all.

Frank was also very emotional. He had been to China, but it was many years ago. At that time, China wanted to work with Europe to develop the Galileo satellite system. He had just finished his astronaut career and came to China as an ordinary staff member of the negotiation delegation.

Compared with that time, China has now left Europe behind in the field of aerospace.

After the rocket disappeared from the sky, Frank took out his phone and opened YouTube to watch the live broadcast.

Guangjia Aerospace's official channel has hundreds of thousands of followers on YouTube, and people in underdeveloped areas see it as a hope to fight against SpaceX.

For people in countries within the Greater China region such as Southeast Asia, Japan, and Korea, the existence of light armor aerospace makes them have very complicated emotions.

The group with the highest attention rate should be Malaysian Chinese, many of whom have a strong sense of involvement in China's scientific and technological development achievements.

Next are the Japanese. Although their own achievements in aerospace are unremarkable, they, like India, have always had a dream of becoming a great power in aerospace. They cannot realize this dream on their own, but seeing hope in the non-governmental organizations of neighboring countries is equivalent to realizing it themselves.

The real-time comments in the YouTube live broadcast room were flashing very fast.

It's impossible to see it with the naked eye.

After the rocket successfully entered orbit, Chinese and Japanese words appeared on it:
"so amazing"

"The God of Light is indeed the light of the Chinese people"

Yes, after the successful launch of the reusable rocket of Guangjia Aerospace last year, the Chinese newspapers in Malaysia gave Chen Yuanguang the title of "The Pride of the Chinese". Not many media in China use this title, but it is quite popular in Southeast Asia. It was first used in Malaysia, and later in Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and other countries.

"Yokata"

"fun"

There are also a lot of Japanese comments, most of which are from space enthusiasts. Although they may not necessarily be friendly to China, they are all happy to see that SpaceX has challengers.

The staff of Guangjia Aerospace began to applaud first, and then the applause spread to the entire viewing platform.

Chen Yuanguang walked over to answer a call from his mother, "Yes, it should have been successful. Now we just need to observe the rocket recovery.

The only uncertainty now is whether the recovered part of the rocket can land accurately within the sea area we have set in advance."

"Hey, don't worry about me. I'm not a workaholic like people say on the Internet. I usually have a good balance between work and rest."

Your mother always cares about whether you have had a good rest. Calling Chen Yuanguang to congratulate him on the successful launch of Pioneer 2 was just an excuse. What was more important was to ask him how he was feeling recently.

Over there, after Wolfe finished clapping, he saw Frank looking at his phone. He leaned over and asked, "Should we go ask about their recycling situation?"

Frank showed the phone to Wolf, who immediately saw the YouTube interface, the rapidly scrolling comments on the live broadcast channel, and the Light Armor Aerospace logo.

"Look, this is the live broadcast room of Light Armor Aerospace. The images now displayed are images of their sea recovery area. Just watch here to see the accuracy of their rocket recovery."

Wolfe and Frank found a bench and sat down, staring at the still picture on the phone screen.

"What are the people in the live broadcast room saying?" asked Wolfe.

Frank said, “I don’t know.”

As expected, the recyclable part of Pioneer 2 landed in the target sea area. The offshore salvage ship quickly picked it up and prepared to send it back to the laboratory. The data captured by the sensors on it is very important for the subsequent optimization of Pioneer 2.

Frank and Wolfe looked at each other when they saw this scene, and both sides could feel the other's complicated emotions.

You should know that more than ten years ago, when the International Conference on Lunar Exploration and Utilization was held, Chinese aerospace experts and officials coveted the SMART-1 lunar probe launched by Europe and the automatic cargo spacecraft launched at that time.

At that time, the European Space Conference will also emphasize that Europe must play a leading role in space.

As time goes by, the roles of both parties have completely reversed.

Fortunately, compared with America, China is willing to trade.

They feel sad for the decline of Europe. They hope that Guangjia Aerospace's reusable rockets can be successful so that the technology they traded will be valuable enough. At the same time, they don't want China's technology to advance so quickly and leave Europe far behind in the field of aerospace.

In fact, Wolf was also very puzzled. More than ten years ago, Europe was able to launch an automatic cargo spacecraft. He remembered that the research and development of that project alone cost 13 billion euros. This was 13 billion euros more than ten years ago.

Why was it no longer used and directly abandoned after launching five spacecraft? It was abandoned and retired after 15 years. Then now it is announced that this technology will be brought back and the launch of automatic cargo spacecraft will be realized in 2028.

When the automatic cargo spacecraft project came about, Wolf had already retired and was working as an external consultant. He was puzzled by the current state of the European space industry over the past decade or so, and he was discarding his own advantageous technologies one by one.

Just like the automatic cargo spacecraft, he vaguely remembered that it was retired because the spacecraft would burn above the Pacific Ocean during landing, and would take away waste from the International Space Station, causing a lot of pollution to the ocean. This project was repeatedly protested by environmental organizations.

The Kourou Space Center in French Guiana faced several sieges and protests from environmental organizations, and the project was later abandoned. In the meantime, Russian spacecraft were responsible for delivering goods to the International Space Station, and later SpaceX.

Wolfe simply could not understand who made this decision and why the senior officials in Paris agreed to it.

Frank can roughly say one, two, three, but it's all about votes. No one wants to take responsibility, and if they do nothing, they won't make mistakes.

When everyone thinks this way, it is only natural that the project is terminated.

“Gentlemen, how about this? If we can reach a cooperation in the future, we are willing to share more data with the European Space Agency.

If we use the Trailblazer series rocket to transport cargo to the International Space Station, we will share the data during the flight with the European Space Agency. "

In the afternoon, they met at a five-star hotel in Yantai. Compared with Wolf and Frank, who seemed a little tired, Chen Yuanguang seemed full of energy.

The successful launch of the Pioneer II rocket has brought Guangjia Aerospace another major step forward.

It not only brings fame, but also brings actual business.

Previously, the orders with Bolivia, Brazil, and Indonesia were just intention orders, but now they can’t wait to turn the intention orders into actual orders.

Countries such as Malaysia, Thailand, and Serbia have also expressed their hope for opportunities to cooperate, and Guangjia Aerospace's business department is almost too busy to handle it.

In terms of funding, state-owned assets in Pengcheng, Huizhou, Shenhai and other places have expressed their willingness to increase investment. The next round of 5 billion US dollars will be no problem. We will grit our teeth and give it to you.

Because Guangjia Technology was blacklisted by America, the 5 billion US dollars does not need foreign exchange. Since the foreign exchange cannot be used, RMB can be used.

RMB is even less of a problem for state-owned assets.

The most urgent one is Pengcheng, because Guangjia Aerospace's R&D center is in Pengcheng. For Pengcheng, aerospace will be added to their list of advanced manufacturing industries.

This is the benefit of success, the whole world is giving you the green light.

Frank and Ulf followed the strategy they had worked out during the lunch break. Frank remained silent, and Ulf said:
"It was an excellent result. The landing was so precise in the first recovery, which was beyond our expectation.

We are very interested in the technology of Light Armor Aerospace, and I think officials in Paris will also be very interested in this deal."

Thinking that this technology would be available soon, Wolfe felt a few years younger.

Chen Yuanguang waved his hand: "Sorry, this is not the right time to discuss this with me."

Ulf was surprised and asked, "Why?"

Chen Yuanguang was afraid that the other party would misunderstand him, so he continued, "The deal will still go ahead.

However, the negotiation partner is not Guangjia Aerospace, but China National Technical Import and Export Corporation. We will give them full authority to negotiate with us on this technology."

Wolf looked at Frank, his eyes revealing confusion about what this company did.

The reason why Wolfe said this is because as a retired old man he can say whatever he wants and he doesn't have to take responsibility even if he says something wrong.

Frank is also the director of the Astronaut Center. If he says something wrong, he will be misunderstood.

Their desire to cooperate does not mean that the officials in Paris also want to cooperate. When everyone just wants to stay in a good position but does not want to assume the responsibilities corresponding to the position, they often make wrong decisions.

Chen Yuanguang's unconventional approach disrupted their plans.

Frank had to take over the conversation: "Didn't we say it was a private transaction before?"

Chen Yuanguang said: "I'm sorry, because aerospace technology is very sensitive, the specific transaction method and content will be handled by a company in China that specializes in this area.

Whether it is a private transaction or not is not up to me.”

Chen Yuanguang's businesslike manner left them at a loss as to what to do.

Based on Frank's understanding of the nature of the people in Paris, the probability of a private transaction is 30%, and the probability of a public transaction is less than 1%.

Chen Yuanguang continued, "Please take this message back to everyone at the European Space Agency. Light Armor Technology is very sincere.

People from the European branch of China National Technical Import & Export Corporation will contact you later.

We and Europe complement each other in many ways, and I hope this cooperation is just the beginning.”

Chen Yuanguang repeated the same words to the representatives of the Russian side after returning to Pengcheng the next day.

The only difference is that the word "Europe" in the sentence was replaced by "Mao".

In this kind of transaction, Russia is much more flexible than Europe.

As long as the price is right, there is nothing that cannot be sold, let alone rocket engine technology from thirty years ago.

　Please give me a monthly vote. I’ve been so diligent lately that even I’m scared of myself!
　　
　
(End of this chapter)