Chapter 185: The Crystallization of the Predecessors' Wisdom
After receiving Loulan's report, Lu Yuan immediately took action, boarding an aerospace plane to the asteroid belt.
Accompanying him were a three-fighter escort formation and a large number of curious employees.
At this point, Loulan had already approached the unidentified flying object and completed a preliminary survey.
“Executive Officer, this is undoubtedly an artificial structure, but no weapons were found on the surface, nor were there any engine nozzles at the tail. There was, however, damage left by an explosion. End of transmission.”
“Received, you did well, thank you for your hard work.”
Lu Yuan opened the public channel, his tone noticeably more excited than usual: “Attention, all units, advance, prepare to board!”
The formation of five spacecraft rapidly approached.
The detailed features of the unidentified flying object gradually became visible to the naked eye.
It did not employ any stealth design or external armor. The main body was a 600-meter-long hollow carbon fiber truss, with numerous pressure cabins and equipment directly exposed and fixed to this truss. Its appearance was quite rugged, with a strong heavy industry style.
This was undoubtedly a relatively primitive design. All unnecessary outer shells were omitted, and all possible areas were hollowed out, emphasizing weight reduction to an extreme degree, indicating that zero element technology had not yet been mastered.
No mistake!
This was definitely a part of the colonial ship that was left behind in the Li Star System. It looked like it should be the bow after the ship disintegrated!
“What is that?”
Male God looked out through the porthole, pointing to a large mass at the bow of the unidentified flying object.
“Why does this spaceship fly with such a thick shield on top?”
He was referring to a hexagonal flat plate, quite massive in size, over a kilometer in diameter, and nearly 100 meters thick.
It was perpendicular to the ship's main truss, like the relationship between an umbrella canopy and its handle.
“You're right.” Lu Yuan patted Male God's shoulder, “That really is a shield.”
“To be precise, it's a Whipple shield!”
Jubian stared out the window, his heart racing.
Like the Executive Officer, the moment he saw this structure, he already understood its mystery.
“What is a Whipple shield?”
Male God was completely confused.
“What we are seeing now is the bow section of the 'cangyuan one' giant colonial ship, launched in 2095,” Lu Yuan explained, “This ship, limited by the technological conditions of the late 21st century, was actually a hybrid ship.”
“What do you mean? Spaceships also have hybrid oil-electric power? New energy?”
Lu Yuan was amused by Male God.
Going to get a green license plate, are we?
“Not oil-electric hybrid, but solar sail and nuclear fusion hybrid! That large hexagon is actually the solar sail after being folded layer upon layer.
“Before the colonial ship set sail, Cangyuan Future Technology needed to build thousands, or even tens of thousands, of small space stations within the solar system. These space stations were equipped with lasers, powered by nuclear fusion reactors or solar panels.
“After the launch command was issued, the colonial ship would first glide to the edge of the solar system. Then, the solar sail would fully unfurl in front of the hull.
Immediately after, all Cangyuan space stations in the solar system would 'fire' simultaneously, projecting tens of thousands of laser beams onto the colonial ship's solar sail.
“Because the distance was far enough, the lasers diffused, and the energy density was not enough to burn through the solar sail. Most photons would be reflected by the solar sail, thereby generating light pressure.
“The light pressure of a single laser might be negligible, but tens of thousands of lasers combined could produce enormous thrust, allowing the solar sail to slowly accelerate the spaceship.”
“Amazing!”
Male God scratched the back of his head.
“I understand, Boss! This is no different from a sailboat at sea, except the 'wind' is blown by humans themselves. But why make it so complicated? Couldn't they just use nuclear-powered engines to run?”
“It should be to maximize the ship's speed as much as possible, given the limited technology.”
Dan Ta's eyes sparkled.
“This way, all the fuel carried by the ship can be used for the final deceleration phase, and it can glide at a higher constant speed in between, which is equivalent to indirectly increasing the engine's specific impulse. Am I right?”
After three months of playing “Star Sea,” her aerospace knowledge had evolved from a complete novice to far beyond the average person.
It was highly unlikely for a non-aerospace engineering female in her early 20s in reality to use the term “specific impulse,” let alone fully understand the concept and apply it by analogy.
Dan Ta's specialty was shooting, but she wasn't content with that and was constantly self-studying.
“Absolutely correct!” Jubian praised, “Not simple, young lady!”
“Hahaha, so that's how it is.” The unstudious Male God laughed awkwardly, “Then why isn't what we're seeing now an unfurled solar sail?”
“Because the universe isn't a complete vacuum,” Lu Yuan patiently explained, “There's interstellar dust in space. Although the particles that make up the dust are very small, if you collide with them at extremely high speeds, they will still cause damage to the ship's hull.”
“Oh—like a passenger plane hitting a bird, right?”
“Yes.”
“So extra protection is needed!” Jubian took over from his boss, continuing the popular science explanation.
“The 'Qinling' class frigates we are building rely on kinetic shields for dust defense; while Star Alliance warships don't have shields, they do have Zero Element Furnaces to help accelerate, so they are not sensitive to weight and can solve the problems caused by interstellar dust and micro-meteorites with thick armor.
“But lower-tech spacecraft, being extremely sensitive to weight, had no choice but to build lighter protective barriers at the bow to protect the hull behind them.
“The aerospace professional name for this barrier is 'Whipple shield.'
“The designers of 'cangyuan one' were very clever, using the folded solar sail as a Whipple shield, with a structure similar to the spaced armor on tanks! One object, two uses, further reducing weight!”
Lu Yuan smiled, shaking his head slightly.
“You said too little, it should be one object, three uses! Let's get closer and scan it.”
The aerospace plane finally stabilized next to the bow of the colonial ship. The impatient players poured out, scanning the Whipple shield separately.
“Boss, the scan results show that the solar sail is folded a full 1000 layers! A single layer has an area of 1 square kilometer, a total area of 1000 square kilometers, and a total mass of 150,000 tons!”
“Received. What is the preservation status of the solar sail?”
“There are thousands of small holes on it. This thing has not only been hit by dust but also ravaged by micro-meteorites. Where it was hit by micro-meteorites, on average, it was penetrated over 300 layers, and the holes are about half a meter in diameter.”
“Hiss… Then how is the overall reflectivity after unfolding? Is it greatly affected?”
“The main body is intact, so the impact is not very significant. The overall reflectivity still remains above 95%,” Jubian replied.
He paused for a few seconds, then suddenly slapped his forehead.
Holy crap!
“I understand! I understand why you said it's one object, three uses! The solar sail can also be used to generate electricity! After 'cangyuan one' completed deceleration, the nuclear fuel in the hull was exhausted, and it must have used solar energy for supplementary power generation. This was a function considered from the very beginning of the design!
“Each 1-square-kilometer solar sail unit can be slightly deformed and converted into a concave mirror, which can reflect and concentrate a huge amount of sunlight to a single point. At this point, as long as a photovoltaic converter is placed at this focal point, it becomes a solar power plant!”
“Oh oh oh~~~”
There was a chorus of admiration on the public channel.
The designers were so clever!
Lu Yuan couldn't be sure before whether “cangyuan one” had a solar sail, but he knew it must have a solar power generation solution to compensate for the energy deficit at the end of the voyage.
“Then hurry up and help everyone calculate what the power generation capacity is like,” Black Smoke urged Jubian.
“Hmm! The solar irradiance power in Li Star orbit is as high as 2100W per square meter. The solar sail's reflectivity is 95%. The light-to-heat conversion efficiency, based on the nano-photothermal technology reserves in the industrial ship, is calculated at 90%. Then, multiplied by a comprehensive thermoelectric conversion rate of 30%, the final result is an 'installed capacity of 537GW!!!'”
“What?!”
Black Smoke was instantly stunned.
“Are you sure it's GW, not MW?”
“Brother, I have 40 intelligence points, how could I possibly make a mistake in addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division! This is a total light-collecting area of 1000 square kilometers, not 1 square kilometer. In reality, it could cover the entire territory of Hong Kong!”
Black Smoke re-verified the calculation for him and found no errors. Indeed, he had previously missed three zeros.
As a power Engineer, he had never seen such a gigantic solar power plant, which had led to his rigid thinking.
After all, the largest solar power plant in the world in reality has an installed capacity of no more than 1GW.
The power generation capacity of this solar sail was equivalent to 17 industrial ships, or 24 Three Gorges Dams.
Black Smoke looked up at the massive solar sail, filled with emotion.
“Humans in the 21st century were truly awesome! Even without any knowledge of zero element, relying solely on the meager physics they had, they managed to build such a massive spaceship, breaking out of the solar system cradle with the assistance of tens of thousands of laser stations. This truly counts as an astronomical-scale project. How much money must it have cost? How many people's youth did it consume? And how much courage and perseverance did it require…”
For a moment, he seemed to see a interstellar version of Yu Gong moving mountains.
“It was precisely with this spirit that we ushered in the golden age!”
Other players were also greatly encouraged.
The predecessors of Cangyuan worked so hard, so they too must achieve something significant.
The players' morale was greatly boosted as they entered the ship to explore.