China Reveals a New Heavy Lift Rocket That Is a Clone of SpaceX's Starship (arstechnica.com) 64
Ars Technica's Eric Berger reports: When Chinese space officials unveiled the design for the country's first super heavy lift rocket nearly a decade ago, it looked like a fairly conventional booster. The rocket was fully expendable, with three stages and solid motors strapped onto its sides. Since then, the Asian country has been revising the design of this rocket, named Long March 9, in response to the development of reusable rockets by SpaceX. As of two years ago, China had recalibrated the design to have a reusable first stage. Now, based on information released at a major airshow in Zhuhai, China, the design has morphed again. And this time, the plan for the Long March 9 rocket looks almost exactly like a clone of SpaceX's Starship rocket.
Based on its latest specifications, the Long March 9 rocket will have a fully reusable first stage powered by 30 YF-215 engines, which are full-flow staged combustion engines fueled by methane and liquid oxygen, each with a thrust of approximately 200 tons. By way of comparison, Starship's first stage is powered by 33 Raptor engines, also fueled with methane and liquid oxygen, each with a thrust of about 280 tons. The new specifications also include a fully reusable configuration of the rocket, with an upper stage that looks eerily similar to Starship's second stage, complete with flaps in a similar location. According to a presentation at the airshow, China intends to fly this vehicle for the first time in 2033, nearly a decade from now. Last week, Chinese space startup Cosmoleap announced plans to develop a fully reusable "Leap" rocket with the next few years. "An animated video that accompanied the funding announcement indicated that the company seeks to emulate the tower catch-with-chopsticks methodology that SpaceX successfully employed during Starship's fifth flight test last month," reports Ars.
Based on its latest specifications, the Long March 9 rocket will have a fully reusable first stage powered by 30 YF-215 engines, which are full-flow staged combustion engines fueled by methane and liquid oxygen, each with a thrust of approximately 200 tons. By way of comparison, Starship's first stage is powered by 33 Raptor engines, also fueled with methane and liquid oxygen, each with a thrust of about 280 tons. The new specifications also include a fully reusable configuration of the rocket, with an upper stage that looks eerily similar to Starship's second stage, complete with flaps in a similar location. According to a presentation at the airshow, China intends to fly this vehicle for the first time in 2033, nearly a decade from now. Last week, Chinese space startup Cosmoleap announced plans to develop a fully reusable "Leap" rocket with the next few years. "An animated video that accompanied the funding announcement indicated that the company seeks to emulate the tower catch-with-chopsticks methodology that SpaceX successfully employed during Starship's fifth flight test last month," reports Ars.
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Or do you consider all cars to be clones of the Hippomobile (1860)?
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By TFA's logic the SpaceX rocket it is a clone of is just a knock-off of Blue Origin's rocket that did the first vertical landing.
In reality you are absolutely correct. There is an optimal shape for rockets, an optimal design for the fold out legs, an optimal size and location for the control surfaces. Like all airliners look pretty much the same, with the wings and tail converging in the same places.
We had the same thing with Buran as well, despite it being a very different spacecraft to the Shuttle.
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There has been enough in the media about SpaceX Starship that copying the basic design and reverse engineering the rest would be possible
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It wasn't based on stolen Shuttle designs. Naturally they looked at the Shuttle's capabilities and the types of missions it could perform, but Buran is a fundamentally very different vehicle.
For example, it has no main engines at all. If it was a copy of the Shuttle, it would need those engines to reach orbit. If the goal was to copy the Shuttle, those engines would be vital for matching its performance and in-orbit capabilities. Russia wanted the payload and platform aspects, but had different missions in
Re:Technically (Score:4, Informative)
It [Buran] wasn't based on stolen Shuttle designs.
In fact it was explicitly based on the Shuttle design. After the fall of the iron curtain the designers admitted that.
They did different engines because that was technology the Soviets had (they were good at that), but the vehicle design itself was a nearly-identical copy of shuttle; that saved them from having to do the complex hypersonic aerothernodynamics.
PIty, because in fact the Soviets had done a lot of work on spaceplane designs, which looked very different from shuttle (although they were much much smaller). But they had been given their instructions: drop everything and make a shuttle clone.
Buran flew once then was discarded.
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By TFA's logic the SpaceX rocket it is a clone of is just a knock-off of Blue Origin's rocket that did the first vertical landing.
DC-X 1993.
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By TFA's logic the SpaceX rocket it is a clone of is just a knock-off of Blue Origin's rocket that did the first vertical landing.
DC-X 1993.
Also the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM) in the 1960s starting with prototype rocket platforms.
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The Soviets cloned the shape of the orbiter and the parallel configuration. But the main second stage engines are in the base of the rocket not the orbiter.
The US also copied the Soviet BOR-4 shape to make the Dreamchaser.
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They’re both clones of the delta clipper. Which was the point of the thing, once NASA took over the program.
It’s the way it works. Someone has a crazy idea and convinces some other someones to work on it. If it works out, which it usually doesn’t, everyone else starts doing it too.
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They’re both clones of the delta clipper.
The Delta Clipper was intended to be a vertical take off and landing craft. No wings. Single stage to orbit. No external fuel tanks or SRBs. How are either the Shuttle or Buran a clone of it?
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"Based on the same principles" would be things like "rolls on a 2D surface, minimizing friction" and "has an internal propulsion mechanism", perhaps "carries its fuel along". When implementation details like "has four wheels" and "an internal combustion engine" come up, it is closer maybe not to a clone, but to an offspring.
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In the case of technology, it means that you are building eithe
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Continuing your line of thought, today's physicist doesn't ever use Newtonian mechanics in its original form from 400 years ago, therefore it is completely unrelated to its modern restatements.
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Other countries are not bound by our laws (Score:2)
it's not fair, it never was, to the people at the top, this looks like us versus them and they don't lose, these things go as far as they can
i'm tired of being manipulated by you /.
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people can't just post anonymously anymore, that's total bs
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first post free speech, i'm on a roll here ....
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i'm referring to the fact that anonymous cowards aren't really anonymous anymore since we all have to log in to post and recently slashdot has made me wait before I submit anonymous comments
i get that such comments aren't worth much but still, it's the principle of the thing, I mean we already have the best moderation system and being able to post anonymously lets people make complete fools of ourselves but at least we get the raw stuff that oversight removes
censorship isn't pretty
yah, i get carried away w
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yah, but we shouldn't let people like that wreck it for the rest of us
Clone? (Score:1)
China Reveals a New Heavy Lift Rocket That Is a Clone of SpaceX's Starship
Clone? Last time I looked 'clone' meant an exact component for component copy. That does not look like an exact slavish copy unless Musk has obtained an insanely broad patent on cylindrically shaped launch vehicles with a rounded pointy nose section fins on sides and rocket engines at the back end and if somebody wants to point at the canards as evidence of 'cloning', the concept of canard control surfaces have been around since the Wright Flyer in 1903 which was literally the first aircraft capable of sust
Re: Clone? (Score:1)
Excuse me, China bad, ok?
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Excuse me, China bad, ok?
I know, stupid is as stupid does.
Re: Clone? (Score:1)
Yes. Stupid, bad, and evil. Now excuse me while I order a cart full of stuff Made In China.
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According to your definition, Buran wasn't a clone of the Space Shuttle either, because NASA didn't have a patent on space-plane-looking craft designed to operate in some extremely specific manner. Never mind that some other country did all the R&D, engineering and flight testing to prove the design was feasible in the first place.
Give me a break. You know the situation has become desperate when they must copy a design to this degree. What I'm really curious about is if China bothered to make their own
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The Soviets had their own space shuttle designs with their own research on shapes. Take a look at the Spiral spaceplane for example.
The problem is the Soviet designers got a directive from the politicians at the top to replicate the capabilities of the US Shuttle, which they suspected was some sort of orbital bomber, and they ended up changing the design of both the launcher and the orbiter.
Re: Clone? (Score:2)
Re:Clone? (Score:5, Interesting)
Well it is a bit like the Buran, russia's "clone" of the space shuttle. It certainly had its differences, but it's impossible to look at it and not see the similarity. Calling it a "copy" or a "clone" is probably too harsh, but it's definitely a ripoff of mos of the major design elements. It's hard to blame them - rocket science is expensive and time-consuming. Taking advantage of the hard work and expense that the Other Guy has invested is somewhere between extremely tempting and the obviously right choice.
BUT after getting the whole "china copies everything" out of the way... I still approve of it. Expanding space exploration isn't an american or chinese thing, it's a human thing, and it's something we all need to be working together on. And not polluting space with junk is a HUGE deal. So I have no problem at all with them copying design elements from a successful reusable rocket. Anything that keeps trash out of LEO gets my thumbs up.
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Burn wasn't a copy either. It's just that there is an optimal shape for a space plane, a vehicle that has to re-enter the atmosphere, slow down, and glide to land. It has to have wings that shape for those kinds of speeds, and a big control surface on the tail. With the current state of the art there is no other viable shape.
Beyond those superficial similarities, Buran was a very different vehicle. No main engines, larger crew and payload capacity, different mission profiles as a result.
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Well it is a bit like the Buran, russia's "clone" of the space shuttle. It certainly had its differences, but it's impossible to look at it and not see the similarity. Calling it a "copy" or a "clone" is probably too harsh, but it's definitely a ripoff of most of the major design elements. It's hard to blame them - rocket science is expensive and time-consuming. Taking advantage of the hard work and expense that the Other Guy has invested is somewhere between extremely tempting and the obviously right choice.
It’s true that the Buran shared a lot of external design similarities with NASA’s Space Shuttle. However, historical accounts suggest that the Soviets acquired some of the Shuttle’s design documents through espionage. Interestingly, these plans may have been deliberately flawed to mislead anyone trying to recreate the Shuttle directly. The Buran’s engineers made their own improvements to adapt it for Soviet technology, resulting in a vehicle with several key differences, like fully a
Re: Clone? (Score:2)
I mean, I can somewhat see it in this case. The idea of a tower block skydiving from space was really not on the table until a year or two ago. Suddenly china came up with the exact same idea!
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SpaceX don't do patent, they'll just be road map that Chinese entities can copy. They do trade secrets. I mean China doesn't recognize US patent law anyway.
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China recognizes patent law.
But like in any other jurisdiction: you have to register the patent.
It is not automatically a patent in a different country, if you do not register it there.
Re: Clone? (Score:2)
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Omg, what next?? (Score:2)
Will they start making mini flame throwers, digging tunnels under Vegas and producing the ugliest truck ever conceived?!
If they make an ugly af truck he should definitely sue! "There can be ... only one!" *lightning and thunder*
Re: Omg, what next?? (Score:2)
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No, he stole it from Doc Brown and the MTV vid, and pumped it up on steroids.
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Musk has more power now to "punish" China for copying Space-X, for good or bad. Next 4 years are going to be even crazier than the first round, Tinty is tossing out the normies and putting loyalists in.
Good. (Score:4, Interesting)
We could use a nice space race again. And with all the anti-China sentiment we've been stirring over the past decade and some change, even the public might get on board with, "WE MUST BEAT CHINA TO THE MOON, TO MARS, TO $space_body." I hope they manage to get successful flights out of their design to stir up that competitive spirit in our space industry. It might just give us something to cheer for other than identity politics and shit-sandwiches of public discourse.
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Maybe companies like SpaceX, but NASA? Good luck.
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Maybe companies like SpaceX, but NASA? Good luck.
Getting NASA to do anything more than funnel money to congressional districts would require congress to stop directing them to do nothing but shovel money to congressional districts. Maybe a good space race could shake loose the idiocy, but I wouldn't hold my breath on that one.
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As a Chinese living in America, I'm firmly against CCP. So spare me with your anti-China sentiment.
SpaceX Cybersecurity Apparently Sucks (Score:2)
https://www.reuters.com/article/business/theft-of-f-35-design-data-is-helping-us-adversaries-pentagon-idUSL2N0EV0T3/
It is a well known fact that China is going after US industrial secrets far harder than it is going after American defense secrets. Seems like Musk has ignored the obvious threats, just like he did the obvious value of Twitter.
Re: SpaceX Cybersecurity Apparently Sucks (Score:1)
Re: SpaceX Cybersecurity Apparently Sucks (Score:2)
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Because china is more practical and Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin wanting their own patents so others can't use their technology or have them pay a lot.
That makes no sense when they are so far behind. Nothing stopping them from coming up with patents yet still using open source ones.
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Stop with the conspiracy theories.
Random internet dudes and children are making rockets that land vertically. Once someone demonstrates it’s worth doing, actually making a fuel tank with flaps, an engine and a decent flight computer is fairly straightforward.
Re: SpaceX Cybersecurity Apparently Sucks (Score:2)
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You provided a URL (annoyingly not a link) to a story about the F35, a military project, and concluded that espionage was behind the Chinese showing off a mockup that kind of looks like Starship.
Re: SpaceX Cybersecurity Apparently Sucks (Score:2)
I hope ... (Score:2)