They launched an unmanned capsule this year and plan to launch a person ‘within five years’.
What’s the deal? Why will it take them so long?
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Technical problems. Mainly that their aerospace engineering is still about where the Soviet Union was in 1964. Despite a measure of progress in a few big cities, China is still very unevenly modernized.
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Money. These things cost billions, and every (what is the Chinese unit of money?) spent on spaceflight is money that can’t be spent on desperately wanted modernization of their military.
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Need. What exactly would the Chinese do with a manned space program? Put two or three sinonauts up in a capsule? The US and the USSR did that thirty years ago. Work on a space station? They could become partners in the Alpha station with the US, Russia, and Europe. Military/strategic value? Zip. Economic value? Zip.
What I don’t know is why they even considered a manned spaceflight program, except maybe that someone high up considered it a prestige program.
Me, I have this blind hope/fear that they’ll do it right, not stop or slow down…
Space must be utilized… it’s one of the best resources that we don’t use nearly enough, nor in the right way. If the chinese are willing to do so, good for them. I hope that it leads the US (and Europe and others, get off me!) to get back in the game for reals.
And there is a ton of value in a satellite program… having a manned program is just the tip o’ the iceberg.
The amount of technology needed to sustain life in an environment as harsh as space takes a large amount of time to design and assemble. I really doubt that NASA is going to let them look at our designs for a place to start.
They need to design and test a multitude of components to do this, that 5 years sounds like a reasonable amount of time. Nasa was started in 1958, and absorbed several other organizations that had spent years studying aeronautics and astronautics. It still took them nearly 3 years (from October 1, 1958 - May 5, 1961) to put a man in space.
The Chinese don’t have all the data that NASA started with, so they predict it will take them a little longer.
For more information regarding NASA, see the link below.
It seems to be common knowledge that the Russians built their shuttle from our design. I figured the designs are readily available.
With Russia, it is highly unlikely that we openly gave them the plans. I would suspect that the plans were obtained in a less honest way. And if the plans are openly available, why would China start with unmanned launches? Why not just jump right to the shuttle? That would be more logical than spending all this money on testing.
The Chinese spacecraft that they want to send people up into orbit in is a virtual copy of Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft. They call it Shenzhou. Accoring to this page China paid good money (hard currency, no doubt) to the Russian space agency throughout the '90s for space technology, so it is no surprise that it looks as if they cribbed off Russia’s notebook.
The page says China should have its first manned flight next year. They’ll be the third nation to send a man into orbit and that is a big deal, very nice propoganda, even if Russia & the U.S. have been doing this for 30 years.
Lumpy wrote:
I think you are under estimating the power of human ego. The Chinese would gladly do it just to show the world that they can. It’s a matter of national/cultural/racial pride, and letting the imperialistic Americans know that the Chinese have caught up with them and will soon be able to kick their ass 
Yep. This is really important to the Chinese, something they’ve been working on for a long, long time.
I’m no marxist, or maoist, or whatever you want to call the supporters of communist dictatorships. But there is something to be said for whipping out the big 'ol rocket for everyone to see. The early success of the Soviet space program really did have a profound impact on international affairs. China, having spawned from the same screed as the Soviets, may well view their space program in similar terms. And other nations, particularly along the Pacific Rim, might just be impressed by such a dog-and-pony show.
After what appears to be a failed manned program, possibly as a result of the purges of the 1970’s, the Chinese manned program has advanced slowly but steadily. Recently, several launch vehicles have been seen with launch escape systems–a tell-tale sign of a manned craft. Revoverable launch vehicles have been successfully tested. Furthermore, the Chinese have seen fit to allow a little bit of their own speculation to creep out, as evidenced by Mark Wade’s scoop of some Chinese lunar base plans.
History of the Chinese Manned Space Program
A manned space program means that you have confidence in your systems. Especially if you’re in a culture where you’d rather not lose face, this says “Our rockets WORK” in blinking neon.
Incidentally, it also says “Your multimillion dollar payload is safe on top of our rockets”, and that’s a message worth sending if you want a chunk of that market.
Presto, international prestige and hard currency in one nice package.
Does anybody know the fate of the “hermes”-a French designed shuttle-like orbital vehicle? It was to be launched by a souped-up Arian rocket. Did it fail, or was the program just cancelled?
Shuttle craft represent an enormous investment in advanced technology that the Chinese lack almost entirely. The specialized materials and computer guidance packages required to fly such a machine are light years beyond the Spam-in-a-can flights they are currently pursuing. Besides, do you know how many cheap fireworks you have to lash together for a single launch?
According to legend, the Soviets showed up in Washington to obtain all that they could about the American Space Shuttle project. Much of the Shuttle’s designs are available from the GAO due to the fact that NASA is a civilian agency. The guidance, powerplant and computing systems do not appear in the GAO plans.
Evidently, the final restricted packages that they bribed out of people contained specific and intentional errors in them. Wing dihedrals and the like were just a little bit off. Nothing that would leap out at their design bureau, but just enough to queer the job for them. After decades of Soviet misinformation smearing the USA I find it hilarious that we may have screwed, blued and tatooed them out of billions of Rubles with their failed shuttle program. Anyone got some backup on this story? I’d love to find out the details on it.
All of this points up the problems with “acquired” technology. If you don’t invent it yourself, it’s a lot harder to know when you have the real thing. I feel little sympathy for the Chinese and the difficulties they face in their conquest of space. Until they stop being the armaments candy store for all of the corrupt regimes in this world it’s just nothing I can feel sorry for.
Oh, and Lumpy, the unit of Chinese currency is called the Yuan.
Accordingto what I know, the Russian “BURAN” space shuttle was not quite a direct copy of our shuttle. I t did resemble the shuttle in overall shape. I also understand that the BURAN did make at least one sub-orbital flight (unmanned). If so, the Russian guidance computers must have been fairley good, since it landed OK. By that time, the Russians were bankrupt, so that ended their space shuttle program.
This page has about all you need to know about Hermes from the Encyclopedia Astronautica: http://www.friends-partners.org/~mwade/craft/hermes.htm
The French discovered the same thing that NASA did…there is nothing “cheap” about a reusable space vehicle, despite early claims to the contrary.
I could have sworn that back in the '80s that I read that the Japanese were developing their own shuttle as well. However, I can only find an unmanned shuttle called HOPE on the AE page: http://www.friends-partners.org/~mwade/craft/hope.htm
Back to the OP, the Chinese flirted with a spaceplane for a time as well: http://www.friends-partners.org/~mwade/craft/tsie1978.htm
Anything you might want to know about Buran has a link here. The major difference vs. the US shuttle is that Buran did not have engines onboard, which considerably simplified a lot of other dssign considerations. Rather, the Energiya booster took it all the way up.
Although the lessons learned from the US program are obvious, the Soviets did a great deal of their own engineering, and Buran should not be dismissed as a simple copy.
It made only 1 flight, in 1988, with no crew due to various problems with life-support systems. With funding disappearing in the crumbling USSR, it never flew again, and is now on display in a Moscow park.