Chapter 93: Voyage
At this moment, because Tom had made it clear that he would leave Loshen Star and head to the Inner Solar System after fully mastering the secondary pressurized propulsion technology, he temporarily had no need to build too many ships with existing technological levels. Therefore, starting more than ten years ago, all the shipbuilding factories on Loshen Star, which used to roar day and night, were shut down.
But now, under Tom’s command, they were once again reborn.
Raw materials once again began to be transported by train, and a large number of Clones gathered here. After the power grid was overhauled, surging electricity was once again transmitted.
As a result, a large number of parts were once again produced from these factories.
All these parts were transported to Loshen Star’s orbit and began to be assembled there.
The most important of these was the secondary pressurized thruster, which had a total mass of over 5,000 tons.
A complete secondary pressurized thruster consists of three modules: a nuclear fission reactor module, an internal combustion engine module, and an electromagnetic control module.
When these three modules are assembled together, they form a complete, state-of-the-art thruster.
It cannot be disassembled because its processing requirements are too high; it can only be produced on the ground.
However, the cargo spaceship at this moment needed to be assembled in space.
There was no other way; Tom had to specially develop a set of heavy-duty cargo transfer methods, using a full 40 dedicated aerospace-grade spaceships to lift it.
The total volume of this thruster reached over 10,000 cubic meters, with a length of 50 meters, a width of 25 meters, and a height of 10 meters.
It was specially welded with over 1,000 connection holes and extended 1,000 high-strength cables.
Every 25 cables converged into one, finally extending to an aerospace-grade spaceship, totaling 40 spaceships. Through these 1,000 cables, this behemoth was lifted.
The chemical fuel in the forty aerospace-grade spaceships burned explosively, spewing out fiercely, pushing the propulsion power to its extreme. With precise coordination, they collectively increased the speed of this engine, which weighed over 5,000 tons.
For a moment, dust flew in the hoisting yard, and countless gases instantly vaporized, as if a large cloud of mist had appeared out of nowhere.
But even though the propulsion power of these 40 aerospace-grade spaceships had been pushed to its limit, this enormous engine still only slowly increased its speed, appearing leisurely.
There was no other way; it was simply too heavy. Even with 40 spaceships, the mass each spaceship needed to accelerate was as high as over 130 tons.
This has nothing to do with Loshen Star’s gravity field; it is only related to the object’s own mass. And mass is constant; it remains constant no matter which gravity field it is in.
Under the massive fuel expulsion, this engine slowly ascended diagonally upwards, increasing its altitude while also increasing its operating speed.
Finally, after flying around Loshen Star three times, the speed of this engine was finally increased to 950 meters per second.
At this point, it could finally fly around Loshen Star on its own, no longer requiring additional pulling force.
One engine was transported, followed by the second, then the third. In the end, a total of 50 engines were transported into space.
Accompanying them were a large number of spaceship parts.
In this vast space, the steel plates of the spaceship’s outer shell began to be welded, the framework began to be erected, the engines began to be fixed, the internal circuits began to be connected, the pipelines began to be joined...
Finally, after several months, the first spaceship built by Tom using a secondary pressurized thruster was completed!
This was undoubtedly a behemoth.
It had a length of 330 meters, a maximum width of 50 meters, and a maximum height of 20 meters.
Its total volume reached 73,000 cubic meters, and its empty weight alone was as high as 16,000 tons!
When fully loaded, its maximum total mass could reach 80,000 tons!
Cargo from Loshen Star’s surface and from space, destined for God-Enemy Star, converged into this massive cargo ship like rivers flowing into the sea, filling every one of its cargo holds.
Next, Tom’s long-awaited maiden voyage finally began.
The fission reactor’s power began to increase, not only providing power for the spaceship itself but also producing more energy.
The internal combustion engine started, and its internal 2,000-plus tons of liquid oxygen and methane began to burn, generating high-temperature, high-pressure gas, which was then sent into the secondary pressurization chamber.
The energy from the fission reactor quickly heated these gases, causing them to turn into plasma due to the excessively high temperature.
Before this plasma could harm the solid chamber, the electromagnetic confinement device began to work, tightly confining these high-temperature, high-pressure gases within a small volume, preventing them from coming into contact with any solid matter.
When the pressure reached a certain point, the electromagnetic confinement device opened a channel.
Thus, like a collapsing dam, this extremely high-pressure plasma, with an unstoppable momentum and a speed of up to 30 kilometers per second, surged out through this channel.
Under this massive reverse thrust, the cargo spaceship’s enormous hull, with a total mass of 80,000 tons, began to slowly accelerate, eventually breaking free from Loshen Star’s gravity field and flying towards God-Enemy Star, which was over 40 million kilometers away.
During this process, acceleration never stopped, and the speed even reached 12 kilometers per second without halting.
In the past, once the speed reached 12 kilometers per second, cargo ships would enter an inertial flight state and stop accelerating.
It wasn’t that they couldn’t reach higher speeds.
In this zero-gravity space, as long as acceleration continues, speed can become faster and faster.
The most crucial problem was the lack of fuel.
If you keep accelerating, you can indeed achieve higher speeds, but upon reaching your destination, if there isn’t enough fuel, how do you decelerate?
12 kilometers per second was a product of a reluctant compromise that balanced fuel carrying capacity with transportation speed and timeliness.
But at this moment, the speed of this cargo ship continued to increase.
20 kilometers per second, 30 kilometers per second...
It only stopped at 60 kilometers per second!
Its acceleration efficiency was not higher than other cargo ships, but the duration of its acceleration was several times longer.
Previous cargo ships, even if they exhausted all their fuel, could not accelerate to such a speed.
And now, even after accelerating to a high speed of 60 kilometers per second, the chemical fuel carried inside this cargo ship has consumed only 800 tons!
Not even half of it.
Its overall fuel utilization rate reached six times that of ordinary chemical propulsion cargo ships!
At this unprecedented high speed, it took only 8 days to arrive near God-Enemy Star.
After spending one day decelerating and consuming another 800 tons of fuel, it finally docked at God-Enemy Star’s port.
In total, it took nine days to complete a voyage that would have taken an ordinary spaceship over a month.
And with less fuel consumption!