When the planes of the Master Company took off for the space supplies transported by China, it completely stimulated the whole world, especially the United States and Russia. On the one hand, Russia launched the rockets in stock as soon as possible, and on the other hand, it was also studying the engines of the Master Company and also studying its own space shuttles.

In this regard, the United States is undoubtedly much faster, after all, it has a strong foundation; a 200-year technological power is not just a joke.

On January 25, 2047, the first space shuttle in the United States that uses two K01 engines was completed and is ready to test flights today.

Because it is a temporary test flight and has not been finalized yet, the new aircraft has no code name, only one set of numbers: No. 301, the third generation of the first space shuttle.

As the world's largest aerospace agency, NASA has always been the leader in aerospace. As the saying goes, it can be imitated and never surpassed. However, with the rise of the expert company, Nasa's position has begun to be challenged. Since the expert company assisted China in successfully making the first Feilong fighter, NASA has actually begun to pay attention, but the engine technology is not a toy. A small engine requires more than 100,000 parts, which is extremely precise. When rashly disassembled a brand new engine, almost no country or organization could perfectly reinstall it - especially the installation of all engine parts of the expert company borrows the convenience (encryption) of the formation. Therefore, those who do not understand the formation will definitely not be able to install it after disassembly.

In this regard, due to the expert company in recent years, Huaxia attached great importance to the ancient Chinese civilization. A large number of experts have been discovered. Every university has begun to regard ancient Chinese knowledge as a main course. In addition, the expert company has cooperated with the country in various aspects to develop, which has given China a preliminary mastery of introductory knowledge, but that is all.

Since the forced launch, Zhang Jingyuan has begun internal discussions and cooperation with the country will gradually begin to enter a stage of complete cessation.

But here in the United States, today's Chief Engineer John is particularly excited and nervous. As the head of research and development of the third-generation space shuttle in the United States, he shoulders heavy responsibilities and is under great pressure. Especially now, the top core engines are not from the United States, and they cannot be produced and manufactured. Five of the 15 engines bought from experts were placed here. One of the engines was sent to the Power Research Institute for disassembly and research, ready for reproduction - but there is no hope of reproduction so far, whether it is the material or the strange installation method; after disassembly, the Power Research Institute tried several times and could not assemble it back.

However, this does not prevent NASA from using the engines of expert companies to manufacture space shuttles; the current situation is that the most correct way to take the planes off as soon as possible, and at least it is necessary to keep the people confident and supportive in the authorities.

In fact, the national life of the United States is not good now, and it is a bit aligned with China in the early 21st century. With the rise of China, the strong oppression of Russia, and the isolation of the European Union, the pressure on the United States is getting greater and greater, especially even countries in South America, Central Asia, South Asia, Central Africa and other places are also rising rapidly, making the pressure on the United States increasingly greater. In order to withstand external pressure, the United States has had to transfer the pressure to the people again. The former world police have been demoted to regional police.

In this case, the United States had to spend a huge cost to develop a new generation of space shuttles, which is also the third-generation space shuttle in the United States. The former Columbia, Atlantis and others are far from meeting the needs of modern aerospace.

At noon, the contemporary American president arrived, and John led the NASA team to simply welcome him. In this regard, the United States has a lot of open politics and left the president's White House. In other places, the president has no superior status under informal circumstances.

"Dr. John, what's going on?" the president asked with some concern as he looked at the plane placed on the ground. He had known before that due to material issues, the space shuttle has not yet solved some of the problems, such as the light and strong structure.

"It can barely be able to test flights, so it should be an explanation for the domestic people." Dr. John was a little unconfident. To be precise, the space shuttle developed at the moment is only 20 tons. Although it has made great progress compared to before, with a large-capacity launch vehicle and a powerful transportation capacity of expert companies, the current situation is really not optimistic.

President: "Can you give a general introduction to the situation?"

"Okay." Dr. John pointed to the space shuttle in the distance, "the fuselage borrowed from the design of the Raptor fighter and changed slightly. Because the working medium of the engine is air, it is mainly in the stratosphere, and natural air is used to work in the atmosphere. Therefore, the aircraft still retains the air inlet; it also carries three tons of liquid air, which is used as the working medium when the air in space and the atmosphere is thin. This design can reduce the weight of about three tons for the aircraft.

In addition, in order to be able to carry 100 tons of thrust of two engines, the fuselage is made of titanium alloy as the frame. In order to achieve the maximum strength effect, the main structure of the aircraft is adopted in one-piece processing technology. The main structure is a fuselage structure with a field of 22 meters, a width of 20 meters and a height of 3 meters. It is made of a titanium alloy with a length of 23 meters, a width of 21 meters and a height of 3.3 meters. The rest of the structures are…”

"Wait!" The president interrupted Dr. John's words, "What is the cost of the main structure of the aircraft made of a whole titanium alloy!" Listening to Dr. John's introduction, the president's face changed. The cost value of such a large piece of titanium alloy is absolutely terrifying. You must know that this is not an iron ingot, but an aviation-grade material that must maintain high strength in every inch. It can only be processed by segmented pouring and forging technology, and the success rate is very low.

"Uh... the cost is $1.3 billion. In order to complete this unprecedented large component, we spent more than ten tons of tools and scrapped three top-level super-large combined gantry machining centers, and the scrap chips were about 460 tons." Dr. John was a little uneasy, but the cost was a bit high. However, there is no new material technology as powerful as a master company, and only such a framework can be used to narrow the overall gap.

"Okay, then tell me, except for two engines, how much does the remaining parts of this space shuttle cost?"

“12 billion US dollars!”

"How much!" the president screamed, "12 billion US dollars! Oh, God, the engine is the heart. We spent $20 billion to buy it since China. This is a thing of the past. But now you tell me the rest of the parts, it still costs $12 billion. How do you tell me how to explain it to the people!"

"But, Mr. President, in order to achieve the best results, there is $4 billion for custom-made parts from expert companies."

"..." The president was stunned for a moment, then waved his hand with a frustrated expression, "Let me see the test flight situation. You see, there are already tens of thousands of enthusiastic citizens watching around."
Chapter completed!