Xiao Yu began intensive pre-construction preparations.
First of all, Xiao Yu spent two months building a brand new titanium and zirconium processing and smelting base next to a methane lake that was confirmed to be free of black worms in order to prepare for the large amount of raw ore that might arrive after the earth mining trip.
Then, Xiao Yu built thousands of small nuclear fusion engines with certain intelligence, and loaded them all into the Hope. After all preparations were made, the Hope took off smoothly, and after rushing to the original Earth orbit, the construction of the Shuguang began.
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Various bases, collection, smelting and other equipment have been built. Now there is no need to expand the scale again. We only need to maintain the current production rate. Therefore, Xiao Yu in addition to dividing a fixed part of the calculation rate to maintain the operation of all bases
In addition, all remaining energy at this stage is devoted to the construction of Dawn.
Within the main base, hundreds of planes take off and land every day, delivering materials here in an endless stream. Immediately after the planes land, robots will sort the raw materials they bring and send them to different processing workshops.
After being purified or tempered again, they are manufactured into individual parts, and then robots transport them to the assembly workshop, assemble them into large components, and then transport them to a large factory building for assembly.
Countless robots are like hard-working worker ants, and the huge Dawn is like an ant nest. Under the busyness of these hard-working worker ants, the Dawn gradually takes shape.
By this time, Hope had already reached its original Earth orbit after a long two-month journey.
After these years of development, an asteroid belt around the sun has been formed in the original Earth orbit, with a total circumference of more than one billion kilometers, a width of about 10,000 kilometers, and a thickness of only about ten kilometers. Xiao Yu knew that this was
Formed under the influence of the sun's gravity. The current earth is the "ring" of the sun, just like the rings of Saturn and the rings of Jupiter. In the future, these things can no longer be called the earth, but should be called "solar rings".
After observing the movement of the earth through the Hope, Xiao Yu secretly sighed.
He knew that under the gravitational disturbance of the outer planets, such as Jupiter, Mars, and the inner Venus, no new planets could be formed here in the Earth's orbit. The Earth has become a thing of the past.
This place is 1.3 billion kilometers away from Xiao Yu. There is a delay of about 80 minutes in the communication between here and Titan. Therefore, Xiao Yu handed over most of the operating authority of the Hope to the pre-programmed program, and he could only do it at any time.
Monitor the situation of Nozomi.
The endless stream of data is transmitted to a high-power communication satellite pre-placed at the Sun-Jupiter Lagrangian point. This satellite in turn transmits the signal to the satellite placed at the Sun-Saturn Lagrangian point, which in turn transmits the signal.
Passed to the satellites orbiting Saturn, they then pass the signal to the satellites orbiting Titan. After such twists and turns, the signal can be transmitted to Xiao Yu's mind. If Xiao Yu wants to send instructions, he must also follow this process, but the order is exactly the opposite.
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Through these data, Xiao Yu can know the movements of the Hope.
Hope has been surveying below this "ring" in the original Earth orbit. It is equipped with an extremely sensitive titanium and zirconium detection instrument. As long as it finds meteorites rich in titanium and zirconium and their sizes are within the acceptable range, Hope
No. will take action against it.
"Huh? The Hope has discovered a meteorite that meets the conditions?" Xiao Yu was overjoyed and immediately waited for the next signal to be transmitted.
This meteorite has a shape close to a cube, with a length, width and height of about ten meters, and a volume of about one thousand cubic meters. It is mainly composed of 30% rock and 69% ilmenite, and the rest is
The mass of some impurities is as high as about 5,000 tons, which is heavier than the entire Hope.
According to estimates, Xiao Yu can smelt nearly a thousand tons of titanium from just this one meteorite.
"It's already worth starting." Xiao Yu thought to himself, "According to the preset program, the next step is for the Hope to drag it below the solar ring to obtain a quiet processing environment."
When Xiao Yu received this signal, the signal had been running in space for more than an hour. In other words, this had happened more than an hour ago.
Faintly, Xiao Yu felt a little nervous.
Practice is the best way to test the accuracy of a program. Although Xiao Yu has tested the program hundreds of thousands of times before the launch of Hope, testing is just a test after all. Whether the program runs correctly still depends on its practice.
How is the performance in .
Continuous signals continued to come. Xiao Yu saw that the Hope first cautiously approached the meteorite. It was not until the distance shortened to thirty meters that he launched a mechanical claw. After firmly fixing it, the engine
It started and dragged the meteorite away from the solar ring.
Everything was as Xiao Yu expected.
Seeing that his preset program had withstood the test of practice, Xiao Yu breathed a sigh of relief and continued to pay attention to the next move of the Hope.
The Hope slowly brought the meteorite closer, and scanned it with a three-dimensional scanner. After calculating the center of gravity, density and other information, it found the best place to install the engine.
That's right, the role that Xiao Yu's thousands of small nuclear fusion engines will play is exactly this.
Xiao Yu's plan is to install an engine on it after finding a meteorite that meets the conditions, and let it fly to Titan by itself under the power provided by the nuclear fusion engine. After all, due to the tonnage limit of the Hope,
The transportation capacity is really limited. If the Hope alone transports it back and forth, Xiao Yu may not be able to obtain enough materials in a hundred years.
The power that a small nuclear fusion engine can provide is extremely limited. Correspondingly, the acceleration it can provide for a meteorite is also limited. This means that it takes about a year for a meteorite to fly to reach Titan.
The speed increase caused by the gravitational acceleration of Saturn, Jupiter and other stars that can be experienced during the flight.
But even so, using this method is much more cost-effective than having the Nozomi transport it from time to time. After all, at the speed of the Nozomi, a round trip will take four months, and even if it uses a towed
The transportation method can only transport up to 100,000 tons of meteorites in one trip, no more. This kind of efficiency is really low.
After bringing the meteorite close enough, the Hope opened the hatch. Several robots installed a small nuclear fusion engine on the meteorite. After fixing it, they returned to the Hope.
Start looking for the next valuable meteorite.
As for this meteorite, about thirty minutes after the Hope left, the small nuclear fusion engine installed on the side facing the sun suddenly ejected a stream of light blue flames, pushing the meteorite to accelerate forward.
During the year-long flight, high-power communication satellites scattered in space will serve as navigation tasks to ensure that it can reach Titan safely and accurately.
Seeing that everything was going smoothly, Xiao Yu breathed a sigh of relief and was full of confidence in this mining plan.
Three days later, Hope found another meteorite that met the conditions. The mass of this meteorite was much larger than the previous meteorite. Its volume was about 30,000 cubic meters, and its mass was astonishing.
Hundreds of thousands of tons. But its ilmenite content also reaches an astonishing 80%.
According to calculations, Xiao Yu could obtain more than 30,000 tons of titanium ore from this meteorite.
In Xiao Yu's setting, the Hope did not have the decision-making power to decide whether to collect such a large meteorite. After it sent the information to Xiao Yu, it began to track the meteorite, waiting for Xiao Yu's response.
Xiao Yu thought for a while and decided to collect it. After all, more than 30,000 tons of titanium ore is not a small amount. It's just that the transportation plan needs to be revised.
Xiao Yu quickly made an improved transportation plan and sent it to the Hope.
After receiving the signal, the Hope followed the program guidelines and first towed it away from the ecliptic plane, then installed fifteen nuclear fusion engines on it before leaving and continuing to explore the next meteorite.
It took half a year for the Hope to collect nearly 300 meteorites, with different sizes and masses. The largest one weighed 300,000 tons, and the smallest one weighed 2,000 tons. Xiao Yu has done this
It is estimated that these nearly three hundred meteorites can provide him with about three million tons of titanium ore and about one million tons of zirconium ore, enough to support him in completing the first phase of interstellar fleet construction.
After completing all this, installing the 300 meteorites on the fusion engines one by one, and sending them on their way, Xiao Yu gave the order for the Hope to return.
The speed of Hope is several times faster than that of meteorites, but even so, it is expected that it will take another two months for Hope to return to Titan. Then, after another four months or so, the first meteorite will arrive.
It will reach the orbit of Saturn. At that time, Hope will be needed to respond. After all, there are too many variables in one year, and it is difficult to ensure that the meteorites can accurately hit their targets.
Moreover, when entering the atmosphere, Xiao Yu does not want to lose mass due to friction with the atmosphere. That would be too much of a loss. However, Xiao Yu has made a complete response plan to ensure that these meteorites arrive safely with minimal losses.
There is a processing plant prepared for them.
Half a year has passed, and the construction of Dawn has come to an end. All post-processing is currently underway. Soon, Dawn will be able to leave Titan and fly freely in space.
Everything is moving forward according to Xiao Yu's plan.