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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 0340.PDF
FLIGHT, 11 March 1960 "Flight" Copyright Drawings By GORDON HORNER Left, a Leyland transporter eases a Thor through a partition in the HIM building at Feltwell; right, missile in tiring position The Thor weapon system (WS-31SA) includes a wide range of training equipment. The propulsion-system training unit (right) is being used by Ch Tech F. T. McManus to instruct a class on the vernier motors. Below, Fit Lt Kenneth Hunter and M/Sig W. Willis are seen at work in the launch control trailer THOR IN SERVICE ... installed. Each pad needed an extensive earthing system andfloodlighting, which was extended to include the security fences. This series of jobs at Feltwell and its satellites cost the AirMinistry about £1,750,000. This part of the work was a British Government expense under die agreement. By the rime it wasfinished, the men of the Douglas Company, who were the con- tractors of the USAF for the whole system, including installation,were starting to move in. The Americans accepted the bases as meeting the specification and took over in early September. Serious domestic problems were created by the arrival of largenumbers of Douglas technicians. They were given a hangar of their own, a barrack block, telephone lines and caravan parks,where many erf them lived. On some main bases, it was possible to bring US transport aircraft in with the missiles and machinery;but Feltwell was too small and could easily be served by using the big USAF base at Lakenheath. Much of the trucking fromLakenheath was done by the RAF and some of the heaviest equipment came by sea. One of the first jobs was to align the launch mount and get itsposition exact. Gravimetric and astro-geodetic surveys had been made outside the sites by the Director of Military Surveys at theWar Office. The Americans completed this work inside the sites for the first two complexes and the Air Ministry Works Directoratedid it for the last two. One large piece of construction work was eliminated when thedecision was taken to drop the requirement for liquid-oxygen plants on the sites themselves. Reliance was placed on theregular production facilities of the British Oxygen Company's plants. The tanks on the launching site contain enough oxygento enable a missile to be filled without requiring replenishing for some weeks. The Douglas men laid out each pad with its liquid oxygenand paraffin tanks on opposite sites and pipes leading up from them into the missile itself. Nitrogen was supplied from a mobile trailer, a method whichalso provides a launch control headquarters and power distribu- tion. One of the first things to go up on each site was the heavyshelter for the missile. The Douglas Company employed 4S0 British civilians in the work at Feltwell and there was generalsurprise and pleasure at the speed with which things were put in their place. This had been done only on the test ranges, wherethere were reserves of specialists and equipment for every pur- pose. The men who came to England to do the job had much to Kim, and Cpl A. Duxbury of the RAF police, see that all is well as a missile is put through a simulated launch sequence
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