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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 1739.PDF
FLIGHT, 30 November 1961 845 Missiles and Space flight a higher level than ever before." He stressed the tremendous role of rocket weapons with powerful atomic and thermu-nuclear war- heads in this attainment. "We must strengthen our defences, create powerful weapons, be vigilant and in a constant state of combat readiness," he continued, "The rocKet forces and the artillery together with the other arms and services of the armed forces have in recent months greatly improved their combat readiness." Referring to the Novemoer / parade in Moscow and the rocKets that were shown there varentsov added: "It is quite obvious that only certain sampies of soviet rocket weapons were shown at the parade. Our armed forces have plenty of other, much bigger rockets too . . . "Rockets have become now the main weapons of all the Soviet armed forces. Our rocket troops possess great power and mobility, and are able to manoeuvre quickly and ure with great precision, regardless of weather and climatic conditions." Red Star also printed an interview with Col-Gen of Artillery KLuleshov, who said that at the present time Moscow and the majority of large cities in the Soviet Union had a powerful rocket and radar defence and a network; of lighter aerodromes. "We have also successfully solved the problem of the destruction of various rockets in flight," he added. In an interview in the same paper, Engineer-Admiral Isachenkov said that a variety of types of submarines represented the main striking force of the Soviet Navy. The backbone of the submarine fleet itself consisted of atomic submarines whose range and endur- ance when submerged were practically unlimited. Soviet submarines were missile carriers, he stated, and the Soviet Navy now had a fleet of tirst-class rocket cruisers and rocket-carrying vessels armed with homing rockets. "Soviet ships can destroy enemy ships, in particular aircraft carriers, hundreds of kilometres away." Col-Gen Tolubko, describing Soviet strategic rockets, pointed out that; "The existence of powerful nuclear rocket weapons has enabled the Soviet country to create a new arm—the strategic rocket troops . . . We can add to the above that we have even more power- ful nuclear weapons and their number is considerably larger than calculated by American experts . . . Our ballistic rockets have proved themselves so well that nobody can doubt their ability to rise and deliver every sort of missile to any point on earth. F-1 PROGRESS "We have had 40 F-1 engine firings at Edwards Air Force Base to date, without major mishap. In fact, the engine is performing very nicely," George f. Sutton, manager of long-range planning for the Rocketdyne Division of North American Aviation, told an audience in Dayton, Ohio, on November 8, "Usually, in a develop- ment programme of this kind, we have some spectacular fires, but so far there have been only very minor problems with the F-1. We also have fired the engine's thrust chamoer over 100 times with good results," Mr Sutton declared in his talk on the F-1 engine pro- gramme before a joint meeting of the Institute of the Aerospace Sciences and the American Rocket Society. In his review of the F-1 programme (a correspondent writes) Mr Sutton indicated that the injector was one of the more trouble- some features of the engine in the very early stages of development. "It took eight months to come up with a stable injector," he reported. He added that the turbopump also required more design and development time than anticipated, but otherwise performance of each component was about as expected. 1 he rirst turbopump for the F-1 was not nred until January of 1961, and the engine was given its first test on February 10 at Edwards Air Force Base when it developed 1,550,0001b of thrust. Since then it has developed 1,640,0001b of thrust. Prime purpose of the first tests is checking start-up and shut-down performance. Pre-tlight rating tests that include some 18,000sec of actual firing time are scheduled for completion early in 1963,Mr Sutton declared. The Rocketdyne engineer came out strongly for keeping space research in a civilian agency and out of the military, and for going to the Moon "in one fell swoop" rather than first building an inter- mediate station in low orbit and firing a manned capsule to the Moon from there. His reason for concentrating space research in a civilian agency apart from the Department of Defense was fear that space research would lose its priority if it came under the military, which has so many other projects that would compete for attention and financial support. He also said that it would take longer to develop the larger vehicles that can make a round-trip to the lvioon in one step, than to use existing vehicles to begin establishing a secondary platform in space from which a Moon vehicle could be launched. But we knew little about rendezvous techniques, and "it is hard enough Artist's impression of Transit 4B experimental navigation satellite (left) and TRAAC (Transit research and attitude control) satellite, launched together by Thor-AbleStar from Cape Canaveral on November 15 and reported in last week's issue for us to assemble space vehicles on the ground without having to do it in space." Mr Sutton therefore strongly supported the Saturn and Nova programme (in which his company has a large stake) to get a man to the Moon. The Saturn S-1B will use the F-1 engine, and NASA is expected to let a contract for this vehicle very soon. The S-1B will be built in Michaud, Louisiana, the pay load for the vehicle will be worked out at the new NASA manned spaceflight centre to be built near Houston, Texas, and the vehicle will be fired from Cape Canaveral. But, for the manned lunar capsule, NASA is studying the huge Nova vehicle that would use 8 F-ls in the first stage to develop 12 million pounds of thrust—and would spew forth exhaust flames 1,200ft long. Such a vehicle, with almost any of a variety of upper stages, could put a 400,0001b vehicle into a low orbit of 300 miles. It could put a smaller payload of 170,0001b into an escape mission so that it would land on the Moon with a weight of 156,0001b, and while returning to Earth the capsule would have a weight of 10,000-15,0001b upon re-entry. Most of the weight loss on the mission would result from the consumption of fuel, Mr Sutton stated. He noted that the Department of Defense and NASA currently are deciding whether to go ahead with the eight-engine Nova vehicle, or to pursue the rendezvous idea for getting to the Moon. In answer to a question, Mr Sutton said that recovery of large boosters intact was technically feasible, but unless such a booster could be launched and re-launched many times after recovery, the economics of the idea simply were against it. Responding to another question, Mr Sutton declared that preliminary studies by Rocketdyne indicated that single-chamber rockets with thrust ratings up to 15 million pounds were feasible. "Other companies have made similar studies and say single-chamber rockets developing 40 million pounds of thrust are feasible." However, no detailed study of the problems that might be en- countered in making such large single-chamber rockets had been undertaken by anyone in the West, so far as Mr Sutton knew. Completion of the series of four Skylark firings from Woomera in which US payloads were carried was announced in Adelaide on November 22. Data obtained have been sent to the USA for analysis. A USAF announcement from Point Arguello on November 22 stated"A satellite employing an Atlas-Agena B booster combination was successfully launched today. The satellite is carrying a number ofclassified test components." The satellite is believed lo be one of the Samos series of experimental reconnaissance spacecraft. Launches of two "3-ton Agatha rockets" on November 13 and 17from the French base at Hammaguir, in the Sahara, were announced in Paris on November 24. The tests were stated 'o be part of "research ona satellite-launcher expected to be ready in the next four years." Nose- cones and payloads were recovered after achieving a height of 64km. The RL-10 liquid hydrogen/liquid oxygen rocket engine, intended forCentaur and Saturn vehicles, has completed successful pre-flight test firings, according to a National Aeronautics and Space Administrationannouncement on November 19. The engine has been developed by Pratt & Whitney. A Moscow report on November 18 quoted Prof Stanyukovich.believed to be connected with the design of Soviet sputniks, as saying that "Soviet scientists are now working on a theory regarding rocketsthat will start for space without any explosive blast. Solar energy will be used instead." No details were given except that, in his opinion,space-ships equipped with solar engines could make any trip within the solar system and visit any planet in the system.
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