Word: hydrogenized
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...minutes later ignominiously exploded. The failure of the missile (control-system malfunction, officials explained) was bad enough; worse, this Atlas was the first fully powered U.S.-made ICBM to be flight-tested. It carried for the first time a wedge-shaped tactical nose cone capable of carrying a hydrogen-bomb warhead, and it was powered by three engines that burned simultaneously from the moment of ignition and generated more than 350,000 Ibs. of thrust. Atlas score, so far in nine launchings: three successful limited-range (600 miles plus) flights, six midair failures...
Light Molecules. The simplest kind of atomic engine uses a nuclear reactor to heat a gaseous propellant and shoot it out of a nozzle. Its chief advantage over chemical rocket engines: its propellant can be liquid hydrogen, whose molecules are light and therefore move faster at a given temperature. The best possible chemical combination (hydrogen and ozone), burning at 5,000° F. and 500 lbs.-per-sq.-in. chamber pressure, gives an exhaust velocity of 13,000 ft. per sec. A nuclear rocket, using hydrogen at the same pressure and only 3,000° F., shoots...
...Deep Space. Nuclear rocket enthusiasts are not really satisfied with an engine that works in so simple a way. They are already dreaming of more sophisticated schemes for long-distance flights. One of these is an engine whose nuclear fuel is a uranium-rich gas mixed with the hydrogen propellant. When the nuclear reaction starts, both gases will get hot and blast out of the nozzle. This would produce a magnificent short-duration thrust, but the wasted uranium would cost something like $150 million per takeoff. The way around this little difficulty would be some system to keep the heavy...
Since the efficiency of a rocket engine depends largely on its exhaust velocity, the nuclear engine has a big initial advantage, but it has to pay a high price. The engine itself, which must be cooled elaborately by the liquid hydrogen, will be about as complicated as a conventional chemical engine (see diagram). Its controls will be even more complicated, and all its delicate parts will have to perform perfectly in spite of intense gamma rays striking through them at takeoff...
...diameter, but it will have to generate something like 100 times the energy of the massive reactor of Britain's Calder Hall nuclear power station. This means that it will run very hot, and will be kept from flashing into vapor only by the stream of liquid hydrogen forced rapidly through it. On the other hand, the core need work for only a few minutes. By that time the propellant will have been exhausted, and the rocket will be on its way into deep space...