Word: rockets
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...rocket-launching vehicle that will toss the U.S. earth satellite into its orbit is proving a tougher design job than some of the scientists thought. Last week Assistant Secretary of the Navy James H. Smith Jr., taking public notice of the fact, announced that the first satellite will not take to space until early...
Balloon Tanks. The vehicle, Rosen told the National Capital Astronomers, will be a three-stage rocket 72 ft. long and 45 in. in maximum diameter. It will have no fins, but will depend for steering on its movable rocket motor and an array of small gas-jets. The tanks holding the propellants (liquid oxygen and gasoline for the first stage, nitric acid and dimethyl-hydrazine for the second) will be thin-walled to save weight, and will have little strength when empty. When they are full and highly pressurized with helium, they will become as rigid as auto tires...
...first-stage rocket, carrying stages 2 and 3 and the payload satellite, will be fired due east, to take advantage of the spin of the earth (1,340 ft. per second at the launching point. Cape Canaveral, Fla.). When it burns out and separates, 36 miles above the earth on a curving trajectory, the second stage will take over. After burning out in turn, it will coast upward, still attached to stage 3, to the 300-mile level. While it coasts, its mechanical brain will be reading its numerous instruments and telling little gas-jets how to turn...
...will be at orbital level, above nearly all the atmosphere and pointing in the right direction. But its speed will be only half the speed required (17,000 m.p.h.) to make the satellite stick safely to its orbit. Reaching orbital speed is the job of the third-stage rocket. The final rocket will be small and will use solid fuel, which requires no tricky pumps or valves. It will fire for 30-60 seconds, depending on how much accelera tion the delicate instruments in the satellite can take without damage. When the fuel is gone, the burned-out rocket will...
Forbidden Planet. For earthlings with that end-of-winter feeling: spring cruise at speed of light to Altair-4-small, out-of-the-way planet with two moons, green sky, pink sand, personal robot service. Caution: pack a rocket pistol. Occasional monsters (TIME, April...