Word: thiokol
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...points from its 1960 low of 18-despite heavy 1960 losses -and jumped five points last week on news that the Administration plans to step up the Polaris missile program. The success of last week's Minuteman missile shot helped send up Boeing, the prime contractor, and Thiokol, maker of the first-stage engine...
Stop Loss. A phenomenon of the market in recent weeks has been a flurry of sudden, sharp drops in such old favorites as Brunswick, Universal Match and Thiokol. Many brokers blamed such flurries on the thinness of the markets: a comparatively small number of shares, bought or sold, cause a big change in price. To make markets broader, the New York Stock Exchange argues that margins, which now require a buyer to put up 90% of the price, should be reduced, since there is far less credit buying in the market than in any other segment of the economy...
...Brigham City plant began as a research center and pilot plant for production of rocket engines filled with the rubbery solid fuel that was Thiokol's first contribution to rocketry. It has grown into 84 smallish structures scattered over miles of desert, but it still reflects the basic simplicity that is solid fuel's chief advantage over liquid. The liquid-fuel rocket engines that push the Thor and Atlas must be static-tested with their flames shooting downward, which requires massive, well-anchored test stands to resist the upward thrust. Their liquid fuel and oxidizer call for pumps...
...Cylinder. Thiokol's test stands are hardly more than nicks in the rocky hillsides. They need no elaborate structures or tubing because a solid-fuel booster is little more than a fat, blunt-nosed casing for the fuel it encloses. It lies on its side in a heavy steel cradle and pokes its enormous thrust against a vertical rock face sheathed with concrete. Instruments record vibrations, temperatures and the stress in its metal skin, but human watchers do not shelter in a blockhouse. They watch the tests from open hillsides. "Distance is cheaper," they say, "than concrete and periscopes...
Like all big missiles, Minuteman is an assembly job, using components from many sources. Besides making the heavy first-stage booster, Thiokol may also get the contract for the second-stage booster. The third stage, which has yet to reach final design, will probably be made by Hercules Powder Co. at Bacchus, 15 miles southwest of Salt Lake City. The guidance system, made by North American Aviation, Inc. (it recently got a $115 million contract), will be shipped in from California. Boeing Airplane Co. will put together the three stages and install the guidance system in the completed missile...