by neufer » Tue Oct 07, 2008 2:51 pm
clarencedonath wrote:http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap081001.html
Why would Sputnik be considered the first artificial satellite if the upper stage of the Bumper V2 "was able to reach then-record altitudes of almost 400 kilometers, higher than even modern Space Shuttles fly today."?
http://www.designation-systems.net/dusr ... v-g-1.html
<<In 1944, the Army Ordnance Department began funding a rocket development program by the California Institute of Technology (CIT). The ORDCIT (for "Ordnance" and CIT) project's first product was the Private A, a small solid-propellant rocket to test basic principles of launch operations and flight stability. 24 Private A rockets were flown during December 1944. The ultimate goal of ORDCIT was the development of the Corporal, a liquid-fueled surface-to-surface missile (which eventually became the SSM-A-17/MGM-5), and by late 1944, enough progess had been made to initiate the development of a small sounding (high-altitude research) rocket based on Corporal propulsion technology.
The planned sounding rocket was called WAC Corporal, and was to carry 11 kg (25 lb) of instrumentation to an altitude of at least 30 km (100000 ft). The origin of the WAC label are a bit unclear, but some sources state it stood for "Without Attitude Control", referring to the fact that the simple rocket had no stabilization and guidance system. The WAC Corporal was boosted into the air by a Tiny Tim 11.75" solid-fueled rocket (a heavy air-to-surface rocket of the U.S. Navy), and powered by a liquid-fueled sustainer engine. After it had left the high three-rail launch tower, the missile was stabilized in flight by its three tailfins only. The nose cone was designed to separate near the end of the flight, releasing a parachute for instrument recovery. >>
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wac_Corporal
<<The WAC Corporal was the first sounding rocket developed in the United States. Begun as a spinoff of the Corporal program, the WAC was a "little sister" to the larger Corporal. It was designed and built jointly by the Douglas Aircraft Company and the Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory. In a NASA oral history group interview, William Hayward Pickering indicated the WAC "was named after the Women's Army Corps". In the same group interview, Dick Jones suggested it might have been an acronym for "Without Attitude Control" (the rocket lacked a guidance system and relied on three fins for stability).
The WAC Corporal was a liquid-fuel rocket, with fuming nitric acid and aniline used as oxidizers and furfuryl alcohol as fuel. For the first few seconds of launch, the Wac used a cluster of solid fuel Tiny Tim engines.
The first WAC Corporal dummy round was launched on September 16, 1945 from White Sands Missile Range near Las Cruces, New Mexico. After a White Sands V-2 rocket had reached 69 miles on May 10, a White Sands WAC Corporal reached 80 km (49 mi) on May 22, 1946 -- the first U.S.-designed rocket to reach the edge of space (under the U.S. definition of space at the time). On February 24, 1949, a Bumper WAC Corporal at White Sands accelerated to 5150 mph to became the first flight of more than five times the speed of sound.
A few WAC Corporals survive in museums, including one at the National Air and Space Museum and another in the White Sands Missile Range Museum.>>
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WAC image of Mercury
http://messenger.jhuapl.edu/gallery/sci ... age_id=214
<<Yesterday, at 4:40 am EDT, MESSENGER successfully completed its second flyby of Mercury. Today, at about 1:50 am EDT, the images taken during the flyby encounter began to be received back on Earth. The spectacular image shown here is one of the first to be returned and shows a WAC image of the departing planet taken about 90 minutes after the spacecraft’s closest approach to Mercury. The bright crater just south of the center of the image is Kuiper, identified on images from the Mariner 10 mission in the 1970s. For most of the terrain east of Kuiper, toward the limb (edge) of the planet, the departing images are the first spacecraft views of that portion of Mercury’s surface. A striking characteristic of this newly imaged area is the large pattern of rays that extend from the northern region of Mercury to regions south of Kuiper. This extensive ray system appears to emanate from a relatively young crater newly imaged by MESSENGER, providing a view of the planet distinctly unique from that obtained during MESSENGER’s first flyby. This young, extensively rayed crater, along with the prominent rayed crater to the southeast of Kuiper, near the limb of the planet, were both seen in Earth-based radar images of Mercury but not previously imaged by spacecraft. As the MESSENGER team is busy examining this newly obtained view that is only a few hours old, data from the flyby continue to stream down to Earth, including higher resolution close-up images of this previously unseen terrain.>>
[quote="clarencedonath"]http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap081001.html
Why would Sputnik be considered the first artificial satellite if the upper stage of the Bumper V2 "was able to reach then-record altitudes of almost 400 kilometers, higher than even modern Space Shuttles fly today."?[/quote]
http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app1/rtv-g-1.html
<<In 1944, the Army Ordnance Department began funding a rocket development program by the California Institute of Technology (CIT). The ORDCIT (for "Ordnance" and CIT) project's first product was the Private A, a small solid-propellant rocket to test basic principles of launch operations and flight stability. 24 Private A rockets were flown during December 1944. The ultimate goal of ORDCIT was the development of the Corporal, a liquid-fueled surface-to-surface missile (which eventually became the SSM-A-17/MGM-5), and by late 1944, enough progess had been made to initiate the development of a small sounding (high-altitude research) rocket based on Corporal propulsion technology.
The planned sounding rocket was called WAC Corporal, and was to carry 11 kg (25 lb) of instrumentation to an altitude of at least 30 km (100000 ft). The origin of the WAC label are a bit unclear, but some sources state it stood for "Without Attitude Control", referring to the fact that the simple rocket had no stabilization and guidance system. The WAC Corporal was boosted into the air by a Tiny Tim 11.75" solid-fueled rocket (a heavy air-to-surface rocket of the U.S. Navy), and powered by a liquid-fueled sustainer engine. After it had left the high three-rail launch tower, the missile was stabilized in flight by its three tailfins only. The nose cone was designed to separate near the end of the flight, releasing a parachute for instrument recovery. >>
-------------------------------------------------------------
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wac_Corporal
<<The WAC Corporal was the first sounding rocket developed in the United States. Begun as a spinoff of the Corporal program, the WAC was a "little sister" to the larger Corporal. It was designed and built jointly by the Douglas Aircraft Company and the Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory. In a NASA oral history group interview, William Hayward Pickering indicated the WAC "was named after the Women's Army Corps". In the same group interview, Dick Jones suggested it might have been an acronym for "Without Attitude Control" (the rocket lacked a guidance system and relied on three fins for stability).
The WAC Corporal was a liquid-fuel rocket, with fuming nitric acid and aniline used as oxidizers and furfuryl alcohol as fuel. For the first few seconds of launch, the Wac used a cluster of solid fuel Tiny Tim engines.
The first WAC Corporal dummy round was launched on September 16, 1945 from White Sands Missile Range near Las Cruces, New Mexico. After a White Sands V-2 rocket had reached 69 miles on May 10, a White Sands WAC Corporal reached 80 km (49 mi) on May 22, 1946 -- the first U.S.-designed rocket to reach the edge of space (under the U.S. definition of space at the time). On February 24, 1949, a Bumper WAC Corporal at White Sands accelerated to 5150 mph to became the first flight of more than five times the speed of sound.
A few WAC Corporals survive in museums, including one at the National Air and Space Museum and another in the White Sands Missile Range Museum.>>
------------------------------------------
WAC image of Mercury
http://messenger.jhuapl.edu/gallery/sciencePhotos/image.php?gallery_id=2&image_id=214
<<Yesterday, at 4:40 am EDT, MESSENGER successfully completed its second flyby of Mercury. Today, at about 1:50 am EDT, the images taken during the flyby encounter began to be received back on Earth. The spectacular image shown here is one of the first to be returned and shows a WAC image of the departing planet taken about 90 minutes after the spacecraft’s closest approach to Mercury. The bright crater just south of the center of the image is Kuiper, identified on images from the Mariner 10 mission in the 1970s. For most of the terrain east of Kuiper, toward the limb (edge) of the planet, the departing images are the first spacecraft views of that portion of Mercury’s surface. A striking characteristic of this newly imaged area is the large pattern of rays that extend from the northern region of Mercury to regions south of Kuiper. This extensive ray system appears to emanate from a relatively young crater newly imaged by MESSENGER, providing a view of the planet distinctly unique from that obtained during MESSENGER’s first flyby. This young, extensively rayed crater, along with the prominent rayed crater to the southeast of Kuiper, near the limb of the planet, were both seen in Earth-based radar images of Mercury but not previously imaged by spacecraft. As the MESSENGER team is busy examining this newly obtained view that is only a few hours old, data from the flyby continue to stream down to Earth, including higher resolution close-up images of this previously unseen terrain.>>