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Secretary of the Navy: ...
"My dear sir, in fact Juno-1 has the ability to launch a small satellite into space." Wilbur Brooke said bravely, "a satellite not smaller than the Navy's 'Grapefruit'."
"Your rockets are just that big," the senator gestured a distance with his hand, "Soviet rockets are so...big, I think you're cheating money."
Wilbur Brook: "No. The Soviet launch vehicle was big, but the Chinese launch vehicle was not."
"What evidence do you have?"
Wilbur Brook took out models of the Long March-1 rocket and the Forward-[-] satellite from his briefcase.
Senator: "That's a children's toy."
Wilbur Brook: "This is the latest model to be peddled by China... yes, it's a children's toy, but this model can show the approximate size of the Chinese rocket. Compared with the Soviet rocket, the Chinese rocket model has a simple appearance and a small convex shape. There are very few parts and small parts, which means that its size is smaller than that of Soviet rockets."
Senator: "So can you guess how big the Chinese rocket is?"
"Well... 60 to 90 feet in length and about 35 to 55 tons in weight."
Secretary of the Navy: "We have already verified and calculated that a rocket of 20 to 30 tons can send a satellite into space. ... Well, I shouldn't say that."
Wilbur Brook: "The Juno-1 and Jupiter-C developed by the Army both weigh more than 25 tons and are capable of launching satellites. However, since June 57, the Army has not received enough funding, so that it can only Look at the first stage of the rocket, and simply the second stage, and if the Army takes the Juno-6 and uses a three-stage rocket system, then you can put a satellite into space."
……
Although the hearing in December was bloody, in the end the military committee was lenient and gave the army a little more funding (in fact, it was transferred from the funds cut by the navy), and the project of launching satellites with Juno-12 was quickly launched. started.
Wilbur Brooke came to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California and found that Director Pickering was not in the office or in the test area, and several core members were missing.
"Where did they go? The development of rockets and satellites is at a critical point." Wilbur Brook said.
Assistant: "Director Pickering and the R&D team went out to rub the computer."
"rub?!"
Assistant: "Director Pickering invented the word 'rubbing'. In fact, it may be more similar to the leased machine when it was secretly leased."
JPL's laboratory is located in the small town of Pasadena, which is part of Greater Los Angeles.Pickering Computers is a pharmaceutical company in Long Beach, part of Greater Los Angeles, but a good 50 kilometers from Pasadena.
Two cars parked at the building of the pharmaceutical company. Stullinger and Ludwig lifted a hard drive out of the trunk, carried it on a trolley, and pushed it into the building.
"This is the weight of knowledge." Ludwig joked.
Pickering: "It's Chinese knowledge...Chinese hard drives. If it's American knowledge, it's three times as heavy."
In order to prevent data leaks, every time a C55 computer from a pharmaceutical company is borrowed, JPL researchers bring their own hard disk, connect it to the C55 computer, use the program inside to perform calculations, and store the results in the hard disk, and take the hard disk away with them. .
In 1957, there were seven or eight types of transistor computers on the market in the United States.
The computer produced by the United States itself, the high imitation version of the T51 of the US Air Force is of the best quality.However, the U.S. Air Force's high imitation T51 has never been sold, and is only used in the U.S. Air Force and its affiliated research institutions.
There are also several kinds of computers, which are imitation T1956 computers produced by various large, medium and small computer companies after 51. The quality is uneven, and the price is about 100 million US dollars.As for vacuum tube computers such as the UNIVAC-1 series, which were very popular in the past few years, they have been quickly discontinued and eliminated by the market.
The C55 computer that flowed into the United States from a mysterious channel is said to have been obtained by a daring smuggler who bribed a Chinese computer factory. The price is US$110 million, excluding hard drives.
However, the computers produced by domestic companies in the United States do not include hard drives by default. If you want a hard drive, you can go to IBM to buy an IBM350 RAMAC with a capacity of 5 megabytes and a price of 4.99 US dollars.Or buy a Chinese hard drive that is said to be smuggled, with a capacity of 10 megabytes and a price of 15 US dollars.It seems that IBM's hard drive is cheaper, but the IBM350 RAMAC weighs 244 kg, and the Chinese hard drive weighs 42 kg.
……
"The computer is on. Come on, let's type the program quickly."
The calculation program is first written on paper, and when it arrives at the pharmaceutical company, the hard disk is connected, the computer is turned on, and then the program is input into the computer, checked and debugged, and it can be run if there are no errors.
JPL is now calculating the launch trajectory of the Explorer [-] satellite.
The design of Juno-1 to upgrade to a three-stage rocket has been completed in the past month.But the second and third stages of this 29-ton rocket are ammonium perchlorate-aluminum polysulfide solid propellants.This is definitely not enough, so a small rocket was added to the "Explorer 4" satellite, with a total of [-] stages, the first stage is a liquid rocket, and the second, third and fourth stages are solid.
Even so, it is still relatively difficult to transport and fly into the sky.
JPL needs to find an optimal lift-off trajectory to allow the rocket to increase its flight speed and altitude in the least labor-intensive way.These are all calculations that need to be accurate to several places after the decimal point.Pickering pressed Enter on the keyboard, and the C55 computer beeped in a low hum, its power consumption increased, and it began to calculate at full capacity.
"It's already January 1," Ludwig said, "China launched another satellite a few days ago."
Pickering: "The Chinese are enjoying the joy of success. Ludwig, don't be depressed, we will be successful too, it's only a matter of time."
……
White House.
"Now the Air Force, Navy, and Army each have their own ballistic missile and satellite programs. The three compete for budget in Congress, and as a result, none of the three parties get enough budget."
"In addition to the three military services, there are at least five universities conducting research on launch vehicles and aerospace engineering. This situation seriously disperses research forces."
Eisenhower called a White House staff and think tank meeting.The issue pointed out by the director of the President's Office of Science and Technology Policy is not uncommon, and the US has been arguing about it for several months.
Eisenhower: "NACA (National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics) is suitable to be reorganized into a new department that integrates national aerospace capabilities. I want to separate the launch vehicle and satellite agencies and development teams of the Air Force, Navy, and Army and integrate them together."
Dulles: "It seems so. But NACA's consulting nature is relatively strong, and there is little experience in actual engineering execution."
Chief of Staff: "NACA hosts the XCA program for the USAF, and it executes well."
Eisenhower patted the table and said he had made up his mind:
"NACA's consulting and coordinating functions are not enough to lead the national aerospace engineering. What we need is NASA, which must have some departments with sufficient reputation and authority in the research field to join first, as the cornerstone of NASA."
"I know that there are many research departments and agencies that have been created or employed in all three services, and these agencies are trying to express themselves."
"Then, whoever first successfully launches a satellite for the United States will be NASA's No. [-] cornerstone."
Chapter 170, Salary will increase in the future!
Cape Canaveral.
The Soviet Union and China each launched two satellites into the sky, and now it is finally the turn of the United States.
The special Juno-1 launch vehicle explorer was placed on the LC-26A launch pad. The time was 1:31 on January 22, US Eastern Time. The night sky was dark, and the lights under the launch pad could roughly illuminate the Juno-1A launch pad. 1, it is roughly an intermediate guide—the diameter is about the same as Long March-1, a little shorter than Long March-1, and the weight is between Pioneer and Long March-[-].
There is a "needle" on the head of the rocket. This is not a lightning rod or a pitot tube. This is the satellite Explorer [-] and the fourth-stage solid rocket to be launched this time (the two are welded together and will be in orbit together in the future. circle up).
This launch declined any media live broadcast, and only two military movie cameras were shooting documentaries at the scene.
"Good luck with the launch, everyone eats a little bit."
Pickering dumped a bag of peanuts on the table, and von Braun, Van Allen, Stullinger, and Ludwig all came over to grab a handful.
"It's good luck to eat peanuts before a very important rocket launch," Pickering added. "It's a JPL tradition."
Van Allen dropped a peanut into his mouth, "The only regret of Explorer [-] is that it is too small."
"The president only gave us 90 days to turn a ballistic missile into a launch vehicle and launch a satellite," said von Braun, who was not on JPL's team but also chewed peanuts with the crowd. It is the best choice to accomplish the purpose within a limited time. Bigger rockets and heavier satellites, wait for the future."