siddly
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Joined: May 2012
Posts: 12
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Post by siddly on May 6, 2012 10:15:03 GMT -5
Thanks Carl, both attachments arrived. Just the kind of stuff I love to read. So that's what happened after we gave up on the Miles then ? I seem to recall reading that the air ministry or whoever claimed supersonic research was too dangerous to be undertaken in a manned aircraft, although that may be urban legend. Or possibly an obfuscation to disguise the real reasons for not continuing ( whatever they might have been, I'm just conspiracy theorising )
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Post by britishrocket on May 9, 2012 6:11:12 GMT -5
Hello Siddly,
Pleased you enjoyed the papers. The One on the Beta motor is full of useful information. A lot of innovative ideas there. Particularly tin plating the mild steel components; economic construction that can withstand the corrosive H2O2. The details on heat transfer in the motor are also very interesting, and I have used these figures as a guide in my own calculations. The injector in the Beta Motor is a work of genius, and I've seen nothing quite like it.
The second paper on the Miles prototype gives a lot of insight into what it must have been like trying to carry on important research in the Austerity period. It must have been frustrating. The War was won, an Enemy, utterly base, evil and ruthless, smashed. The brains that had won it were all in their prime, and the new technologies forged in those fires were ready to be developed and exploited for peace...but no money. Britain saves the world yet destroys herself to do it.
Perhaps safety concerns were used to cover up for the cost saving inherent in using models. Then again, it is technologically superior to use a model with instrumentation and a telemetry system to get basic data, rather than a manned vehicle. A human pilot subjected to supersonic conditions might black out or become disorientated. There was clearly also a definite safety dimension, one only has to think of Geoffrey De Havilland.
Nowadays we have Alan Bond at Reaction Engines, who may very well in a few years time show the world the first truly reusable space plane in the shape of Skylon. Incidentally, the title of my blog, British Reaction Research, is a nod to Reaction Engines! Had the government listened to Bond in the early 80s, and helped BAe with funding for his HOTOL project, we could have made the US Shuttle obsolete 30 years before they said it was. It is something i get hot under the collar about. Like the short sighted attitude in the early 70s that cancelled the Black Knight and Black Arrow program, after we had succesfully launched a satellite, Prospero. We are Lions led by Donkeys.
I tend to think that the future of space belongs to the enthusiastic amateur and entrepeneur. Certainly the Americans seem to agree on that. Politicians are far too short sighted and interested in the next chance to grip on to power to appreciate the time scales involved in basic research and the effort required to reach space and other planets. We must do this as a civilisation. The British Empire was the greatest the world has ever seen, and was started because one man got in his ship and sailed it to where no one had ever been before, or indeed thought it possible to go. We as a nation need to regain that spirit. It will energise our entire country and we shall all ride its wake to greater success and prosperity as the 21st century progresses.
God Save The Queen.
Carl.
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siddly
Member
Joined: May 2012
Posts: 12
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Post by siddly on May 10, 2012 1:09:04 GMT -5
Hi Carl
I went straight to the illustrations initially ( I think in pictures when it comes to engineering, if that makes any sense ) and the injector design struck me as a work of art right away. I don't know if you have seen a cutaway drawing of the Walter hot motor injector, but the general principle is the same. Except that the Walter used a whole load of them, each one needing precision machining and with a high part count. The Beta injector plate is kind of like one large Walter injector, with the saving in cost and complexity that brings. It's very clever and very elegant.
As for the situation with British rocket research, we are on the same page there. What a terrible lack of vision and wasted effort. Lions led by donkeys indeed.
A mate of mine was up at Spadeadam a couple of years ago, he owns a small defence company who are developing a product which will hopefully save a lot of lives, and the MoD agreed he could test it there ( the test involved high explosives ) He looked around at the remains of the rocket facilities and told me he was gutted thinking about what might have been.
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Post by britishrocket on May 10, 2012 5:49:34 GMT -5
Hi Siddly,
Totally agree with you re the illustrations; a picture paints a thousand words. Always do that myself to get a feel of the thing I am reading about.
I haven't seen the Walter hot motor injector but it sounds very interesting. Is that shown in one of the books you listed? I am currently looking into getting hold of several of those titles. Incidentally, I also have a couple of papers about the influence of German Engineers on the Soviet Rocket program. Everyone knows about the Germans taken to the US, but not much is ever said about the ones that went the other way. I think they were mostly repatriated by the early to mid 50s. I shouldn't think they had quite as nice a time of it as the ones that went to the US. As most people know Werner Von Braun, a former member of the SS and someone who was well aware of Concentration Camp slaves being executed and worked to death at the Mittelwerk, was disgracefully made a US citizen in 1960.
All this is a bit far removed from your search for an oxidiser! How is that going? Here is an idea for you. I had always wanted to experiment with a very strong aqueous solution of Sodium Chlorate. This is weed killer and is strongly oxidising. Possibly enough to ignite a fuel into and produce power. I have never tried it but always wanted to. Might be something to try.
All the best,
Carl.
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Post by britishrocket on May 10, 2012 6:14:27 GMT -5
Hi Siddly,
Just checked quickly on my old idea...seems like Sodium Chlorate makes an excellent oxidising agent when in acid solution. Apparently forms a brown liquid, no corrosive fumes. Perhaps we have hit on something here?
Best Wishes,
Carl
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siddly
Member
Joined: May 2012
Posts: 12
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Post by siddly on May 10, 2012 10:30:32 GMT -5
Regarding 'ze Germans' there is a story in Tom Wolfe's book 'The Right Stuff' ( the most entertaining but least accurate account of the early days of US manned spaceflight ) about Von Braun and his fellow engineers gathering around a piano in a bar at the Cape, singing the Horst Wessel song. Probably needs to be taken with a large pinch of salt... Willy Ley comes out of that period without a stain on his character though, leaving when the regimes true intent became obvious to him. I think it was in RV Jones Secret War where I read about British Intelligence finding a change in the composition of the V-2 fuel that initially caused a mild flap. It turned out however just to be a de-naturing agent added so that the slave workers would stop stealing it and drinking it to alleviate their miserable existence. Would be funny if it wasn't so horribly tragic. I'll try to scan the Walter injector picture later, and a few other tidbits. I have actually formulated a plan for dehydrating the H2O2. Temperatures here are now steady in the mid 30's and I'm going to make a suitable container, painted black, which can sit out in the sun ( on some wasteland several hundred yards from the farm ) . It will have a downward pointing vent to prevent dust ingress and a mesh screen to keep bugs out. I don't know how I'll test the concentration though. One thing I'm going to gear up for is making some injectors to test spray patterns, but I have to get the lathe fully operational first. I bought it with some missing parts in the tailstock and have had to make those ( which strictly speaking required the use of a functioning tailstock, which of course I didn't have - took some lateral thinking ) It's only a tiny little Emco Compact 5, but very accurate. The next job is to make a compound slide for it, as there isn't any way to cut a taper at the moment. I do miss my Boxford toolroom lathe, but that had to stay in England. Sodium Chlorate I do know a little about. It was the oxidiser I used in the solid rockets I built as a kid. Very temperamental stuff and the fire retardant added to the weedkiller variety didn't help matters ( although that can apparently be boiled off if the Sodium Chlorate is put into solution, I was never crazy enough to try ) I have a feeling it has been banned in the UK ( and therefore possibly the whole EU ) I've got a Spanish\English technical and engineering dictionary so I'll look up 'Sodium Chlorate' in Spanish and check some of the labels on the weedkillers in the hardware shops. As I say though, it makes me nervous ( didn't when I was kid, it's a miracle I have all my limbs intact ;D )
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Post by britishrocket on May 11, 2012 2:45:13 GMT -5
Hello Siddly,
The Horst Wessel song you say? Not so sure about that though you never know. Apparently in the early days there the language of the test facilities was German. The Americans complained because they couldn't understand what the hired help were doing. I did not know that about Willy Ley. I am lucky to have a copy of "V2" by Walter Dornberger; very interesting. Also when I was at Cosford I got to examine at close quarters several Walter motors and a V2, as well as many excellent British engines, like the Spectre. That, to be honest, is what set me on this path, many years ago.
Interesting what you say about the "Haftlinge" drinking the C Stoff. It was Methanol, Hydrazine Hydrate and Water, so perhaps it started out as Ethanol and they drank the pure stuff before mixing, and thats why they changed to Methanol.
Thank you for the info on Sodium Chlorate. If you have seen my blog posts on fuel you'll know that I'm very hot on safety being an important part of a successful rocket engine attempt. So I now won't be going anywhere near it!
The H2O2 concentration operation sounds very intriguing. I like the fact that you are using the suns' heat to do it. There must be some chemical test to check concentration, probably pretty routine too.
Good luck with your injection experiments. I will be posting more on mine soon with some video footage. I am also trying to develop a home built version of something called "Shadow sizing" This involves strobe back lit high speed photography of the spray. In the real word this method allows digital image processing to calculate droplet size and distribution. I am hoping to get at least some idea of the spray quality and possibly get a mean droplet size.
All of this depends on getting my workshop back up and running...I just moved house so its all go.
Nice work with making the parts for you tailstock. They are lovely machines from what I hear. Shame about your Boxford. I'd have been in tears. I have a Harrison M250 which took a bit of work (electrical) to get running but is otherwise pristine. Not much now would convince me to part with it!
Will you be posting your progress via a blog or here? Be great to see how things go.
Best Wishes,
Carl.
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