Spaceflight -need help!

[kamikazit]

Hey,

Ive recently started a project on space travel but I had to go through rockets first of all. That took a lot of explanatio and I cant make my text too long. Now im at spacecrafts and I think I will skip over a few of them since almost every 2 years a new rocket was built (especially between 1956 and 1970) So I was wondering, if anyone knows their rocket history well, can you tell me which ones I should take into consideration?

My friend suggested me to skip over most of USSR's rockets except the Soyuz, and then talk about USA's Saturn V, and finally the Space Shuttle.

What do you think??

Thanks

[C1ay]

Originally Posted by kamikazit

Hey,

Ive recently started a project on space travel but I had to go through rockets first of all. That took a lot of explanatio and I cant make my text too long. Now im at spacecrafts and I think I will skip over a few of them since almost every 2 years a new rocket was built (especially between 1956 and 1970) So I was wondering, if anyone knows their rocket history well, can you tell me which ones I should take into consideration?

My friend suggested me to skip over most of USSR's rockets except the Soyuz, and then talk about USA's Saturn V, and finally the Space Shuttle.

What do you think??

Thanks

Welcome to Hypography.

I think you certainly need to include Dr. Goddard's first rocket flight in 1926. It truly gave birth to the technology that would later become the space age. I'd certainly cover the first man in space as well and his spacecraft. Yuri Gagarin traveled to space in 1961 aboard a Vostok 1. For the details of any spacecraft try the Encyclopedia Astronautica.

[kamikazit]

Oh I have mentionned Dr. Goddard's first rocket, him and two other European theologists who were the true pioneers of space crafts...

[Stargazer]

I would say that Atlas, Jupiter-C, Saturn V, Souyz, Ariane, N1, Energia and the Shuttle are all noteworthy. Depends how detailed you want to get I suppose.

[Dark Mind]

And if there is a limitation on how long the report can be.

[UncleAl]

What is important? Newton's laws, the rocket equation, specific impulse, reduction to practice, politics, achievements. The shape of the engine bell, cooling its walls; moving fuel and oxidize for large volumes at high pressures, guidance... are all fascinating.

http://www.neofuel.com/optimum/

Oxygen/hydrogen motors burn way rich in hydrogen because losing unburned fuel is worth increasing specific impulse by lowering exhaust average molecular weight. The French blew up nearly a $billion in vehicle and payload because they improved their engines at enormous cost and didn't rewrite their software control for a few bucks more. The accelerometer ran out of bytes and guidance shut down.

Politics! The Space Scuttle started as a low-orbit nuclear bomber with woven ferrite core memory immune to nuclear EMF. Recycling its solid fuel boosters costs more than fabricating them from scratch - and substantially compromises their performance. Cost of boosting mass with the Space Scuttle is about $30/gram, the most expensive and inefficient of all modern boosters. Etc.

http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/nasas3.htm

You know what you need in your report. Do what you need to get a good grade. I caution you that Offiical Truth is not much like what really happened. History is a graveyard in which the magnificence of its markers bears little relationship to the interred.

[MDI]

Since Space Travel was the topic, that implies manned space flight, I should think.
Therefore, a brief discussion of the vehicles adapted and/or designed for that purpose would probably be in order...

Redstone
Atlas
Titan II
Saturn iB
Saturn V

MDI