Jul 26 1965
From The Space Library
Dr. Hugh L. Dryden, NASA Deputy Administrator, said during a recent interview that the next immediate step beyond the initial Apollo lunar landings was to extend the usefulness of both spacecraft and launch vehicle to permit longer stays in earth orbit and on the moon." This fall we will have to make a definite recommendation to fund one or both," he said. (M/S Daily, 7/26/65)
A Gemini circumlunar flight had not been approved but the idea was receiving serious study, Kenneth S. Kleinknecht, Deputy Manager of the Gemini Project Office at NASA Manned Spacecraft Center, told reporters. The Gemini capsule could circle the far side of the moon- 240,000 mi. from earth-and then return to its home planet, a round trip of about six days. Kleinknecht said if the proposal were accepted, a Titan III-C rocket equipped with two upper stages called "transtages" would place one of the transtages in orbit. A Titan II would send the Gemini craft after the transtage and the two would be docked in orbit, Gemini then would use the transtage propulsion system and its maneuverability for the lunar voyage. The feasibility was being studied by NASA; the Martin Co., systems manager for Titan III-C; and Aerojet-General, which builds the transtage, "We are always studying possible future missions for Gemini," Kleinknecht added. (Benedict, N.O, Times-Picayune, 7/26/65)
NASA announced the addition of two new pilots to the joint NASA-USAF X-15 research program: Capt. William J. Knight (USAF) and William H. Dana, civilian. They were expected to make their first flights this fall. (NASA Release 65-244; FRC Release 16-65)
The Agena target vehicle for GEMINI VI was delivered to Cape Kennedy by the Pregnant Guppy aircraft. (Orl, Sent., 7/27/65)
July 26-29: Second annual meeting of the AIAA was held in San Francisco. Dr. William H. Pickering, Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, opened the meeting with a signal from MARINER IV soaring through space 144 million mi. from earth. Received at the Johannesburg tracking station, the signal was relayed to San Francisco from JPL in Pasadena, Speeches at AIAA: President of Lockheed Aircraft Corp, Daniel J. Haughton, speaking on "Your Role in the New Environment," said: "American aircraft products have dominated world markets for decades. Today at least 90 percent of the airline jets flown in the free world are built in the United States. Aircraft exports, both military and civilian, are $1.2 billion a year, Imports, on the other hand, are almost negligible-$90 million last year. "But now something new has been added-and that is more thrust toward cooperative programs... "Cooperative programs are increasing. Only last May Secretary of Defense McNamara proposed a common market for military hardware. If successful, it will help integrate the total NATO market, including the U.S. even more closely, and will also permit foreign firms to sell selectively in the American defense market. "The total effect of these developments means, for U.S. manufacturers, more competition, more cooperative programs, and a more flexible approach ... but I do not believe this means we must abdicate our technological leadership, I think, on the contrary, that we must strengthen it, One of my colleagues suggests we should add a new item to our national goals-the goal of overwhelming technical strength... ." (Text)
Brig, Gen. Edmund F. O'Connor (USAF), Director of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center's Industrial Operations, told the AIAA meeting: "The progress of the Saturn IB has been excellent. We are on schedule to begin flight tests next year, to be followed by manned flights in 1967. "In the Saturn V/Apollo program we are also on schedule... ." (Text)
USAF's Titan III-C rocket could match the Soviet Union's most powerful booster pound for pound in launching heavy-weight satellites into orbit, according to William G. Purdy, General Manager, Launch Vehicles, Martin Co, "Engineering analysis of Titan III-C's performance on its maiden flight of June [18] shows that a payload of nearly 27,000 pounds could have been orbited. In the past, Titan III-C's maximum payload has been computed at 25,000 lbs." Mr. Purdy said that the Soviet Union's best was the 26,840-lb, PROTON I satellite launched July 16 by powerful new rocket. (Martin Co. Release)
NASA Science Advisory Committee was considering a proposal by radio astronomers to create a 10-mi.-dia. antenna array to permit a "look" into the past with radio energy, disclosed Bernard M. Oliver, Vice President of a Palo Alto electronics firm. He estimated that 1,000 antennas, each perhaps 10-ft,-dia, spread out over the area of a 10-mi, circle, would provide the resolution of signal intake necessary for the kind of radio observation he was suggesting. Intake of all the antennas would be focused at a single laboratory. There the radio energy would be converted to sound energy and then into light to provide photographic images equivalent to optical images now taken of the moon, Oliver said: "We quite strongly believe that such an exploration tool can provide the maximum amount of information relating to the origins of the universe, to the life cycle, and to the destiny of the universe, and, in a sense, to the destiny of the human race as a whole." (Chic. Trib., 7/28/65)
Missions to Jupiter could be conducted by 1969, suggested Eugene Lally, Space-General Corp. engineer, in a paper presented to the AIAA outlining a program of six missions to the planet Jupiter, beginning with a fly-by in 1969 and culminating with a Jovian orbit in the mid-1980's. A Jupiter mission would take about two years, Lally postulated that payload weights ranging from a 650-lb. payload to a 12,400-lb, orbiter payload could be easily handled by boosters ranging from Atlas-Centaur with an added kick stage, through the Saturn V which would be used to place a man on the moon, Lally speculated that an instrumented probe would be able to obtain information on the constitution of the core and surface layers, the atmosphere, nature of the largest of the planet's spots, topography, constitution of meteoroids in its vicinity and the presence of small satellites not yet discovered with telescopes, Lally's probe would contain experiments to measure the atmosphere, magnetic fields, and gravitational fields; to conduct infrared and microwave examinations of the surface; and to provide pictures similar to those taken of Mars by MARINER IV. (Space-General Corp. Release)
An Electro-Optical Systems (EOS) bombardment ion engine had successfully operated for more than 2,610 hrs. in vacuum chamber conditions and, as a result of that extended run, "lifetimes in excess of 10,000 hours can now be calculated for the tiny engine under conditions of space flight," Gordon Sohl, Electro-Optical Systems, Inc., told the AIAA meeting in San Francisco. Fueled with cesium, the EOS engine was less than two feet long and weighed 10 lbs, fully loaded with a five-pound fuel supply. It provided a power-to-thrust ratio of 182 kw, per pound. Financed by NASA Lewis Research Center, the EOS research program recently received a follow-on funding from LRC to determine "if the ion engine with 100 pounds of cesium fuel is equivalent in thrust to a conventional chemical rocket carrying a ton of propellant." (EOS Release)
Dr. Raymond L. Bisplinghoff, NASA Associate Administrator for Advanced Research and Technology, presented the third annual Theodore von Kármán lecture. Dr. Bisplinghoff discussed advances in air transport, such as V/Stol aircraft and the hypersonic transport. He pointed out that within 20 yrs. an estimated 130 million persons (about 50% of the U.S. population) would be living in three main metropolitan areas and that there would be an increasing demand for "air buses." Dr. Bisplinghoff suggested that the hydrogen-fueled hypersonic transport could be used as a cheap transport, or as an earth-to-orbit aircraft. He said that the hypersonic transport would carry passengers halfway around the earth nonstop at speeds up to 8,000 mph, but there was one problem area: ... "Where the airplane threatens to overpower the pilot with characteristics which make the airplane unflyable by human systems." Dr. Bisplinghoff called for increased research for operational experience with the scramjet (supersonic combustion ramjet) engine as a prelude to developing the hypersonic transports. In a press conference preceding his lecture, Dr. Bisplinghoff predicted "another revolution" for personal aircraft in the form of highly simplified controls similar to those in automobiles. He also urged quick Government action to begin the acquisition of a follow-on hypersonic research aircraft to succeed the X-15 and run the flight profile out to mach 10 to 12. (NASA Release 65-247; Text, M/S Daily, 7/28/65; EPH )
NASA Electronics Research Center Director Dr. Winston E. Kock discussed ERC in address. During FY 1965, he said, ERC "awarded 33 contracts totaling almost $2 million. The organizations to whom these contracts were awarded are spread widely throughout the country. . . . "The average value of the 33 contracts was $59,000, the largest being $285,000. These contracts were almost all in fairly basic research fields, ranging from integrated circuits and thin film space-charge limited triodes, through research in millimeter and submillimeter waves, optical wave-guides and optical components, to space-borne memory organizations, laser gyros and fluid storage and control devices. . . ." He discussed ERC personnel: "We have grown from a group of 65 at our inception last year [Sept. 1] to a total of 244. As we are still in the formative stages, our scientific and engineering personnel now total only 92 out of the 244, but when we have reached our full strength of 2100, we expect that our staff will be about equally divided between scientific and engineering, technical support and administrative... ." (Text)
Thomas Bilhorn, Manager, Mechanics Section, Scientific Balloon Facility at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) , revealed that facilities for launching balloons capable of carrying 16,000-lb. payloads were expected to be completed by next summer at NCAR's Scientific Balloon Flight Facility in Texas. The device under construction, called an inflation shelter, would have a ceiling height of 140 ft. and interior diameter of 120 ft. It would reduce handling problems during inflation and would give the capability of periods of hold, recall, and post-inflation inspection and repair. (Text)
"There is nothing hostile or aggressive in the military space program we foresee. It is entirely within the context of a national program expressly devoted to peaceful purposes," said Dr. Albert C. Hall, Deputy Director (Space) of Defense Research and Engineering, He continued: "It is likely that military interest will remain focused primarily on near-earth missions, out to synchronous orbit, certainly through 1975. We expect to continue our very large and vigorous unmanned military space program which is performing very important functions. The need for these programs will not diminish since they are by far the most efficient and cheapest way of performing specified tasks. With a steadily increasing experience and know-how in manned space flight, we may expect that spacecraft will acquire characteristics permitting rendezvous, station-keeping, docking, and transfer of man and material. We will likely acquire the means of sustaining military men in space for the periods of time we require. Booster capacities are not likely to limit the applications, but the booster and payload costs will continue to do so." (Text)
In AIAA session on the "History of Rocket Research Airplanes," John Stack, former NACA-NASA designer, pointed out how little was known about transonic and supersonic flight in 194.3, when X-1 was conceived. Walter C. Williams, Dr. Raymond Bisplinghoff, and Walter T. Bonney, among other speakers, also stressed the key role of engineer test pilots in the success of the X-1, D-558, X-2, and X-15 programs. Session was chaired by Robert Perry of RAND Corporation, who traced the history of rocket-powered aircraft. (EPH ; RAND P-3154)
DeMarquis D. Wyatt, NASA Deputy Associate Administrator for Programing, told the meeting: "Any discussion of the NASA space program for the next 10 years must be given and received with a grain of salt, Reconstruct in your minds the situation 10 years ago and evaluate the validity of any discussion at that time of the NACA program for the period 1955-1965. Such a discussion would not have even mentioned space in any serious fashion. A paper delivered in 1960 that attempted to outline the NASA program for 1960-1970 would have widely missed the mark in the prediction of today's realities. One can, therefore, conclude that one of the major management problems of the national space program is the lack of an adequate crystal ball for forecasting the future. "In the 61/2 years of its existence NASA has carried out a vigorous program of space activities designed to yield: "(a) a description and scientific understanding of the space environment; (b) the development of a broadly based national capability and capacity for manned and unmanned operations in space, and (c) the development of practical uses of space. "Decisions will have to be made with an appreciation of, and indeed the shaping of, our whole national attitude toward space in relation to our other national requirements and interests, Far too many future studies within and without the government are predicated on the assumption that the national investment in space research and technology will at least grow at the rate of the Gross National Product. This has not been true for the past several years and does not afford a necessarily sound planning assumption for the future. Our total federal budget has leveled off in spite of the great increase in the national product in recent years, If this trend holds, then marked increases in space expenditures can only come about through decreases in other federal spending, Such an assumption would indeed be a slender reed upon which to prognosticate the future." (Text)
Dr. Vincent P. Rock, Director of George Washington Univ.'s Program of Policy Studies in Science and Technology, said: "People are shaped by their environment. Technology is creating a new environment. In these circumstances power flows to those with access to technology-all technology, not simply military weapons. The exercise of power brings with it responsibility. The ultimate responsibility of those who exercise technological power is the achievement of a hospitable environment for mankind." "Text)
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