February 1954

From The Space Library

First flight of XF-104, powered with J-65 engine (later powered with J-79 engine). Rand Corp. report recommended that Atlas ICBM program efforts be increased and its characteristics relaxed to obtain an operationally useful ICBM at an earlier date.

Mechanix Illustrated magazine runs a cover story on a "Light Propelled" spacecraft. The article is about using nuclear power to generate ions for thrust. It is based on a paper by Eugen Sänger and Irene Sänger-Bredt.

German engineer Krafft Ehricke of the Bell Aerospace Preliminary Design Department prepared his paper "Analysis of Orbital Systems" for the International Astronautical Congress in Innsbruck Austria. Ehricke had concluded that a spinning toroidal station would require constant attention to keep it balanced as it rotated. His proposal included a design for a space station which could house a crew of four and would be built up from large cylindrical tanks left over from the stages of his proposed launch system. The whole station would be 400' long with most of the mass accumulated at the center of a bar-bell configuration. He called it a Manned Observational Satellite. The station would have weighed 500,000 lbs with a volume of 20,000 cu ft. In late 1954 Ehricke left Bell for a position at Convair. He then presented his design to the US Government with a large model in late 1957.

"In order to produce a functional satellite which combines the advantage of apparent gravity with smaller size and a less precarious balancing situation, it is proposed to concentrate most of the mass in a center body from which two extensions, oppositely directed, lead to the crew space. Most of the satellite's mass is concentrated in the center which contains all stowage, reserve parts, emergency equipment, radioactive power supply with shielding material, earth scanning equipment, purifiers, attitude control and, of course the entrance tubes on the hub with the double air locks. In the peripheral sections are located the living and working quarters (for 2 persons on each side), control motors and actuators." - Krafft Ehricke