 |
Business | Industries | Finance | Tax |
| Index: > A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z |
|
|||||
| First Prev [ 1 2 3 4 ] Next Last |
As early as 1927 members of the German Rocket Society had started experimenting with liquid-fueled rockets. By 1932 the Reichswehr started taking notice of their developments for potential long-range artillery use, and a team led by General Walter Dornberger was shown a test vehicle designed and flown by Wernher von Braun. Although the rocket was of limited ability, Dornberger saw Von Braun's genius and pushed for him to join the military.
Image:V2 rocket at Air and Space museum.jpg|thumbnail|V2 rocket on display at the National Air and Space museum in Washington D.C.]]Von Braun did so, as eventually did most of the other members of the society. In December 1934 Von Braun scored another success with the flight of the A2 rocket , a small model powered by ethanol and liquid oxygen, with work on the design continuing in an attempt to improve reliability.
By 1936 the team had moved on from the A2 and started work on both the A3 and A4. The latter was a full-sized design with a range of about 175 kmTo help compare orders of magnitude; this page lists lengths between 100 and 1,000 km (105 and 106 m). See also lengths of other orders of magnitude. Distances shorter than 100 km 100 km is equal to: 62 miles side of square with area 10,000 km² radius of (109 miles), a top altitude of 80 kmTo help compare different orders of magnitude this page lists lengths between 10 and 100 km (104 to 105 m). See also lengths of other orders of magnitude. Distances shorter than 10 km 10 km is equal to: 10,000 metres 6. 2 miles 1 mil unit of measure commo and a payload of about a tonneFor ton as a unit of volume see Ton (volume There are three similar units of mass called the ton or tonne tonne ( SI) or metric ton 1000 kg (2204 lb). The official symbol is t but mT and T are also used. short ton (or simply ton in casual use in the USA). This increase in capability had come through a complete redesign of the engine by Walter ThielWalter Thiel ( March 2 1910 August 17 1943) was a German engineer who largely designed the rocket engine that powered the V-2 missile. Thiel was born and grew up in Breslau. He studied materials engineering at the Technical University there and became int. It was clear that Von Braun's designs were turning into real weapons, and Dornberger moved the team from Kummersdorf (near BerlinBerlin [ bɛrˈliːn ] is the national capital of Germany and its largest city, with 3,387,404 inhabitants (as of September 2004); down from 4. 5 million before World War II. Berlin is located on the rivers Spree and Havel in the northea) to a small town, PeenemündePeenemunde is a village in the northwest of the German island of Usedom on the Peene river, on the easternmost part of the German Baltic coast. Rocket facility During World War II, Peenemunde was the location of the Heeresversuchsanstalt an extensive rock, on the island of UsedomUsedom (Polish name Uznam is an island north of the mouth of the Oder river, where it flows into the Szczecin Bay (ger: Stettiner Haff pol: Zalew Szczecinski . It belongs to the region called Pomerania. Most of the island is a part of Mecklenburg-Western on Germany's BalticThe Baltic Sea is in northeastern Europe, bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of east and central Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat and the North Sea by way of the Oresund, the Great Belt and the Small Belt. It is coast, in order to provide more room for testing and greater secrecy.
The A3 proved to be problematic, and a redesign was started as the A5. This version was completely reliable, and by 1941 the team had fired about 70 A5 rockets. The first A4 flew in March 1942, flying about 1.6 km and crashing into the water. The second launch reached an altitude of 11 km before exploding. The third rocket, launched on October 3 1942, changed things by following its trajectory perfectly. It landed 193 km away, and became the first man-made object to enter space.
Production started in 1943 on the wonder weapon Vergeltungswaffe 2 (reprisal weapon 2), or the V-2 as it became better known, at the insistence of Goebbels' propaganda ministry. The Allies were already aware of the weapon. At a test site at Blizna in Poland a fired missile had been recovered by Polish resistance agents from the banks of the Western Bug, and vital technical details had been given to British intelligence. The British launched a massive bombing campaign against Peenemünde which slowed testing and production considerably as well as killing many slave workers.
Dornberger had always wanted a mobile launch platform for the missiles, but Hitler pressed for the construction of massive underground blockhaus structures from which to launch them. V-2s arrived from a number of factories in a continuous stream on several redundant rail lines, and launching was almost continual.
Construction of the first such site started at Eperleques in the Pas-de-Calais area in 1943, but the British spotted it almost immediately and started a massive bombing campaign that eventually forced the Germans to abandon it. Another site was then started nearby in a huge quarry and called La Coupole, but it wasn't long before that too was bombed into submission. Eventually they gave up on the area and moved to the south near Cherbourg, but once again the site was discovered and bombed -- this time while the cement was still wet.
The plan was changed to build large truck-towed trailers for the missiles. An entire convoy for the missile, men, equipment and fuel required about thirty trucks. The missile was delivered to a staging area on a Vidalwagen and the local crews would fit the warhead. Launch teams would then transfer their missile to their own Meillerwagen and tow it to the launch site. There it was erected onto the launch table, fueled, and launched.
The missile could be launched practically anywhere, roads running though forests being a particular favourite. The system was so mobile and small that not one Meillerwagen was ever caught in action.
| Politics | Business | Finance |
 |
 |
 |