Space is a mysterious and maximally inauspicious space. Nevertheless, Tsiolkovsky believed that the future of mankind lies precisely in space. There is no reason to argue with this great scientist. Space is boundless prospects for the development of the entire human civilization and the expansion of living space. In addition, he hides the answers to many questions. Today, man is actively using outer space. And our future depends on how rockets take off. People's understanding of this process is no less important.
Space race
Not so long ago, two powerful superpowers were in a state cold war... It was like an endless competition. Many prefer to describe this period of time as a conventional arms race, but this is not at all the case. This is a race of science. It is to her that we owe many gadgets and benefits of civilization to which we are so accustomed.
The space race was just one of the most important elements of the Cold War. In just a few decades, humans have transitioned from conventional atmospheric flights to landing on the moon. This is incredible progress when compared to other achievements. At that wonderful time, people thought that the exploration of Mars was a much closer and more realistic task than the reconciliation of the USSR and the USA. It was then that people were most fascinated by space. Almost every student or schoolboy understood how a rocket takes off. It was not difficult knowledge, on the contrary. This information was simple and very interesting. Astronomy has become extremely important among other sciences. In those years, no one could say that the Earth was flat. Affordable education has eradicated ignorance everywhere. However, those days are long gone, and today everything is not at all like that.
Decadence
With the collapse of the USSR, the competition ended. The reason for overfunding space programs has disappeared. Many promising and breakthrough projects have never been implemented. The time of striving for the stars gave way to real decadence. That, as you know, means decline, regression and a certain degree of degradation. You don't need to be a genius to understand this. It is enough to pay attention to the media network. The flat earth sect is actively pursuing its propaganda. People don't know basic things. V Russian Federation astronomy is not taught at all in schools. If you approach a passer-by and ask how rockets take off, he will not answer this simple question.
People don't even know what trajectory the missiles fly. In such conditions, there is no point in asking about orbital mechanics. Lack of proper education, "Hollywood" and video games have all created a false idea of space as such and of flying to the stars.
This is not a vertical flight
The earth is not flat, and this is an indisputable fact. The earth is not even a ball, because it is slightly flattened at the poles. How do rockets take off in such conditions? In stages, in several stages and not vertically.
The biggest misconception of our time is that rockets take off vertically. It's not like that at all. Such a scheme for entering orbit is possible, but very ineffective. Rocket fuel runs out very quickly. Sometimes in less than 10 minutes. There is simply not enough fuel for such a takeoff. Modern rockets take off vertically only at the initial stage of the flight. Then the automation starts to give the rocket a slight roll. Moreover, the higher the flight altitude, the more noticeable the roll angle of the space rocket. So, the apogee and perigee of the orbit are formed in a balanced way. This achieves the most comfortable balance between efficiency and fuel consumption. The orbit turns out to be close to a perfect circle. It will never be ideal.
If the rocket takes off vertically upwards, the climax is incredibly huge. Fuel will run out before perigee appears. In other words, the rocket will not only fail to fly into orbit, but due to lack of fuel will parabolic back to the planet.
The engine is at the heart of everything
Any body is not capable of moving by itself. There must be something that makes him do it. In this case, it's a rocket engine. A rocket, taking off into space, does not lose its ability to move. For many, this is incomprehensible, because in a vacuum the combustion reaction is impossible. The answer is as simple as possible: slightly different.
So, the rocket flies in. There are two components in its tanks. It is a fuel and oxidizer. Mixing them together ignites the mixture. However, it is not fire that escapes from the nozzles, but incandescent gas. In this case, there is no contradiction. This setup works great in a vacuum.
Rocket engines are of several types. These are liquid, solid propellant, ionic, electroreactive and nuclear. The first two types are used most often, as they are able to provide the greatest traction. Liquid-propellant ones are used in space rockets, solid-fuel ones - in intercontinental ballistic missiles with a nuclear charge. Electro-reactive and nuclear are designed for the most efficient movement in a vacuum, and it is on them that the maximum hopes are pinned. They are not currently used outside of test benches.
However, Roscosmos recently placed an order for the development of a nuclear powered orbital tug. This gives reason to hope for the development of technology.
A narrow group of orbital maneuvering engines is kept apart. They are intended for control. However, they are not used in rockets, but in spaceships. They are not enough for flying, but enough for maneuvering.
Speed
Unfortunately, nowadays people equate space travel with basic units of measurement. How fast does a rocket take off? This question is not entirely correct in relation to It does not matter at all how fast they take off.
There are quite a few missiles, and all of them have different speeds. Those intended for launching astronauts into orbit fly slower than cargo ones. A person, unlike a cargo, is limited by overloads. Cargo rockets, such as the super-heavy Falcon Heavy, take off too quickly.
The exact units of speed are difficult to calculate. First of all, because they depend on the payload of the launch vehicle (launch vehicle). It is quite logical that a fully loaded launch vehicle takes off much more slowly than a half-empty launch vehicle. However, there is a common value that all missiles aim to achieve. This is called cosmic speed.
There is the first, second and, accordingly, the third cosmic speed.
The first is the required speed, which will allow you to move in orbit and not fall on the planet. It is 7.9 km per second.
The second is needed in order to leave the earth's orbit and go to the orbit of another celestial body.
The third will allow the apparatus to overcome the gravity of the solar system and leave it. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 are flying at this speed. However, contrary to media reports, they still have not left the boundaries of the solar system. Astronomically, it would take them at least 30,000 years to reach the Horta cloud. The heliopause is not the boundary of the stellar system. This is just the place where the solar wind collides with the intersystem environment.
Height
How high does the rocket take off? The one that is required. After reaching the hypothetical boundary of space and atmosphere, it is incorrect to measure the distance between the spacecraft and the planet's surface. After entering orbit, the spacecraft is in a different environment, and the distance is measured in terms of distance.
And we know that in order for movement to occur, the action of a certain force is necessary. The body either itself must push off from something, or the outside body must push the given one. This is well known and understandable to us from life experience.
What to push off from in space?
At the surface of the Earth, you can push off from the surface or from objects on it. For movement on the surface, legs, wheels, tracks and so on are used. In water and air, you can repel from the water and air themselves, which have a certain density, and therefore allow you to interact with them. Nature has adapted fins and wings for this.
Man created engines based on propellers, which many times increase the area of contact with the medium due to rotation and allow one to push off from water and air. But what about the case of an airless space? What to start from in space? There is no air, there is nothing. How to fly in space? This is where the law of conservation of momentum and the principle of jet propulsion come to the rescue. Let's take a closer look.
Impulse and the principle of jet propulsion
Impulse is the product of body mass by its velocity. When the body is stationary, its speed is zero. However, the body has some mass. In the absence of external influences, if part of the mass separates from the body at a certain speed, then according to the law of conservation of momentum, the rest of the body must also acquire a certain speed so that the total momentum remains equal to zero.
Moreover, the speed of the remaining main part of the body will depend on the speed with which the smaller part will separate. The higher this speed is, the higher the speed of the main body will be. This is understandable if we recall the behavior of bodies on ice or in water.
If two people are near, and then one of them pushes the other, then he will not only give that acceleration, but he will fly back. And the harder it pushes someone, the faster it will fly off itself.
Surely, you had to be in a similar situation, and you can imagine how it happens. So, this is what jet propulsion is based on.
Rockets, in which this principle is implemented, eject some part of their mass at high speed, as a result of which they themselves acquire some acceleration in the opposite direction.
The streams of incandescent gases resulting from fuel combustion are thrown out through narrow nozzles to give them the highest possible speed. At the same time, the mass of the rocket decreases by the amount of the mass of these gases, and it acquires a certain speed. Thus, the principle of jet propulsion in physics is implemented.
Rocket flight principle
The rockets use a multistage system. During flight, the lower stage, having used up its entire supply of fuel, is separated from the rocket in order to reduce its total mass and facilitate flight.
The number of stages decreases until the working part remains in the form of a satellite or other spacecraft. The fuel is calculated in such a way that it is just enough to enter orbit.
MUNICIPAL STAGE OF THE ALL-RUSSIAN CHILDREN'S COMPETITION
RESEARCH AND CREATIVE WORKS
« I am a researcher»
Research
Dmitry Kuksa
student 3 "A" class
MOU SOSH №7
Supervisor:
Alekseevka
The school announced to us that the competition "I am a researcher" will be held. I decided: "I will participate!" I came home and began to think about which topic to choose. And my grandfather, who served in the missile forces, said: “Come on, Dima, let's launch a rocket. As soon as you tell me what force makes the rocket move, I will fulfill my promise. " I liked this idea. And I was not afraid of such a task. I really wanted to see the rocket flight.
I set tasks
1. Study the structure of the rocket
2. Find out what force makes the rocket move
Research methods:
Theoretical: exploring sources of information
Practical: Experiments.
The object of research is: a rocket
Subject of study: rocket flight
Expected Result: research will expand my horizons, help to find out whether it is possible to raise a rocket into the air at home.
Hypothesis: I think you can make a model of a rocket at home, but you can't lift it into the air. It won't take off.
To prove or disprove a hypothesis, I first studied the literature. Here's what I learned.
The Russian word "rocket" comes from the German word "rocket". And this is a diminutive of the Italian word "rocca", which means "spindle". The rocket is similar to a spindle with a sharp streamlined nose to reduce air resistance when flying in the atmosphere and this is the rocket fairing (1)
2 fuel tank- This is the part of the rocket design that provides it with fuel. For liquid-propellant rockets, the fuel tank is divided into a fuel tank and an oxidizer tank, which is located above the fuel tank. For solid-propellant rockets, the fuel tank is connected to the combustion chamber and in the process of fuel burning itself acts as a combustion chamber.
3 the combustion chamber- serves for combustion of fuel and emission of formed gases.
4.The rocket has a stabilizer... It looks like the plumage of an arrow or the tail of an airplane. When moving in the atmosphere, it does not allow the rocket to "wag" from side to side.
5. And there is a hole in the bottom of the rocket. Called nozzle... Gases are ejected from this nozzle in a strong jet. It is from them that a fiery tail remains behind the rocket.
I did a class poll on why a rocket takes off.
Many of my classmates wrote that rockets take off because they bounce off the ground. Some say that this is a very difficult question for them and they cannot answer. But what I learned: according to the third law of mechanics, bodies act on each other with forces equal in magnitude and opposite in direction. In a rocket engine, this law, discovered by the brilliant scientist Isaac Newton, is very simple: the combustion gases are thrown backwards to get the rocket forward.
Newton's law can be easily verified, for example, with a balloon filled with air. If air is released from it, then the ball will begin to move.
Let go of the ball.
Comment: (albeit very chaotic) in the opposite direction to the direction of the air being discharged. Photos with a balloon:
I tried to stabilize the movement of the ball.
I needed string, cocktail tube and scotch tape. Experience. Commentary: the balloon flight has become smooth. Air comes out of the ball and it flies away along the rope in the opposite direction.
Man invented rockets a long time ago. They were invented in China many hundreds of years ago. The Chinese used them to make fireworks.
Rocket weapons "href =" / text / category / raketnoe_oruzhie / "rel =" bookmark "> rocket weapons. These are very formidable weapons. Modern missiles can accurately hit targets thousands of kilometers away. Military missiles are usually solid fuel engines.
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Takeoff of a surface-to-air missile. Rocket launcher "Katyusha"
And in the XX century, the school physics teacher Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky invented a new profession for rockets. He dreamed of how a person would fly into space. He called our planet the cradle of humanity. In order to get out of this cradle and start walking in outer space, rockets are needed.
Tsiolkovsky proposed a rocket operating on liquid hydrogen or kerosene and introduced the second component of jet fuel - an oxidizer, which was chosen as liquid oxygen.
Currently flying missiles are obliged to gunpowder, kerosene, liquid oxygen, and metals.
Recently, multistage rockets have been used. They are equipped with several propulsion systems (stages). The first step is the largest. The steps are sequentially installed one after the other. The last stage can reach significantly higher altitudes than a single-stage rocket.
At the moment of starting, the engine of only the first stage is running, after the end of work, the first stage is separated and the engine of the second stage begins to work, and then the third.
Conclusion: All missiles, both the smallest of industrial production or designed by amateurs, and large, the manufacture of which is associated with large expenditures of manpower and resources, have one thing in common. - they are based on the principle of jet propulsion.
And I said to my grandfather: "The reactive force makes the rocket move"
We raised our rocket with my grandfather into the air. She was on solid fuel. Here's what we got.
The hypothesis was not confirmed, as the rocket took off. It rose beautifully, at the level of the house.
As a result of the study, it was found that rocket launches harm the atmosphere of the planet Earth, since they emit harmful gas.
I really wanted people to continue to study the earth and the solar system, conduct weather forecasts and establish communications with the help of rockets, satellites, but not harm our atmosphere. I hope that I can research this issue and find a simple but reliable solution.
I also realized how dangerous some substances and takeoff speed can be. I believe that launching a rocket or fireworks should only be done with your parents. I shared these observations and experiences with the children in class.
What is a space rocket? How does it work? How does it fly? Why do they travel in space on rockets?
It would seem that all this has long been well known to us. But let's check ourselves just in case. Let's repeat the alphabet.
Our planet Earth is covered with a layer of air - the atmosphere. At the surface of the Earth, the air is quite dense and thick. Higher - thins. At an altitude of hundreds of kilometers, it imperceptibly "comes to naught", goes into airless space.
Compared to the air in which we live, there is emptiness. But, strictly scientifically speaking, the emptiness is not complete. All this space is permeated by the rays of the Sun and stars, fragments of atoms flying from them. Cosmic dust particles float in it. You can meet a meteorite. In the vicinity of many celestial bodies traces of their atmospheres are felt. Therefore, we cannot call the airless space void. We will simply call it space.
Both on Earth and in space, the same law of universal gravitation operates. According to this law, all objects attract each other. The attraction of the huge globe is very tangible.
To break away from the Earth and fly into space, you must first of all somehow overcome its gravity.
The plane overcomes it only partially. Taking off, it leans on the air with its wings. And it cannot go up to where the air is very thin. Moreover, into space, where there is no air at all.
You cannot climb a tree higher than the tree itself.
What to do? How to "climb" into space? What to rely on where there is nothing?
Imagine ourselves as giants of enormous stature. We are standing on the surface of the Earth, and the atmosphere is up to our waist. We have a ball in our hands. Letting go of him - he flies down to the Earth. Falling at our feet
Now we throw the ball parallel to the surface of the Earth. Obeying us, the ball should fly over the atmosphere, forward where we threw it. But the Earth did not stop pulling him to itself. And, obeying her, he, like the first time, must fly down. The ball is forced to obey both. And therefore it flies somewhere in the middle between the two directions, between "forward" and "down". The path of the ball, its trajectory, is obtained in the form of a curved line curving towards the Earth. The ball goes down, plunges into the atmosphere and falls to the Earth. But not at our feet, but somewhere at a distance.
Let's throw the ball harder. It will fly faster. Under the influence of the Earth's gravity, he will again begin to turn towards her. But now it's more shallow.
Let's throw the ball even harder. It flew so fast, began to wrap so gently that it "did not have time" to fall to the Earth. Its surface "rounds" under it, as if leaving from under it. The trajectory of the ball, although it bends towards the Earth, is not steep enough. And it turns out that, continuously falling to the Earth, the ball nevertheless flies around the globe. Its trajectory closed in a ring and became an orbit. And the ball will now fly over it all the time. Without ceasing to fall to the Earth. But also without approaching it, without hitting it.
To put the ball into a circular orbit like this, you need to throw it at a speed of 8 kilometers per second! This speed is called circular, or the first cosmic.
It is curious that this speed in flight will be maintained by itself. Flight slows down when something interferes with the flight. And nothing interferes with the ball. It flies above the atmosphere, in space!
How can you fly "by inertia" without stopping? This is difficult to understand because we have never lived in space. We got used to the fact that we are always surrounded by air. We know that a lump of cotton wool, no matter how hard you throw it, will not fly far, get stuck in the air, stop, and fall to the Earth. In space, all objects fly without encountering resistance. Unfolded sheets of newspaper, cast-iron weights, tiny cardboard toy rockets and real steel spaceships can fly nearby at a speed of 8 kilometers per second. Everyone will fly side by side, not lagging behind and not overtaking each other. They will circle the Earth in the same way.
But back to the ball. Let's throw it even harder. For example, at a speed of 10 kilometers per second. What will become of him?
Rocket orbits at different initial velocities.
At this speed, the trajectory will straighten even more. The ball will begin to move away from the ground. Then it will slow down, smoothly turn back to the Earth. And, approaching it, it will accelerate just to the speed with which we sent it flying, up to ten kilometers per second. With this speed, he will rush past us and carry away further. Everything will repeat itself from the beginning. Again ascent with deceleration, turn, fall with acceleration. This ball will never fall to the Earth either. He also went into orbit. But not circular, but elliptical.
The ball, thrown at a speed of 11.1 kilometers per second, will "reach" the moon itself and only there will turn back. And at a speed of 11.2 kilometers per second, it will not return to Earth at all, it will leave to wander around the solar system. The speed of 11.2 kilometers per second is called the second space speed.
So, you can stay in space only with the help of high speed.
How can one accelerate to at least the first cosmic speed, up to eight kilometers per second?
The speed of a car on a good highway does not exceed 40 meters per second. The speed of the Tu-104 aircraft is not more than 250 meters per second. And we need to move at a speed of 8000 meters per second! Fly thirty odd times faster than an airplane! It is generally impossible to rush with such speed in the air. The air "does not let in". It becomes an impenetrable wall in our path.
That is why we then, imagining ourselves as giants, "leaned out to the waist" from the atmosphere into space. The air got in our way.
But miracles do not happen. There are no giants. But you still need to "stick out". How to be? Building a tower hundreds of kilometers high is ridiculous to think. We must find a way to slowly, "slowly", pass through the thick air into space. And only where nothing interferes, "on a good road" to accelerate to the required speed.
In short, to stay in space, you need to accelerate. And to accelerate, you must first get to space and stay there.
To hold on - to accelerate! To accelerate - hold on!
The way out of this vicious circle was suggested to people in due time by our wonderful Russian scientist Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky. Only a rocket is suitable for going into space and accelerating in it. Our conversation will go on about her.
The rocket has no wings or propellers. She may not rely on anything in flight. For overclocking, she does not need to make a start from anything. It can move both in the air and in space. Slower in air, faster in space. It moves in a reactive manner. What does it mean? Here's an old but very good example.
The shore of a quiet lake. There is a boat two meters from the shore. The nose is directed towards the lake. At the stern of the boat there is a boy who wants to jump to the shore. He sat down, pulled himself up, jumped with all his might ... and safely "landed" on the shore. And the boat ... started off and sailed quietly from the shore.
What happened? When the boy jumped, his legs worked like a spring that was compressed and then straightened. This "spring" with one end pushed the man to the shore. Others - a boat to the lake. The boat and the man pushed off each other. The boat sailed, as they say, through recoil, or reaction. This is the reactive mode of movement.
Scheme of a multistage rocket.
Recoil is well known to us. Think, for example, how a cannon fires. When fired, the projectile flies forward from the barrel, while the gun itself rolls back sharply. Why? Yes, all because of the same. The gunpowder inside the barrel of the cannon, when burned, turns into hot gases. In an effort to escape, they press on all the walls from the inside, ready to rip the barrel of the cannon to pieces. They push out the artillery shell and, expanding, also work like a spring - they "throw in different directions" the cannon and the shell. Only the shell is lighter, and it can be thrown many kilometers away. The cannon is heavier and can only be rolled back a little.
Take now the ordinary small powder rocket that has been used for fireworks for hundreds of years. It is a cardboard tube closed on one side. Inside is gunpowder. If set on fire, it burns, turning into hot gases. Breaking through the open end of the tube, they throw themselves backward and the rocket forward. And they push her so hard that she flies to the sky.
Powder rockets have been around for a long time. But for large, space rockets, gunpowder, it turns out, is not always convenient. First of all - gunpowder is not at all the strongest explosive... Alcohol or kerosene, for example, if sprinkled finely and mixed with droplets of liquid oxygen, explode harder than gunpowder. Such liquids have a common name - fuel. And liquid oxygen or substituting liquids containing a lot of oxygen are called an oxidizing agent. The fuel and oxidizer together form propellant.
A modern liquid-propellant rocket engine, or, in abbreviated form, a liquid-propellant rocket engine is a very strong, steel, bottle-like combustion chamber. Its mouth with a bell is a nozzle. Into the chamber through the tubes into a large number fuel and oxidizer are continuously injected. Violent combustion occurs. The flames are raging. Hot gases with incredible force and a loud roar burst out through the nozzle. When they break free, they push the camera in the opposite direction. The camera is attached to the rocket, and it turns out that the gases push the rocket. The jet of gases is directed backward, and therefore the rocket flies forward.
A modern large rocket looks like this. Below, in its tail, there are engines, one or more. Above, almost all the free space is occupied by fuel tanks. Above, in the head of the rocket, is placed what it flies for. That she should "deliver to the address." In space rockets, this can be some kind of satellite that needs to be put into orbit, or a spaceship with astronauts.
The rocket itself is called a booster rocket. And a satellite or a ship is a payload.
So, we seem to have found a way out of the vicious circle. We have a rocket with a liquid propellant rocket engine. Moving in a reactive way, it can "quietly" pass through the dense atmosphere, go into space and there accelerate to the required speed.
The first difficulty that rocket scientists faced was the lack of fuel. Rocket engines are deliberately made very "gluttonous" so that they burn fuel faster, make and throw back as much gases as possible. But ... the rocket will not have time to gain even half of the required speed, as the fuel in the tanks runs out. And this despite the fact that we have filled literally the entire interior of the rocket with fuel. Make the rocket bigger to fit more fuel? Will not help. A larger, heavier rocket will take more fuel to accelerate, and there will be no benefit.
Tsiolkovsky also suggested a way out of this unpleasant situation. He advised making the rockets multistage.
We take several missiles of different sizes. They are called steps - first, second, third. We put one on top of the other. The biggest one is below. For her - smaller. Above - the smallest, with a payload in the head. This is a three-stage rocket. But there may be more steps.
At takeoff, the first, most powerful stage begins to accelerate. After using up its fuel, it separates and falls back to Earth. The rocket gets rid of excess weight. The second stage starts to work, continuing acceleration. On it, the engines are smaller, lighter, and they use fuel more economically. Having worked out, the second stage is also separated, passing the baton to the third. That is already quite easy. She finishes acceleration.
All space rockets are multistage.
The next question is what is the best way for a rocket to go into space? Maybe, like an airplane, scatter along a concrete path, break away from the Earth and, gradually gaining altitude, rise into airless space?
It is not profitable. It will take too long to fly in the air. The path through the dense layers of the atmosphere should be shortened as much as possible. Therefore, as you probably noticed, all space rockets, wherever they fly later, always take off straight up. And only in thin air do they gradually turn in the right direction. Such takeoff in terms of fuel consumption is the most economical.
Multistage rockets launch a payload into orbit. But at what cost? Judge for yourself. To put one ton into low-earth orbit, you need to burn several tens of tons of fuel! For a cargo of 10 tons - hundreds of tons. The American Saturn-5 rocket, which is launching 130 tons into low-earth orbit, itself weighs 3000 tons!
And perhaps the most distressing thing is that we still do not know how to return launch vehicles to Earth. Having done their job, having dispersed the payload, they separate and ... fall. Crashing against the Earth or drowning in the ocean. We cannot use them the second time.
Imagine that a passenger plane was built for just one flight. Incredible! But rockets, which are more expensive than aircraft, are being built for only one flight. Therefore, launching each satellite or spacecraft into orbit is very expensive.
But we got distracted.
Our task is not always just to put the payload into a circular near-earth orbit. A more complex task is posed much more often. For example, deliver a payload to the moon. And sometimes to bring her back from there. In this case, after entering a circular orbit, the rocket must perform many more different "maneuvers". And they all require fuel consumption.
So now let's talk about these maneuvers.
The plane flies nose forward, because it needs to cut the air with a sharp nose. And the rocket, after it went out into the airless space, has nothing to cut. There is nothing in her way. That is why a rocket in space after turning off the engine can fly in any position - both astern and tumbling. If, during such a flight, the engine is turned on again briefly, it will push the rocket. And here it all depends on where the rocket nose is aimed. If forward, the engine will push the rocket, and it will fly faster. If it is back, the engine will hold back, slow it down, and it will fly slower. If the rocket looked sideways, the engine will push it to the side, and it will change the direction of its flight without changing its speed.
The same engine can do anything with a rocket. Accelerate, brake, turn. It all depends on how we aim or orient the rocket before turning on the engine.
On the rocket, somewhere in the tail, there are small attitude jet engines. They are directed by the nozzles in different directions. By turning them on and off, you can push the rocket tail up and down, left and right, and thus turn the rocket. Orient her nose in any direction.
Let's imagine that we need to fly to the moon and return. What maneuvers will be required for this?
First of all, we enter a circular orbit around the Earth. Here you can take a break by turning off the engine. Without consuming a single gram of precious fuel, the rocket will "silently" walk around the Earth until we decide to fly further.
To get to the moon, you need to go from a circular orbit to a highly elongated elliptical.
Orient the rocket nose forward and turn on the engine. He starts to disperse us. As soon as the speed slightly exceeds 11 kilometers per second, turn off the engine. The rocket went into a new orbit.
I must say that it is very difficult to “hit the target” in space. If the Earth and the Moon stood motionless, and it would be possible to fly in space in straight lines, the matter would be simple. Aim - and fly, keeping the target all the time "on course", as the captains of naval ships and pilots do. There, and speed does not matter. Sooner or later you will arrive at the place, what difference does it make. All the same, the target, the "port of destination", will not go anywhere.
It's not like that in space. Getting from the Earth to the Moon is about the same as quickly spinning on a merry-go-round and hitting a flying bird with a ball. Judge for yourself. The earth we take off from is revolving. The moon - our "port of destination" - also does not stand still, flies around the Earth, flying a kilometer in every second. In addition, our rocket does not fly in a straight line, but in an elliptical orbit, gradually slowing down its movement. Its speed only at the beginning was more than eleven kilometers per second, and then, due to the Earth's gravity, it began to decrease. And you have to fly for a long time, several days. And yet there are no landmarks around. There is no road. There is not and cannot be any map, because there would be nothing to put on the map - there is nothing around. One blackness. Only stars far, far away. They are above us and below us, from all sides. And we must calculate the direction of our flight and its speed in such a way that at the end of the path we arrive at the intended place in space simultaneously with the Moon. Let's make a mistake in speed - we'll be late for the "date", the moon won't wait for us.
In order, despite all these difficulties, to reach the goal, the most sophisticated instruments are on the ground and on the rocket. Electronic computers work on Earth, hundreds of observers, calculators, scientists and engineers work.
And, despite all this, we still check once or twice on the way whether we are flying correctly. If we deviated slightly, we carry out, as they say, a trajectory correction. To do this, orient the rocket with its nose in the desired direction, turn on the engine for a few seconds. He will push the rocket a little, correct its flight. And then she already flies as it should.
Approaching the moon is also difficult. First, we must fly as if we intend to "miss" past the moon. Second, fly aft forward. As soon as the rocket is level with the Moon, we turn on the engine for a while. He slows us down. Under the influence of the moon's gravity, we turn in its direction and begin to walk around it in a circular orbit. Here you can rest a little again. Then we proceed to planting. Again orient the rocket "stern forward" and once again turn on the engine for a short time. The speed decreases and we begin to fall on the moon. Not far from the surface of the moon, we turn on the engine again. He begins to contain our fall. It is necessary to calculate so that the engine will completely extinguish the speed and stop us just before landing. Then we will softly, without impact, descend to the moon.
The return from the moon is already proceeding in a familiar manner. First, we take off into a circular, circumlunar orbit. Then we increase the speed and go to an elongated elliptical orbit, along which we go to the Earth. But landing on Earth is not the same as landing on the Moon. The earth is surrounded by an atmosphere, and air resistance can be used for braking.
However, it is impossible to plumbly crash into the atmosphere. From too sharp deceleration, the rocket will flare up, burn up, fall apart. Therefore, we aim it so that it enters the atmosphere "sideways". In this case, it sinks into the dense layers of the atmosphere not so quickly. Our speed decreases smoothly. At an altitude of several kilometers, the parachute opens - and we are at home. That's how many maneuvers a flight to the moon requires.
To save fuel, designers also use multistage technology here. For example, our rockets, which gently landed on the moon and then brought samples of lunar soil from there, had five stages. Three - for takeoff from Earth and flight to the Moon. The fourth is for landing on the moon. And the fifth - to return to Earth.
Everything we have said so far has been, so to speak, theory. Now let's make a mental excursion to the cosmodrome. Let's see how it all looks in practice.
They build rockets in factories. The lightest and strongest materials are used wherever possible. To facilitate the rocket, they try to make all its mechanisms and all the equipment on it as "portable" as possible. The rocket will be easier - you can take more fuel with you, increase the payload.
The rocket is brought to the cosmodrome in parts. It is assembled in a large assembly and test building. Then a special crane - the installer - in a recumbent position carries the rocket, empty, without fuel, to the launch pad. There he lifts her up and puts her in an upright position. On all sides, the rocket is wrapped around the four pillars of the launch system so that it does not fall from gusts of wind. Then service farms with balconies are brought to it so that the technicians preparing the rocket for launch can get close to any place. A refueling mast is brought up with hoses through which fuel is poured into the rocket, and a cable mast with electric cables to check all the mechanisms and devices of the rocket before flight.
Space rockets are huge. Our very first space rocket "Vostok" even then had a height of 38 meters, with a ten-story building. And the largest American six-stage rocket Saturn-5, which delivered American astronauts to the moon, had a height of more than one hundred meters. Its diameter at the base is 10 meters.
When everything is checked and refueling is complete, the service trusses, the filling mast and the cable mast are retracted.
And here is the start! Automation starts working on a signal from the command post. It supplies fuel to the combustion chambers. Turns on the ignition. The fuel is flammable. Engines begin to quickly gain power, more and more pressure from below on the rocket. When they finally reach full power and lift the rocket, the legs swing back, release the rocket, and it goes into the sky with a deafening roar, as if on a pillar of fire.
The rocket flight is controlled partly automatically, partly by radio from the earth. And if the rocket carries a spaceship with astronauts, then they themselves can control.
For communication with the rocket all over the globe stationed radio stations. After all, the rocket goes around the planet, and it may be necessary to contact it just when it is "on the other side of the Earth."
Rocket technology, despite its youth, shows us the wonders of perfection. The rockets flew to the moon and returned back. They flew hundreds of millions of kilometers to Venus and Mars, making soft landings there. Manned spaceships performed the most complex maneuvers in space. Hundreds of various satellites have been launched into space by rockets.
There are many difficulties on the paths leading to cosmic distances.
For a man to travel, say, to Mars, we would need a rocket of absolutely incredible, monstrous dimensions. More grandiose ocean ships weighing tens of thousands of tons! There is no need to think about building such a rocket.
For the first time, when flying to the nearest planets, docking in space can help. Huge spaceships of "long voyage" can be built collapsible, from separate links. With the help of relatively small rockets, launch these links into the same "assembly" orbit near the Earth and dock there. So it is possible to assemble a ship in space, which will be even larger than the rockets, which in parts lifted it into space. It is technically possible even today.
However, docking does not make space conquest much easier. The development of new rocket engines will give much more. Also reactive, but less voracious than the current liquid. Visiting the planets of our solar system will move forward sharply after mastering electric and atomic engines. However, the time will come when flights to other stars, to other solar systems And then it will be required again new technique... Perhaps by then, scientists and engineers will be able to build photonic rockets. With a "fiery jet" they will have an incredibly powerful beam of light. With an insignificant consumption of matter, such rockets can accelerate to speeds of hundreds of thousands of kilometers per second!
Space technology will never stop developing. A person will set himself more and more new goals. To achieve them - to come up with more and more advanced missiles. And having created them - to set even more majestic goals!
Many of you guys are sure to devote yourself to space exploration. Good luck on this interesting path!
Intercontinental ballistic missile- a very impressive creation of man. Huge size, thermonuclear power, a pillar of flame, the roar of engines and a formidable roar of launch ... However, all this exists only on the ground and in the first minutes of launch. After their expiration, the rocket ceases to exist. Further into the flight and on the performance of the combat mission, only what remains of the rocket after acceleration - its payload - goes.
At long launch ranges, the payload of an intercontinental ballistic missile goes into space for many hundreds of kilometers. It rises into the layer of low-orbit satellites, 1000-1200 km above the Earth, and for a short time is among them, only slightly lagging behind their general run. And then it starts to slide down along an elliptical trajectory ...
What exactly is this load?
A ballistic missile consists of two main parts - the accelerating part and the other, for the sake of which the acceleration is started. The accelerating part is a pair or three of large multi-ton stages, packed to capacity with fuel and with engines from below. They give the necessary speed and direction to the movement of the other main part of the rocket - the head. The accelerating stages, replacing each other in the launch relay, accelerate this warhead in the direction of the area of its future fall.
The rocket head is a complex payload of many elements. It contains a warhead (one or more), a platform on which these warheads are placed along with the rest of the economy (such as means of deceiving enemy radars and anti-missiles), and a fairing. The head also contains fuel and compressed gases. The entire warhead will not fly to the target. It, like the ballistic missile itself, will split into many elements and simply cease to exist as a whole. The fairing will separate from it still not far from the launch area, during the operation of the second stage, and somewhere along the road it will fall. The platform will collapse upon entering the air of the fall area. Only one type of element will reach the target through the atmosphere. Warheads. Close up, the warhead looks like an elongated cone a meter or one and a half long, at the base as thick as a human body. The nose of the cone is pointed or slightly blunt. This cone is special aircraft, whose task is to deliver weapons to the target. We'll come back to warheads later and take a closer look at them.
Pull or push?
In the rocket, all the warheads are located in the so-called disengagement stage, or in the "bus". Why a bus? Because, having freed itself first from the fairing, and then from the last accelerating stage, the breeding stage carries the warheads, like passengers at specified stops, along their trajectories along which the deadly cones will disperse to their targets.
Another "bus" is called a combat stage, because its work determines the accuracy of aiming the warhead at the target point, and hence the combat effectiveness. The stage and how it works is one of the biggest secrets in a rocket. But we will nevertheless take a slight, schematic look at this mysterious step and at its difficult dance in space.
The dilution stage has different forms. Most often, it looks like a round stump or a wide loaf of bread, on which the warheads are mounted on top, pointed forward, each on its own spring pusher. The warheads are positioned in advance at precise separation angles (at the missile base, manually, with theodolites) and look in different directions, like a bunch of carrots, like a hedgehog's needles. The platform bristling with warheads takes a given, gyro-stabilized position in flight. And at the right moments, warheads are pushed out from it one by one. They are pushed out immediately after the end of acceleration and separation from the last acceleration stage. Until (you never know what?) Did not shoot down all this undiluted hive with an anti-missile weapon or refused something on board the breeding stage.
The pictures show the breeding stages of the American heavy ICBM LGM0118A Peacekeeper, also known as MX. The missile was equipped with ten 300 kt MIRVs. The missile was removed from service in 2005.
But this was the case before, at the dawn of multiple warheads. Breeding is now a very different picture. If earlier the warheads "stuck out" forward, now the stage itself is in front, and the warheads hang from below, with their tops back, inverted, like the bats... The "bus" itself in some rockets also lies upside down, in a special recess in the upper stage of the rocket. Now, after separation, the breeding stage does not push, but drags the warheads behind it. Moreover, it drags, resting on the crosswise spaced four "paws" deployed in front. At the ends of these metal legs there are backward-directed traction nozzles of the stage of dilution. After separating from the acceleration stage, the "bus" very precisely, precisely sets its movement in the incipient space with the help of its own powerful guidance system. Itself takes the exact path of the next warhead - its individual path.
Then special inertialess locks are opened, holding the next detachable warhead. And not even separated, but simply now, no longer connected with the stage, the warhead remains motionless here, in complete weightlessness. The moments of her own flight began and flowed. Like one single berry next to a bunch of grapes with other warhead grapes not yet ripped off the stage by the breeding process.
K-551 "Vladimir Monomakh" - Russian nuclear submarine strategic purpose(project 955 "Borey"), armed with 16 solid-propellant ICBMs "Bulava" with ten multiple warheads.
Delicate movements
Now the task of the stage is to crawl away from the warhead as delicately as possible, without disturbing its precisely set (targeted) movement by the gas jets of its nozzles. If the supersonic jet of the nozzle hits the separated warhead, it will inevitably add its own to the parameters of its motion. Over the next flight time (and this is half an hour - fifty minutes, depending on the launch range), the warhead drifts from this exhaust "slap" of the jet for half a kilometer-kilometer sideways from the target, or even further. It drifts without barriers: space is in the same place, splashed - swam, not holding on to anything. But is a kilometer to the side is accuracy today?
Project 955 Borey submarines are a series of Russian nuclear-powered submarines of the fourth generation strategic missile submarine class. Initially, the project was created for the Bark missile, it was replaced by the Bulava.
To avoid such effects, the four upper "legs" with motors spaced apart to the sides are just needed. The stage, as it were, is pulled forward on them so that the exhaust jets go to the sides and cannot catch the warhead separated by the belly of the stage. All thrust is split between four nozzles, which reduces the power of each individual jet. There are other features as well. For example, if at the donut-like stage of dilution (with a void in the middle - this hole is put on the accelerating stage of the rocket, like a wedding ring on a finger) of the Trident II D5 rocket, the control system determines that the separated warhead still gets under the exhaust of one of the nozzles, the control system disables this nozzle. Makes silence over the warhead.
The step is gentle, like a mother from the cradle of a sleeping child, fearing to disturb his peace, tiptoes out in space on the three remaining nozzles in low thrust mode, and the warhead remains on the targeting trajectory. Then the "donut" of the stage with the crosspiece of the traction nozzles is rotated around the axis so that the warhead comes out from under the torch zone of the switched off nozzle. Now the stage moves away from the abandoned warhead already on all four nozzles, but so far also at low throttle. When a sufficient distance is reached, the main thrust is turned on, and the stage moves vigorously into the area of the targeting trajectory of the next warhead. There it is calculatedly slowed down and again very accurately sets the parameters of its movement, after which it separates the next warhead from itself. And so - until it lands each warhead on its trajectory. This process is fast, much faster than you read about it. In one and a half to two minutes, the combat stage removes a dozen warheads.
American Ohio-class submarines are the only type of missile carrier in service with the United States. Carries 24 Trident-II (D5) MIRVed ballistic missiles. The number of warheads (depending on power) - 8 or 16.
Abyss of mathematics
The above is enough to understand how the warhead's own path begins. But if you open the door a little wider and look a little deeper, you will notice that today the reversal in space of the disengagement stage carrying the warhead is an area of application of the quaternion calculus, where the onboard attitude control system processes the measured parameters of its movement with continuous construction on board the attitude quaternion. A quaternion is such a complex number (over the field of complex numbers lies a flat body of quaternions, as mathematicians would say in their precise language of definitions). But not with the usual two parts, real and imaginary, but with one real and three imaginary. In total, the quaternion has four parts, which, in fact, is what the Latin root quatro says.
The dilution stage does its job quite low, immediately after the booster stages are turned off. That is, at an altitude of 100-150 km. And there the influence of gravitational anomalies of the Earth's surface, heterogeneities in an even gravitational field that surrounds the Earth is also affected. Where are they from? From the uneven terrain mountain systems, occurrence of rocks of different density, oceanic troughs. Gravitational anomalies either attract the step to themselves by additional attraction, or, conversely, slightly release it from the Earth.
In such irregularities, complex ripples of the local gravitational field, the stage of disengagement should place the warheads with precision. For this, it was necessary to create a more detailed map of the Earth's gravitational field. It is better to "explain" the features of a real field in systems of differential equations describing the exact ballistic motion. These are large, capacious (to include details) systems of several thousand differential equations, with several tens of thousands of constant numbers. And the gravitational field itself at low altitudes, in the immediate near-Earth region, is considered as the joint attraction of several hundred point masses of different "weights" located near the center of the Earth in a certain order. This is how a more accurate simulation of the real gravitational field of the Earth on the rocket flight path is achieved. And more accurate operation of the flight control system. And also ... but complete! - let's not look further and close the door; what has been said is enough for us.
ICBM payload most conducts a flight in the mode of a space object, rising to a height three times the height of the ISS. The trajectory of enormous length must be calculated with particular accuracy.
Flight without warheads
The stage of disengagement, dispersed by the missile in the direction of the same geographical area, where the warheads should fall, continues its flight with them. After all, she cannot lag behind, and why? After disengaging the warheads, the stage is urgently engaged in other matters. It moves away from the warheads, knowing in advance that it will fly a little differently from the warheads, and not wanting to disturb them. The breeding stage also devotes all its further actions to warheads. This maternal desire to protect the flight of her "children" in every possible way continues for the rest of her short life. Short, but intense.
After the separated warheads, it is the turn of other wards. The funniest things begin to fly to the sides of the step. Like a magician, she releases into space a lot of inflating balloons, some metal things that resemble open scissors, and objects of all other shapes. Durable balloons sparkle brightly in the cosmic sun with the mercury shine of a metallized surface. They are quite large, some in shape resemble warheads flying nearby. Their aluminum-coated surface reflects the radio signal of the radar from a distance in much the same way as the body of the warhead. Enemy ground radars will perceive these inflatable warheads on a par with real ones. Of course, in the very first moments of entering the atmosphere, these balls will lag behind and burst immediately. But before that, they will distract and load the computing power of ground-based radars - both early warning and guidance anti-missile systems... In the language of ballistic missile interceptors, this is called "complicating the current ballistic situation." And all the heavenly army, inexorably moving towards the area of the fall, including real and false warheads, balloons, dipole and corner reflectors, this whole motley flock is called "multiple ballistic targets in a complicated ballistic environment."
The metal scissors open up and become electric dipole reflectors - there are many of them, and they reflect well the radio signal of the long-range anti-missile detection radar beam probing them. Instead of ten desired fat ducks, the radar sees a huge blurry flock of small sparrows, in which it is difficult to make out something. Devices of all shapes and sizes reflect different lengths waves.
In addition to all this tinsel, the stage itself can theoretically emit radio signals that interfere with the targeting of enemy anti-missiles. Or distract them to yourself. In the end, you never know what she can be busy with - after all, a whole step is flying, large and complex, why not load her with a good solo program?
The photo shows the launch of an intercontinental missile Trident II (USA) from a submarine. Trident is currently the only ICBM family to be deployed on American submarines. The maximum throwable weight is 2800 kg.
The last segment
Aerodynamically, however, the stage is not a warhead. If that is a small and heavy narrow carrot, then the step is an empty vast bucket, with echoing empty fuel tanks, a large, non-streamlined body and a lack of orientation in the stream that begins to run on. With its wide body with decent windage, the step responds much earlier to the first blows of the oncoming stream. In addition, the warheads deploy along the stream, piercing the atmosphere with the least aerodynamic drag. The step, on the other hand, piles on the air with its vast sides and bottoms as necessary. She cannot fight the braking force of the flow. Its ballistic coefficient - a "fusion" of massiveness and compactness - is much worse than a warhead. It immediately and strongly begins to slow down and lag behind the warheads. But the forces of the flow grow inexorably, at the same time the temperature heats up the thin unprotected metal, depriving it of its strength. Fuel leftovers boil merrily in hot-water tanks. Finally, there is a loss of stability of the hull structure under the aerodynamic load that has compressed it. Overloading helps to smash the bulkheads inside. Krak! Bastard! The crumpled body is immediately engulfed by hypersonic shock waves, tearing the stage into pieces and scattering them. Flying a little in the thickening air, the pieces break again into smaller fragments. Residual fuel react instantly. Flying fragments of structural elements made of magnesium alloys are ignited by hot air and instantly burn out with a dazzling flash, similar to the flash of a camera - it was not for nothing that magnesium was set on fire in the first flashbulbs!
Everything is now on fire, everything is covered with red-hot plasma and shines well around with orange coals from the fire. The denser parts go to slow down forward, the lighter and sail ones are blown away into a tail stretching across the sky. All burning components give dense smoke plumes, although at such speeds these densest plumes cannot be due to the monstrous dilution by the flow. But from a distance you can see them perfectly. The ejected smoke particles are stretched along the trail of the flight of this caravan of pieces and pieces, filling the atmosphere with a wide white trail. Impact ionization gives rise to the greenish night glow of this plume. Due to the irregular shape of the fragments, their deceleration is rapid: everything that has not burned out quickly loses speed, and with it the intoxicating effect of air. Supersonic is the strongest brake! Having become in the sky, like a train collapsing on the tracks, and immediately cooled down by the high-altitude frosty sound, the strip of fragments becomes visually indistinguishable, loses its shape and structure and turns into a long, twenty minutes, quiet chaotic dispersion in the air. If you find yourself in the right place, you can hear a small charred piece of duralumin softly clinking against the birch trunk. So you have arrived. Goodbye breeding stage!
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