FIRST STEPS TOWARD SPACE - Smithsonian Institution Libraries

210 SMITHSONIAN ANNALS OF FLIGHT
FIGURE 1.—Members of the British Interplanetary Society and R. C. Truax in July 1938. From
left: J. H. Edwards, Research Director, British Interplanetary Society; Eric Burgess, Founder
and President, Manchester Interplanetary Society; H. E. Turner, Editor, Manchester Interplanetary
Society Journal; Midshipman Robert C. Truax, USN, holding liquid propellant
rocket motor of his design; R. A. Smith, engineer and well-known illustrator of space subjects;
M. K. Hanson; and Arthur C. Clarke.
motor and propellant tests, but experimentation
was arrested by lack of money and facilities. Suitable
materials for spacecraft construction, including
plastics, were considered and reported upon by
Janser.
Though in prewar days it was known that shortwavelength
radio would be a possible means of
communication across space, the efficacy had not
been explored. And radar as a navigational aid was
then a secret military art. Because of this lack of
information, the Technical Committee preferred
to suggest transit navigation principally by optical
observations of the planets and stars. However,
navigation during main thrust periods was to be
done automatically by inertial instruments—a principle
since commonly used in complex guidance
and control systems of rockets and spacecraft. An
inertial altimeter, a speedometer, an impulse meter,
and an accelerometer were listed for development,
but only the altimeter was worked on. 10 This consisted
in essence of a weight, a spring, and a flywheel.
The idea was that when the spaceship accelerated
there would be a charge in the internal
"gravitation" putting the spring-weight combina­
tion out of balance by an amount proportional to
the acceleration. The double integral was effected
by setting the out-of-balance force to operate a
flywheel, the revolutions of the flywheel then giving
a reading of the altitude reached by the vessel. This
was not the best kind of mechanism for the job, but
the cost was small. Unfortunately, lack of engineering
facilities and intervention of other activities
aborted progress. Similarly, development of a highenergy
lightweight primary battery, based on a
magnesium reaction, intended to avoid heavy conventional
batteries, had to be abandoned. 11
In prewar days nothing certain was known about
the physiological effects of zero gravity. Some people
believed that derangement would be complete or
persistently severe; others thought that there would
be some derangement but fairly rapid acclimatization;
few maintained that no ill-effects would occur.
In any case, it was generally accepted that work involving
motion would be rendered difficult. Faced
with uncertainty (and with rather unaccustomed
deference to prevailing pessimism), the Technical
Committee decided that the ship would have to
rotate in order to furnish a gravitational datum—