Did you fly into Gemini orbit?
In RuNet, the reasoning that allegedly not only Apollo did not fly to the Moon, but their predecessors, Gemini and Mercury, never went into near-earth orbit is very popular. In this article, these speculations are subjected to scientific criticism.
Docking "Gemini" 6 and 7
Here is what the doctor of physics and mathematics writes. A.I. Popov in the article www.manonmoon.ru/articles/st103.htm .
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Let's start with the disposal of natural waste. Astronaut consumption "Gemini" was very limited. With a low mobility of food, a lot is not required, and water gave out a special gun in portions of 14 grams space-horizon.ru/articles/39 . With a stock of drinking tank of 7.2 liters, it was replenished by condensation of exhaled vapors at the rate of up to 227 g / hour. This means that for 14 days (the longest flight to Gemini, which usually flew from 1 to 4), astronauts could produce no more than 7.2 liters of urine. A glass a day, almost everything else came out with steam from the mouth. Otherwise, as is easy to understand, they would suffer from dehydration. To collect the selection within 10 liters of special tricks is not necessary. Contrary to the jokes about the "super-duper diapers" usa-moon.ru/ # 7 , it is not necessary to keep it inside the spacesuits. Nothing prevented pumping waste from the intermediate tank into a separate tank. Naturally, all this was not too pleasant. It is physically difficult to fly into space even now, and the first cosmo / astronauts were real heroes!
Now about the “suspiciously vigorous state of health” of the “Gemini” astronauts after landing. These ships did not fly for a long time (maximum 14 days), so the effect of weightlessness on muscles and bones was insignificant. The fact that the first Soviet cosmonauts, after short flights, sometimes felt bad, can be explained by the difficult landing conditions. "Gemini" sat on the manual control, and "East" on the automation. This means that our modes of entry into the atmosphere were more stringent overload (for reasons of reliability). The braking of the descent vehicle "Vostok" occurred with an overload of up to 9g, and Gemini experienced only 3g. This alone is enough to make Americans feel much better. In addition, cosmonauts ejected from the Vostok, which added "pleasant" sensations, and in the case of a landing in the "ball" they received a very sensitive blow. There was nothing like that in Gemini.
Americans breathed pure oxygen, and our air, like on Earth. Presumably, this could also affect well-being. The fact that “Gemini” is cramped compared to the “East” in the conditions of a short flight did not matter much. The astronaut relieved the weightlessness of such unpleasant sensations as squeezing the coccyx and numbing legs, and they had the opportunity to tinker in the cockpit to disperse blood and even remove the spacesuit. The conditions in the Soyuz are more comfortable, but after these ships, after long-term tuning, long flights took place, so comparing them with Gemini according to the well-being of the crews is incorrect. And finally, you need to take into account the American mentality - they are not taken to be photographed with a sour face. It is possible that the astronauts were given a couple of hours to recover, before taking pictures with the duty smiles.
It is very strange to read that they "have managed ... not to see the stars above the diurnal half of the Earth." In sunlight, the stars cannot be seen due to their negligible brightness, since pupils and diaphragms are narrowed! For this reason, astronauts on the Moon did not see the stars, and the cameras did not take pictures of them, which also excites debunkers of the "lunar conspiracy."
Neil Armstrong (the same one!) And David Scott in a Gemini-8 capsule after a splash down on March 16, 1966
Now to the works of S.M. Eremenko, who in the “extensive work [6]” usa-moon.ru/#7, declares the inability of the American missiles of that time to bring the ships with the Gemini mass into orbit.
The author tries to convince the reader that “Mercury” and “Gemini” could not fly to near-earth orbit, since were too light compared to the "East". A strange argument, given that our ships and American ships had completely different ideologies. The USSR created a powerful R-7 rocket, so I could not afford to minimize the useful weight. The United States at the time of the first truly suborbital flights had poor Redstone, so they had to fight for every kilogram. For example, in “Mercury”, expensive and heat-resistant beryllium, which is one and a half times lighter than aluminum, was actively used. The heat shield and the lining of the upper, cylindrical part of the capsule were made from it. The body of titanium alloy also reduced the weight, but increased the cost of the device. Soviet ships were cheaper, simpler and more durable, but this does not mean that no other design was unsuitable for flights to orbit.
The author contradicts himself: “by April 1958, research was carried out in the USSR, which made it possible to establish: in order to accommodate a person on board the spacecraft, the necessary service and scientific equipment, its mass should be about 5,500 kg”. How, then, did the Vostok fly with a mass of 4,730 kg? It should be understood that in systemic, technical problems, preliminary assessments are for guidance only. The source of truth is experience, not theoretical research. Moreover, if the single capsule “Mercury”, which made only 4 orbital flights with a maximum duration of 34 hours, was 3.5 times lighter than the two-seater “Vostok”, then Gemini with a mass of ~ 3,700 kg was not that different.
Atlas "Mercury" threw "Atlas-D" into orbital flights. It was far from the “Redstone”, but an intercontinental, ballistic missile capable of flying about 14,000 km. The author is deeply mistaken when he draws a line between the ICBM and the carrier of the orbiter, referring to the equator length of 40,000 km. The dependence of the flight range on the speed of the last stage is not linear. The article extremal-mechanics.org/archives/9573 provides calculations that show that at a speed of 7.65 km / s and a near-zero pitch angle at an engine shut-off altitude of 200 km, an ICBM warhead will fly 10,000 km along the Earth’s surface and fall ( even without taking into account aerodynamic drag). If we increase its speed by only ~ 250 m / s, it will go into near-earth orbit. Here such nonlinearity!
In the combat version Atlas-D had a warhead weighing up to 1,680 kg and carrying a thermonuclear warhead. The mass saving on the “Mercury” (1,350 kg) was sufficient to add a few hundred m / s of velocity. Modes of operation and load of the rocket can vary near the nominal, so scuffling around a few hundred kg of weight and m / s speed looks frivolous. We will come back to this issue when discussing Titan II, which, according to S.M. Eremenko, could not send "Gemini" into orbit.
"Atlas-D" with "Mercury", which he "could not" lift into orbit
Another "argument" causes stormy delight among believers in the lunar conspiracy. It consists in the fact that "Mercury" and "Gemini" could not return from orbit without ablative thermal protection (which was in the "East"). This is another fantasy based on school physics. Indeed, with laminar airflow, the skin can warm up to several thousand degrees. That is why the ICBM warheads at entry into the atmosphere slow down so as not to burn and not to collapse, like meteorites. Depending on the design, they turn around the base of the cone in the direction of flight or have a blunt nose fairing. This creates a compression zone in front of the warhead, which slows it down to a relatively safe ~ 3 km / s at the entrance to the troposphere (where it does not have time to burn). In this regard, it is worth noting that the power of aerodynamic heating in the stratosphere is not proportional to the square of velocity, but to its cube (see formula (1) in extremal-mechanics.org/archives/9573 ).
The shock wave, which is formed before the warhead, qualitatively changes the flow mode, which significantly reduces air heating. Everything is simple - the kinetic energy of the warhead is not transformed into thermal energy (its same), but into the internal energy of compressed air with subsequent transfer to the shock wave. Heating of course remains, but becomes much less. The fact is that the flow turbulence during flow reduces the tangential component of its velocity relative to the surface, and also contributes to the convective transfer of heat back into the atmosphere.
The same thing happened with the capsules of "Mercury" and "Gemini" when returning from orbit! With one amendment, they entered along considerably shallower trajectories than the ICBM warheads. What does it change? The power of aerodynamic heating is proportional to the density of air. Since the capsule significantly loses its speed in the upper atmosphere, heating and mechanical loads are insignificant when entering the denser layers. As noted above, this loss of mechanical energy occurs not so much due to the growth of heat, but rather due to the formation of a shock wave around the apparatus. This is what a heat shield means!
So, the Mercury and Gemini gently descending from orbit warmed up far less dramatically than the revealers paint. But how exactly? Referring to the conference materials on beryllium, which was conducted by the United States Department of Defense in 1970 books.google.com/books?id=IGMrAAAAYAAJ&printsec==== the cohre&hl=en&source= gbs_ge_summary_r . The report from the company McDonell-Douglas explains the use of beryllium in the spacecraft developed by it. On page 610 it is said that the temperature on the surface of the Mercury capsule did not exceed 1,300 degrees Fahrenheit, i.e., about 700 degrees. C. Enough to melt aluminum, but for beryllium with a melting point of 1,500 degrees. C and titanium with its 1,700 is a cold compress. Now I understand why the ablative protection is not needed, and the “Gemini” capsules do not look badly burnt?
Although 700 degrees. C - not so little. The heat shield of the heavier Gemini may have gotten a bit more. Unlike the pure beryllium shield of “Mercury”, it was covered with a self-ruptured coating of plastics impregnated with phenolic resins and some other rubbish. This is an intermediate solution between heat-absorbing and ablative thermal protection. Therefore, here S.M. Eremenko hurried with the conclusion.
Exposing drawing from the article SM. Yeremenko
Now let's look at the pictures. Left is not as far from the truth as it seems to the author. There was actually no plasma flowing around the “Gemini” in the figure to the right. air with a temperature of several hundred degrees can, with a stretch, be called plasma. What is drawn there is similar to the front of a shock wave that slides along the walls, practically not interacting with them. That is why the “Gemini” and “Mercury” paneling did not heat up much. From the front of the shock wave got the upper, cylindrical part of the capsule. He did not flow around it as in the figure, but fell on the surface at an acute angle. This is the most vulnerable part of the capsules, which has been completely lined with beryllium plates. Its high thermal conductivity (4 times more than that of steel), corrosion and thermal resistance ensured stable operation during descent in the atmosphere without a significant increase in temperature on the surface. A sloping path also contributed to the success of this heat-absorbing protection.
Strictly speaking, the tangent of the angle between the longitudinal axis of the capsule and the shock wave front diffracted at the edges of the heat shield is equal to the ratio of the speed of sound to the speed of the capsule. If we take an angle at the apex of a cone of 45 degrees by the eye, the flow shown in the figure on the right corresponds to the speed of the capsule 2–2.5 Mach. At higher speeds, the front of the shock wave does not even approach the surface of the cone. Between it and the walls a pocket is formed, protecting them from overheating. Moreover, this air gap organizes convection heat from the cone, which comes from the cylindrical part of the capsule. The protective screen also played the role of an absorber of this heat (with a beryllium base from Gemini and purely from it from Mercury).
That is why the surface of the cone was coated with not expensive beryllium, but with a steel-nickel alloy, Rene 41, operating in the temperature range of 650-1000 degrees. C. This indirectly confirms that the Gemini and Mercury platings did not heat up above 700 degrees. Apparently, such a temperature was reached only on the surface of the heat shield and in the cylindrical part of the capsule, while in other places it was lower. It is worth explaining that the relation between Rene 41 and titanium alloy in Gemini is not known to me. Presumably, titanium was used only in supporting structures. It is possible that in some models of “Gemini” the entire external surface was lined with beryllium. And yet the skin was heated, although much less than what the revealers think. This is clearly seen in the picture with a capsule in water. Beryllium is a shiny metal, the photo has a dark gray, bluish color. It is obvious that in the ship that left the workshop, the metal surface was polished or painted. The impact of aerodynamic heating, albeit not too strong, still changed it. Someone might ask: “But what about the inscription and the flag of the United States in another photo?” To this you can answer with a question: have you heard of heat-resistant paints? Googling - immediately find the offer of enamel, which withstands 1,000 degrees Celsius.
Heat shield "Gemini" (flying into orbit!)
A natural question arises: why were “Oriental / Sunrises” heated so much? The answer is simple - they were made stupid, because designed for flight and landing in automatic mode. The Soviet scientific school of automatic control deserves the most enthusiastic assessments. However, with the exception of this "East" was primitive. The ship allowed only rotation and braking for de-orbiting, therefore, it was not necessary to choose the optimal descent path. The front hemisphere of the "ball" experienced all the delights of aerodynamic heating to several thousand degrees. Firstly, because of its shape, but secondly, because of the steep decline trajectory compared to Gemini. In the automatic mode, in the absence of active control, it would be too risky to play with the atmosphere in the "pancakes". Therefore, they entered into it as they entered. Gemini, on the other hand, had 16 LREs of orientation and 16 LREs for changing speed in two perpendicular directions, as well as 4 TTRDs for braking space-horizon.ru/articles/39 . Flying in manual control mode, he could afford to enter the atmosphere optimally.
Apparently, S.P. Korolev chose such a way as to overtake the Americans in space at any cost, not allowing the failure. Optimization has been sacrificed reliability. Von Braun, on the other hand, had the opportunity to calmly bring Gemini to mind, taking the leadership of the USSR for granted. The result was an excellent, deeply thought-out apparatus. In addition, they did not spare the money. Nor should we forget that there is almost 5 years between Gemini and Vostok / Rising. As for the "Unions", they are reduced more intelligently, use a heat shield and heat less than their parent. Spooky black color caused by burnt ablative coating. Without it, you can not, because the case is made of aluminum alloys (for the sake of cheapness, since beryllium and titanium are too expensive).
Let's return to the article by A.I. Popov. He claims that 1.3 cu. meters per person in the cabin "Gemini" is too small to fly in a spacesuit. Writes that at 0.4 cu. m more than in the coffin. It may be objected that the cosmo / astronauts were small, since 60s people are generally shorter. Of course - without a gram of excess weight. It means that they were placed, and even this is not so little - 1.3 cubic meters. meters. The box is 2 m long, 1 m wide and 0.65 m high and has such volume. Of course, there was not a box, but an ergonomically designed cabin.
I don’t even want to discuss photos with an antenna on a splash capsule. After all, it is completely obvious that the antenna of the radio beacon did not stick out when the ship was lowered, but was put up after landing. Or maybe someone thinks that "Gemini" taxied straight to the sides of aircraft carriers?
The descent vehicle of the Soyuz
In conclusion, the question of whether Titan II could throw Gemini into a near-earth orbit. Answer S.M. Eremenko is known, but what are his reasons? Quote from his article.
Let's try to solve. The answer to task 1. In addition to the warhead, the Atlas payload included a warhead with a fairing where the warhead was installed. There was also a guidance system, including a gyroscope, its suspension, electric drive, power batteries and rocket control electronics on the active site. Therefore, the total mass of the load is unknown. Where did 1,930 kg come from with a mass of "Mercury" of 1,350 kg? According to data from ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19670005605_1967005605.pdf , the maximum weight of the capsule reached 1,400 kg. Emergency rescue system, which S.M. Eremenko considers a fragment of the rocket, is part of the "Mercury". Even if this is not the case, the estimate of its mass over 500 kg is taken from the ceiling. To accidentally separate from the rocket a capsule weighing 1350 kg will require ~ 10 kg of solid fuel. Presumably, the entire emergency rescue system weighed ~ 100 kg.
As already noted, the distance from the flight range of 14,500 km to “around the ball” is negligible in terms of the required speed. The answer to task 2 is similar. It is worth adding that the Gemini ships weighed in different ways, sometimes 3,600 kg nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/gemini.html . Attempts to catch NASA on a lie in the size of 100 kg look ridiculous. About 40 000 km of the equator - this “argument” is just for younger students.
"Titan II", which "could not" put into orbit "Gemini"
In Appendix B usa-moon.ru/#7the author tried to prove that the Titan-II could not accelerate the Gemini to the 1st cosmic speed of 7.9 km / s. As for Atlas-D, everything is the same, therefore we will discuss only Titan. From the Tsiolkovsky formula, he counted the speed of the last stage after turning off the engines at 9,064.2 m / s, then dividing it by the gravity loss factor K = 1.222 and received 7,417.5 km / s. From which it follows that the alleged "Titan-II" did not give "Gemini" about 500 m / s to enter the near-Earth orbit. The coefficient K = 1.222 is obtained from the data on the actual speed of the Vostok ship and its calculated speed using the Tsiolkovsky formula by dividing the second into the first.
So, elementary calculation in Appendix B is a mathematical trick that has no physical basis. It seemed to the author that he correctly calculated the speed of “Gemini” after separation from “Titan II”, but he hurried to pass on his own mistakes for exposing another “cosmic scam”. The same applies to "Mercury" and "Atlas-D." But even if it is true that the Atlas and Titan-2 ICBMs slightly did not reach the first space velocity, then the missing speed of the Mercury and Gemini added the rotation of the Earth (the sling effect), which gives about 400 m / seconds It is because of this that the rockets take off from west to east.
The network is walking on two more “arguments” against “Gemini” and Mercury ”.
1. Stiffeners across the direction of motion (“not even realized that this increases resistance”).
2. Loose fastening of the cladding sheets on the nuts in loose holes (“it would have blown off, such a bucket would not fly”).
Regarding the first, you can find an explanation above. Namely, there was no task to provide a laminar flow of air, because This increases the heat. Turbulence at the walls of the capsule reduces it. In addition, air turbulence enhances convection plating cooling.
Now about the "bucket". Such an argument that if it were a fake, they would have done everything beautifully and carefully, is unlikely to convince the whistleblowers. Therefore, in essence: "Mercury" and "Gemini" had a heat-absorbing thermal protection. And this means that the metal expanded when heated. Therefore, it was impossible to trim with perfectly fitted joints and joints. Nuts in this sense - the right solution, because they can not tighten, roughly speaking. Beryllium plates (shringles), for example, were not rigidly fixed, so as not to bend. You can read about it here and see photos of books.google.com/books?id=IGMrAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=en&source=gbs_ge_summary_r (pages 608 - 612).
As for what would have been blown off by the flow ... As it was said above, at high speed the front of the shock wave from the edges of the heat-shielding screen almost did not touch the walls. They were as if in an air pocket. This is the question of the oncoming flow of 7,000 m / s, which skeptics like to compare with hurricanes at 200 km / h. They only forget that in the upper atmosphere, where the main inhibition took place, the air is highly discharged. At an altitude of 57 km, its pressure and density are almost 1,200 times lower than above sea level meteo.na.by/meteoprograms/barometer_calculator.shtml . Therefore, here the energy density of the air flow at 7,000 m / s will be exactly the same as the hurricane 200 km / s at the surface of the Earth. But the deceleration of the spacecraft begins even higher (~ 100 km).
And finally, many “Gemini”, returned from space, could be partially disassembled for souvenirs (nuts) and simply unmounted. Did it occur to anyone instead of fantasies about the “scam of Gemini”?
You should not be serious about attempts to expose NASA as a bunch of deceitful imbeciles, but this kind of fabrications are growing in popularity in our society.
Docking "Gemini" 6 and 7
Here is what the doctor of physics and mathematics writes. A.I. Popov in the article www.manonmoon.ru/articles/st103.htm .
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CM. Eremenko in his extensive work [6] relied on the data on the power of the then American missiles and came to the conclusion that they were completely unable to put the ships with the Gemini mass into orbit.
A.K. Kudryavets in article [7] dealt with the question of solving the problem of utilizing natural waste in the ships Mercury (predecessor of Gemini), Gemini and Apollo and came to the conclusion that the systems described by NASA were completely unsuitable for performing the tasks in orbital flight .
A.I. Popov [8] studied NASA photographs reflecting the suspiciously vigorous well-being of crew members of Gemini 5 and 7 directly after returning to Earth after supposedly very long flights at that time (8 and 14 days, respectively).
He in the article [9] dealt with the question of how 20 “astronauts” from all ten “Gemini” (together with a dozen of the same “astronauts” from “Merkuriyev” and “Apollo”) managed after hundreds of hours of their stay, supposedly on near-earth orbits not see the stars above the day half of the Earth?
Let's start with the disposal of natural waste. Astronaut consumption "Gemini" was very limited. With a low mobility of food, a lot is not required, and water gave out a special gun in portions of 14 grams space-horizon.ru/articles/39 . With a stock of drinking tank of 7.2 liters, it was replenished by condensation of exhaled vapors at the rate of up to 227 g / hour. This means that for 14 days (the longest flight to Gemini, which usually flew from 1 to 4), astronauts could produce no more than 7.2 liters of urine. A glass a day, almost everything else came out with steam from the mouth. Otherwise, as is easy to understand, they would suffer from dehydration. To collect the selection within 10 liters of special tricks is not necessary. Contrary to the jokes about the "super-duper diapers" usa-moon.ru/ # 7 , it is not necessary to keep it inside the spacesuits. Nothing prevented pumping waste from the intermediate tank into a separate tank. Naturally, all this was not too pleasant. It is physically difficult to fly into space even now, and the first cosmo / astronauts were real heroes!
Now about the “suspiciously vigorous state of health” of the “Gemini” astronauts after landing. These ships did not fly for a long time (maximum 14 days), so the effect of weightlessness on muscles and bones was insignificant. The fact that the first Soviet cosmonauts, after short flights, sometimes felt bad, can be explained by the difficult landing conditions. "Gemini" sat on the manual control, and "East" on the automation. This means that our modes of entry into the atmosphere were more stringent overload (for reasons of reliability). The braking of the descent vehicle "Vostok" occurred with an overload of up to 9g, and Gemini experienced only 3g. This alone is enough to make Americans feel much better. In addition, cosmonauts ejected from the Vostok, which added "pleasant" sensations, and in the case of a landing in the "ball" they received a very sensitive blow. There was nothing like that in Gemini.
Americans breathed pure oxygen, and our air, like on Earth. Presumably, this could also affect well-being. The fact that “Gemini” is cramped compared to the “East” in the conditions of a short flight did not matter much. The astronaut relieved the weightlessness of such unpleasant sensations as squeezing the coccyx and numbing legs, and they had the opportunity to tinker in the cockpit to disperse blood and even remove the spacesuit. The conditions in the Soyuz are more comfortable, but after these ships, after long-term tuning, long flights took place, so comparing them with Gemini according to the well-being of the crews is incorrect. And finally, you need to take into account the American mentality - they are not taken to be photographed with a sour face. It is possible that the astronauts were given a couple of hours to recover, before taking pictures with the duty smiles.
It is very strange to read that they "have managed ... not to see the stars above the diurnal half of the Earth." In sunlight, the stars cannot be seen due to their negligible brightness, since pupils and diaphragms are narrowed! For this reason, astronauts on the Moon did not see the stars, and the cameras did not take pictures of them, which also excites debunkers of the "lunar conspiracy."
Neil Armstrong (the same one!) And David Scott in a Gemini-8 capsule after a splash down on March 16, 1966
Now to the works of S.M. Eremenko, who in the “extensive work [6]” usa-moon.ru/#7, declares the inability of the American missiles of that time to bring the ships with the Gemini mass into orbit.
The author tries to convince the reader that “Mercury” and “Gemini” could not fly to near-earth orbit, since were too light compared to the "East". A strange argument, given that our ships and American ships had completely different ideologies. The USSR created a powerful R-7 rocket, so I could not afford to minimize the useful weight. The United States at the time of the first truly suborbital flights had poor Redstone, so they had to fight for every kilogram. For example, in “Mercury”, expensive and heat-resistant beryllium, which is one and a half times lighter than aluminum, was actively used. The heat shield and the lining of the upper, cylindrical part of the capsule were made from it. The body of titanium alloy also reduced the weight, but increased the cost of the device. Soviet ships were cheaper, simpler and more durable, but this does not mean that no other design was unsuitable for flights to orbit.
The author contradicts himself: “by April 1958, research was carried out in the USSR, which made it possible to establish: in order to accommodate a person on board the spacecraft, the necessary service and scientific equipment, its mass should be about 5,500 kg”. How, then, did the Vostok fly with a mass of 4,730 kg? It should be understood that in systemic, technical problems, preliminary assessments are for guidance only. The source of truth is experience, not theoretical research. Moreover, if the single capsule “Mercury”, which made only 4 orbital flights with a maximum duration of 34 hours, was 3.5 times lighter than the two-seater “Vostok”, then Gemini with a mass of ~ 3,700 kg was not that different.
Atlas "Mercury" threw "Atlas-D" into orbital flights. It was far from the “Redstone”, but an intercontinental, ballistic missile capable of flying about 14,000 km. The author is deeply mistaken when he draws a line between the ICBM and the carrier of the orbiter, referring to the equator length of 40,000 km. The dependence of the flight range on the speed of the last stage is not linear. The article extremal-mechanics.org/archives/9573 provides calculations that show that at a speed of 7.65 km / s and a near-zero pitch angle at an engine shut-off altitude of 200 km, an ICBM warhead will fly 10,000 km along the Earth’s surface and fall ( even without taking into account aerodynamic drag). If we increase its speed by only ~ 250 m / s, it will go into near-earth orbit. Here such nonlinearity!
In the combat version Atlas-D had a warhead weighing up to 1,680 kg and carrying a thermonuclear warhead. The mass saving on the “Mercury” (1,350 kg) was sufficient to add a few hundred m / s of velocity. Modes of operation and load of the rocket can vary near the nominal, so scuffling around a few hundred kg of weight and m / s speed looks frivolous. We will come back to this issue when discussing Titan II, which, according to S.M. Eremenko, could not send "Gemini" into orbit.
"Atlas-D" with "Mercury", which he "could not" lift into orbit
Another "argument" causes stormy delight among believers in the lunar conspiracy. It consists in the fact that "Mercury" and "Gemini" could not return from orbit without ablative thermal protection (which was in the "East"). This is another fantasy based on school physics. Indeed, with laminar airflow, the skin can warm up to several thousand degrees. That is why the ICBM warheads at entry into the atmosphere slow down so as not to burn and not to collapse, like meteorites. Depending on the design, they turn around the base of the cone in the direction of flight or have a blunt nose fairing. This creates a compression zone in front of the warhead, which slows it down to a relatively safe ~ 3 km / s at the entrance to the troposphere (where it does not have time to burn). In this regard, it is worth noting that the power of aerodynamic heating in the stratosphere is not proportional to the square of velocity, but to its cube (see formula (1) in extremal-mechanics.org/archives/9573 ).
The shock wave, which is formed before the warhead, qualitatively changes the flow mode, which significantly reduces air heating. Everything is simple - the kinetic energy of the warhead is not transformed into thermal energy (its same), but into the internal energy of compressed air with subsequent transfer to the shock wave. Heating of course remains, but becomes much less. The fact is that the flow turbulence during flow reduces the tangential component of its velocity relative to the surface, and also contributes to the convective transfer of heat back into the atmosphere.
The same thing happened with the capsules of "Mercury" and "Gemini" when returning from orbit! With one amendment, they entered along considerably shallower trajectories than the ICBM warheads. What does it change? The power of aerodynamic heating is proportional to the density of air. Since the capsule significantly loses its speed in the upper atmosphere, heating and mechanical loads are insignificant when entering the denser layers. As noted above, this loss of mechanical energy occurs not so much due to the growth of heat, but rather due to the formation of a shock wave around the apparatus. This is what a heat shield means!
So, the Mercury and Gemini gently descending from orbit warmed up far less dramatically than the revealers paint. But how exactly? Referring to the conference materials on beryllium, which was conducted by the United States Department of Defense in 1970 books.google.com/books?id=IGMrAAAAYAAJ&printsec==== the cohre&hl=en&source= gbs_ge_summary_r . The report from the company McDonell-Douglas explains the use of beryllium in the spacecraft developed by it. On page 610 it is said that the temperature on the surface of the Mercury capsule did not exceed 1,300 degrees Fahrenheit, i.e., about 700 degrees. C. Enough to melt aluminum, but for beryllium with a melting point of 1,500 degrees. C and titanium with its 1,700 is a cold compress. Now I understand why the ablative protection is not needed, and the “Gemini” capsules do not look badly burnt?
Although 700 degrees. C - not so little. The heat shield of the heavier Gemini may have gotten a bit more. Unlike the pure beryllium shield of “Mercury”, it was covered with a self-ruptured coating of plastics impregnated with phenolic resins and some other rubbish. This is an intermediate solution between heat-absorbing and ablative thermal protection. Therefore, here S.M. Eremenko hurried with the conclusion.
Exposing drawing from the article SM. Yeremenko
Now let's look at the pictures. Left is not as far from the truth as it seems to the author. There was actually no plasma flowing around the “Gemini” in the figure to the right. air with a temperature of several hundred degrees can, with a stretch, be called plasma. What is drawn there is similar to the front of a shock wave that slides along the walls, practically not interacting with them. That is why the “Gemini” and “Mercury” paneling did not heat up much. From the front of the shock wave got the upper, cylindrical part of the capsule. He did not flow around it as in the figure, but fell on the surface at an acute angle. This is the most vulnerable part of the capsules, which has been completely lined with beryllium plates. Its high thermal conductivity (4 times more than that of steel), corrosion and thermal resistance ensured stable operation during descent in the atmosphere without a significant increase in temperature on the surface. A sloping path also contributed to the success of this heat-absorbing protection.
Strictly speaking, the tangent of the angle between the longitudinal axis of the capsule and the shock wave front diffracted at the edges of the heat shield is equal to the ratio of the speed of sound to the speed of the capsule. If we take an angle at the apex of a cone of 45 degrees by the eye, the flow shown in the figure on the right corresponds to the speed of the capsule 2–2.5 Mach. At higher speeds, the front of the shock wave does not even approach the surface of the cone. Between it and the walls a pocket is formed, protecting them from overheating. Moreover, this air gap organizes convection heat from the cone, which comes from the cylindrical part of the capsule. The protective screen also played the role of an absorber of this heat (with a beryllium base from Gemini and purely from it from Mercury).
That is why the surface of the cone was coated with not expensive beryllium, but with a steel-nickel alloy, Rene 41, operating in the temperature range of 650-1000 degrees. C. This indirectly confirms that the Gemini and Mercury platings did not heat up above 700 degrees. Apparently, such a temperature was reached only on the surface of the heat shield and in the cylindrical part of the capsule, while in other places it was lower. It is worth explaining that the relation between Rene 41 and titanium alloy in Gemini is not known to me. Presumably, titanium was used only in supporting structures. It is possible that in some models of “Gemini” the entire external surface was lined with beryllium. And yet the skin was heated, although much less than what the revealers think. This is clearly seen in the picture with a capsule in water. Beryllium is a shiny metal, the photo has a dark gray, bluish color. It is obvious that in the ship that left the workshop, the metal surface was polished or painted. The impact of aerodynamic heating, albeit not too strong, still changed it. Someone might ask: “But what about the inscription and the flag of the United States in another photo?” To this you can answer with a question: have you heard of heat-resistant paints? Googling - immediately find the offer of enamel, which withstands 1,000 degrees Celsius.
Heat shield "Gemini" (flying into orbit!)
A natural question arises: why were “Oriental / Sunrises” heated so much? The answer is simple - they were made stupid, because designed for flight and landing in automatic mode. The Soviet scientific school of automatic control deserves the most enthusiastic assessments. However, with the exception of this "East" was primitive. The ship allowed only rotation and braking for de-orbiting, therefore, it was not necessary to choose the optimal descent path. The front hemisphere of the "ball" experienced all the delights of aerodynamic heating to several thousand degrees. Firstly, because of its shape, but secondly, because of the steep decline trajectory compared to Gemini. In the automatic mode, in the absence of active control, it would be too risky to play with the atmosphere in the "pancakes". Therefore, they entered into it as they entered. Gemini, on the other hand, had 16 LREs of orientation and 16 LREs for changing speed in two perpendicular directions, as well as 4 TTRDs for braking space-horizon.ru/articles/39 . Flying in manual control mode, he could afford to enter the atmosphere optimally.
Apparently, S.P. Korolev chose such a way as to overtake the Americans in space at any cost, not allowing the failure. Optimization has been sacrificed reliability. Von Braun, on the other hand, had the opportunity to calmly bring Gemini to mind, taking the leadership of the USSR for granted. The result was an excellent, deeply thought-out apparatus. In addition, they did not spare the money. Nor should we forget that there is almost 5 years between Gemini and Vostok / Rising. As for the "Unions", they are reduced more intelligently, use a heat shield and heat less than their parent. Spooky black color caused by burnt ablative coating. Without it, you can not, because the case is made of aluminum alloys (for the sake of cheapness, since beryllium and titanium are too expensive).
Let's return to the article by A.I. Popov. He claims that 1.3 cu. meters per person in the cabin "Gemini" is too small to fly in a spacesuit. Writes that at 0.4 cu. m more than in the coffin. It may be objected that the cosmo / astronauts were small, since 60s people are generally shorter. Of course - without a gram of excess weight. It means that they were placed, and even this is not so little - 1.3 cubic meters. meters. The box is 2 m long, 1 m wide and 0.65 m high and has such volume. Of course, there was not a box, but an ergonomically designed cabin.
I don’t even want to discuss photos with an antenna on a splash capsule. After all, it is completely obvious that the antenna of the radio beacon did not stick out when the ship was lowered, but was put up after landing. Or maybe someone thinks that "Gemini" taxied straight to the sides of aircraft carriers?
The descent vehicle of the Soyuz
In conclusion, the question of whether Titan II could throw Gemini into a near-earth orbit. Answer S.M. Eremenko is known, but what are his reasons? Quote from his article.
Now independently solve two problems for primary school age.
Problem number 1: The Atlas D ICBM was designed to deliver a W-38 thermonuclear warhead weighing 1397 kilograms to a distance of 14,000 km. Question: “If a capsule with an astronaut weighing 1930 kg is installed on an Atlas D rocket, will it fall further or closer?”
Problem number 2: "ICBM" Titan 2 "was intended for the delivery of the Mk-6 warhead, weighing 3,690 kg. at a distance of 15,000 km. Question: "If a Jemeny capsule with two astronauts weighing 3,800 kg is installed on the Titan 2 rocket, will it fall further or closer?" For reference: the circumference of the globe - 40,000 km.
Let's try to solve. The answer to task 1. In addition to the warhead, the Atlas payload included a warhead with a fairing where the warhead was installed. There was also a guidance system, including a gyroscope, its suspension, electric drive, power batteries and rocket control electronics on the active site. Therefore, the total mass of the load is unknown. Where did 1,930 kg come from with a mass of "Mercury" of 1,350 kg? According to data from ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19670005605_1967005605.pdf , the maximum weight of the capsule reached 1,400 kg. Emergency rescue system, which S.M. Eremenko considers a fragment of the rocket, is part of the "Mercury". Even if this is not the case, the estimate of its mass over 500 kg is taken from the ceiling. To accidentally separate from the rocket a capsule weighing 1350 kg will require ~ 10 kg of solid fuel. Presumably, the entire emergency rescue system weighed ~ 100 kg.
As already noted, the distance from the flight range of 14,500 km to “around the ball” is negligible in terms of the required speed. The answer to task 2 is similar. It is worth adding that the Gemini ships weighed in different ways, sometimes 3,600 kg nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/gemini.html . Attempts to catch NASA on a lie in the size of 100 kg look ridiculous. About 40 000 km of the equator - this “argument” is just for younger students.
"Titan II", which "could not" put into orbit "Gemini"
In Appendix B usa-moon.ru/#7the author tried to prove that the Titan-II could not accelerate the Gemini to the 1st cosmic speed of 7.9 km / s. As for Atlas-D, everything is the same, therefore we will discuss only Titan. From the Tsiolkovsky formula, he counted the speed of the last stage after turning off the engines at 9,064.2 m / s, then dividing it by the gravity loss factor K = 1.222 and received 7,417.5 km / s. From which it follows that the alleged "Titan-II" did not give "Gemini" about 500 m / s to enter the near-Earth orbit. The coefficient K = 1.222 is obtained from the data on the actual speed of the Vostok ship and its calculated speed using the Tsiolkovsky formula by dividing the second into the first.
So, elementary calculation in Appendix B is a mathematical trick that has no physical basis. It seemed to the author that he correctly calculated the speed of “Gemini” after separation from “Titan II”, but he hurried to pass on his own mistakes for exposing another “cosmic scam”. The same applies to "Mercury" and "Atlas-D." But even if it is true that the Atlas and Titan-2 ICBMs slightly did not reach the first space velocity, then the missing speed of the Mercury and Gemini added the rotation of the Earth (the sling effect), which gives about 400 m / seconds It is because of this that the rockets take off from west to east.
The network is walking on two more “arguments” against “Gemini” and Mercury ”.
1. Stiffeners across the direction of motion (“not even realized that this increases resistance”).
2. Loose fastening of the cladding sheets on the nuts in loose holes (“it would have blown off, such a bucket would not fly”).
Regarding the first, you can find an explanation above. Namely, there was no task to provide a laminar flow of air, because This increases the heat. Turbulence at the walls of the capsule reduces it. In addition, air turbulence enhances convection plating cooling.
Now about the "bucket". Such an argument that if it were a fake, they would have done everything beautifully and carefully, is unlikely to convince the whistleblowers. Therefore, in essence: "Mercury" and "Gemini" had a heat-absorbing thermal protection. And this means that the metal expanded when heated. Therefore, it was impossible to trim with perfectly fitted joints and joints. Nuts in this sense - the right solution, because they can not tighten, roughly speaking. Beryllium plates (shringles), for example, were not rigidly fixed, so as not to bend. You can read about it here and see photos of books.google.com/books?id=IGMrAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=en&source=gbs_ge_summary_r (pages 608 - 612).
As for what would have been blown off by the flow ... As it was said above, at high speed the front of the shock wave from the edges of the heat-shielding screen almost did not touch the walls. They were as if in an air pocket. This is the question of the oncoming flow of 7,000 m / s, which skeptics like to compare with hurricanes at 200 km / h. They only forget that in the upper atmosphere, where the main inhibition took place, the air is highly discharged. At an altitude of 57 km, its pressure and density are almost 1,200 times lower than above sea level meteo.na.by/meteoprograms/barometer_calculator.shtml . Therefore, here the energy density of the air flow at 7,000 m / s will be exactly the same as the hurricane 200 km / s at the surface of the Earth. But the deceleration of the spacecraft begins even higher (~ 100 km).
And finally, many “Gemini”, returned from space, could be partially disassembled for souvenirs (nuts) and simply unmounted. Did it occur to anyone instead of fantasies about the “scam of Gemini”?
You should not be serious about attempts to expose NASA as a bunch of deceitful imbeciles, but this kind of fabrications are growing in popularity in our society.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/392937/
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