What if the Space Race took place in the 1900s?

[HebaruSan]

I don't know why I'm still pondering this, but one further suggestion:

A good story needs a protagonist, an antagonist, and a struggle. Since it sounds like you've already selected the UK for the former, what about replacing Otto von Bismarck with a more Hitlerian figure in your timeline? Replace his skillful navigation of political dynamics with a more naked and ruthless will to power, and basically move the Third Reich one or two generations earlier. All the same cultural factors should be there to use (vaunted German discipline/engineering, anti-Semitism, etc.), but in altered form (economic strength instead of crisis?), so there would be all sorts of interesting echoes and contrasts with real history.

The story's crisis then begins with a nuclear rocket attack on Paris (e.g.). It turns out that Otto von Hitlermarck had diverted a substantial fraction of Germany's GDP to a black R&D budget. Immediately all the great powers scramble to master this technology. An altered WW1/WW2 hybrid ensues and replaces the cold war, and all of the "first man in space" accomplishments are made that much more tense by the fact that you might be blown out of the sky at any moment while you're trying to aim a giant space cannon at Berlin.

[DerekL1963]

27 minutes ago, sevenperforce said:

15 hours ago, fredinno said:

Well, Missles were not useful for military use until nukes were made.

Are we just ignoring the V1?

No, we're not ignoring the V1.    It pretty much proves what fredinno says - before nukes, missiles weren't that useful for military purposes.

[sevenperforce]

16 minutes ago, DerekL1963 said:

No, we're not ignoring the V1.    It pretty much proves what fredinno says - before nukes, missiles weren't that useful for military purposes.

IIRC, the lack of efficacy associated with the V1 had less to do with inherent limitations of rockets and more to do with Britain's excellent counterespionage efforts that effectively kept the Germans blind to where their rockets were falling.

[DerekL1963]

4 hours ago, sevenperforce said:

5 hours ago, DerekL1963 said:

No, we're not ignoring the V1.    It pretty much proves what fredinno says - before nukes, missiles weren't that useful for military purposes.

IIRC, the lack of efficacy associated with the V1 had less to do with inherent limitations of rockets and more to do with Britain's excellent counterespionage efforts that effectively kept the Germans blind to where their rockets were falling.

V1 wasn't even a rocket...   it was a cruise missile.   And even without those efforts by the British, it's CEP was still on the order of "somewhere in the county, or maybe the adjacent county" (between 7 and 19 miles).   That's simply insufficient for military purposes.

[fredinno]

23 hours ago, ChrisSpace said:

On 3/3/2016 at 7:46 PM, fredinno said:

Well, Missles were not useful for military use until nukes were made.

Well, not necessarily. There are many other types of ICBMs that could have seen development.

No, Missiles sucked because they lacked good guidance, and lacked enough power/$ until nukes were made. That's why I started out by saying it would have been impossible until nukes were developed back in the PM 'thread'.

23 hours ago, ChrisSpace said:

Okay, how about I set some actual rules:

 

No technologies that require a POD before 1700.

No nukes.

No advanced computers.

Nothing developed after 1950 in OTL.

Something in space before 1895.

Some kind of manned orbital spaceflight before 1905.

Manned Luna and Aurora landings before 1935.

No cancelling any major wars.

At least 2 major spacefaring nations outside Europe (probably America and Japan or something).

Ok, I'll add that to the main post, with a few modifications.

 

11 hours ago, insert_name said:

I belive that due to the fact that Bellona would be visible orbiting mars, the heliocentric model would have been disproved sooner, making the scientific revolution happen sooner

Yeah, I think we decided to ignore that due to it being a pain in the a** to deal with, changing multiple centuries (Bellona would likely be very close, approaching the Roche Limit, and beginning to crack like Phobos). It's difficult enough changing 2 world wars.

12 hours ago, HebaruSan said:

I guess it's worth asking what the point of this exercise is. I assumed it wasn't to create a setting with full 1960s tech and call it "1900" arbitrarily. Usually a story in Victorian times involves heavy, bulky machines made out of iron, wood, and brass belching out soot clouds, driven by mechanisms made from big gears and levers, which has a "cool factor" if it's doing something we know needs at least aluminum and vacuum tubes in real life.

Is technological development supposed to be accelerated? Or is earlier tech supposed to get the job done with hand-waving because steampunk is fun? I see some of each so far, and the feedback would probably be more helpful if the intended direction was more clear.

The point of this exercise is because @ChrisSpace is acting a bit stubborn and wants his alternate solar system project to begin space operations at the steampunk era. Ask him for more details, not me. I'm the vessel.

On 3/3/2016 at 9:28 PM, kerbiloid said:

Typical level of 1905 engineering looks like:

Not very close to a rocket engine of V-2 which had required efforts of whole Germany industry.

Gas welding quality is far from arc welding, though. Not that they would can into space.

Typical level. I just showed you that arc welding existed in 1900.

17 hours ago, lugge said:

When you have your 1895-space-object and your 1905-man-in-space, THIS WILL have an impact on WW1 and WW2.

The events and technology would have been a game changer, changing all 20th century history.

I do not say there would have been no major wars. But they would be drastically different, maybe shorter, maybe more loses in WW1. Maybe different allys. Depending on who won the space race.

Consider this: if a huge ICBM, maybe even nuclear, had burnt some cities in WW1, there would be no WW2 because the cold war would have started right after WW1.

How? I'm not an expert on alternate history, again.

12 hours ago, wumpus said:

Two issues: going supersonic and maintaining control after going supersonic.

Going supersonic.  No brainer, just add thrust.  Bullets were going supersonic in 1900 after all... You might find out that your control fins are a bad idea (eject them before going supersonic?) unless you know the one weird trick about SST aircraft...

Maintaining control.  You can only use fins for guidance past the sound barrier if you know about the cross-sectional rule.  Either way, you will have to be doing "proper rocket science" and balancing on your nozzle when you exit the atmosphere.  I remember hearing that the Germans knew about the cross-sectional rule during WWII (the V2 appears to follow it), while the war ended (and the X-1 had already flown) before Kelly Johnson knew why the P-38 lightning had control issues at speed.

A bit of googling has let me down.  I have no idea if Goddard produced rockets that broke the sound barrier.  Then again, I don't think Goddard ever dealt with control (other than straight up).  He may have been willing to simply let the get exactly on course from 0-500mph, then hopefully maintain course after that (spin stabalization should have been relatively easy).  Maintaining a gravity turn would be considerably more difficult, although since you need control out of the atmosphere, it might not matter so much if you switch to vector control inside the atmosphere after you approach the sound barrier.  - Note: In the "beat sputnik" thread, I assumed that the ancients wouldn't have a prayer of building a controllable nozzle (although the modern designers obviously have full modeling/wind tunnel apparatus), so it would essentially be the other way around: 1900 designers would have to build proper "rocket only" controls much earlier than Von Braun.

And yes, this is one tiny bit of rocket science the 1900 engineers need to know.  Probably one of the smallest details.  I'd really recommend having it happen on Kerbal (which lets you have proper steam-punk designs instead of "futuristic 1940s designs").

So, would such a 1900s rocket be able to maintain control back in that era at supersonic speeds?

[fredinno]

10 hours ago, HebaruSan said:

I don't know why I'm still pondering this, but one further suggestion:

A good story needs a protagonist, an antagonist, and a struggle. Since it sounds like you've already selected the UK for the former, what about replacing Otto von Bismarck with a more Hitlerian figure in your timeline? Replace his skillful navigation of political dynamics with a more naked and ruthless will to power, and basically move the Third Reich one or two generations earlier. All the same cultural factors should be there to use (vaunted German discipline/engineering, anti-Semitism, etc.), but in altered form (economic strength instead of crisis?), so there would be all sorts of interesting echoes and contrasts with real history.

The story's crisis then begins with a nuclear rocket attack on Paris (e.g.). It turns out that Otto von Hitlermarck had diverted a substantial fraction of Germany's GDP to a black R&D budget. Immediately all the great powers scramble to master this technology. An altered WW1/WW2 hybrid ensues and replaces the cold war, and all of the "first man in space" accomplishments are made that much more tense by the fact that you might be blown out of the sky at any moment while you're trying to aim a giant space cannon at Berlin.

Only problem was that Bismark dies in 1898, at 83. Even if he lived and maintained power for another decade, he would still die in 1908, a time when the "space race" would still be going on. 93 is pretty darn old, even today.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_von_Bismarck#Fall_from_power

Are you suggesting I make him like Palpatine?

 

[RizzoTheRat]

21 hours ago, wumpus said:

Google the Paris gun.  Same effect, lower cost (for non-nuclear ICBMs).

7kg warhead compared to 1000kg in the V2, and again not accurate, so not really that similar to an ICBM. 

[wumpus]

7 hours ago, RizzoTheRat said:

7kg warhead compared to 1000kg in the V2, and again not accurate, so not really that similar to an ICBM. 

Are you seriously suggesting that the V2 was more accurate than the Paris gun?  Both could roughly hit the city they targeted, nothing more (no idea what a V2 designed to attack Paris at close range would look like, presumably any increase in technology would allow more effective bombers than throwaway missiles for such short range).   Also, the 100kg shell did as least as much damage as anything it contained.  Finally, the V2's primary effect on the war was to increase British morale (or at least resolve).  Generally speaking, terror campaigns such as that cost more to the bomber than the bombed (war over Britain*, US bombing Viet Nam) and would be a disaster in a war of attrition like the Great War.

* the terror war against the English population.  The original attacks against the RAF were dangerously effective.  However the V2 simply didn't have the accuracy to directly attack the RAF and could only attack London (or other large cities).

16 hours ago, fredinno said:

So, would such a 1900s rocket be able to maintain control back in that era at supersonic speeds?

- Edit: missed this: The point of this exercise is because @ChrisSpace is acting a bit stubborn and wants his alternate solar system project to begin space operations at the steampunk era. Ask him for more details, not me. I'm the vessel.

I doubt it.  Consider the fuel pumps: the Wright brothers could build a 12 horsepower motor to power their plane, and they knew that was the technological limit between flying and not flying (I think they believed they needed half that, but it turned out that 12 hp needed a really stiff headwind and a copy 100 years after the fact couldn't get airborne without that wind).  The V-2 had a 580hp turbine.  I don't think the Wright brothers had a prayer of going suborbital, let alone to orbit.  The control issue was just an offshoot of trying to build an orbital rocket with no idea how aerodynamics worked.  In general, expect insurmountable issues in every direction (essentially requiring 40+ years of development).

On entire reason of the thread.   As you may have noticed, the technology differences are just too extreme.  When it's steam engine time you get steam engines, not rocket engines (see the differences between the Wright brother's engines with Van Braun's.  If you [or ChrisSpace] are changing the entire solar system, you either start with 1940s/1950s tech (in 1940/50 or magically transported to whatever era, Roman would make as much sense) or you shrink the planet to Kerbin size and allow the Baltimore Gun club to fire men to the moon orbit (presumably getting ~1600m/s from the gun itself and another 1600m/s from rockets in the projectile).

Edited March 4, 2016 by wumpus

[fredinno]

10 hours ago, wumpus said:

Are you seriously suggesting that the V2 was more accurate than the Paris gun?  Both could roughly hit the city they targeted, nothing more (no idea what a V2 designed to attack Paris at close range would look like, presumably any increase in technology would allow more effective bombers than throwaway missiles for such short range).   Also, the 100kg shell did as least as much damage as anything it contained.  Finally, the V2's primary effect on the war was to increase British morale (or at least resolve).  Generally speaking, terror campaigns such as that cost more to the bomber than the bombed (war over Britain*, US bombing Viet Nam) and would be a disaster in a war of attrition like the Great War.

* the terror war against the English population.  The original attacks against the RAF were dangerously effective.  However the V2 simply didn't have the accuracy to directly attack the RAF and could only attack London (or other large cities).

I doubt it.  Consider the fuel pumps: the Wright brothers could build a 12 horsepower motor to power their plane, and they knew that was the technological limit between flying and not flying (I think they believed they needed half that, but it turned out that 12 hp needed a really stiff headwind and a copy 100 years after the fact couldn't get airborne without that wind).  The V-2 had a 580hp turbine.  I don't think the Wright brothers had a prayer of going suborbital, let alone to orbit.  The control issue was just an offshoot of trying to build an orbital rocket with no idea how aerodynamics worked.  In general, expect insurmountable issues in every direction (essentially requiring 40+ years of development).

On entire reason of the thread.   As you may have noticed, the technology differences are just too extreme.  When it's steam engine time you get steam engines, not rocket engines (see the differences between the Wright brother's engines with Van Braun's.  If you [or ChrisSpace] are changing the entire solar system, you either start with 1940s/1950s tech (in 1940/50 or magically transported to whatever era, Roman would make as much sense) or you shrink the planet to Kerbin size and allow the Baltimore Gun club to fire men to the moon orbit (presumably getting ~1600m/s from the gun itself and another 1600m/s from rockets in the projectile).

Would Mars gravity be enough?

[RizzoTheRat]

On 3/4/2016 at 3:44 PM, wumpus said:

Are you seriously suggesting that the V2 was more accurate than the Paris gun?  Both could roughly hit the city they targeted, nothing more (no idea what a V2 designed to attack Paris at close range would look like, presumably any increase in technology would allow more effective bombers than throwaway missiles for such short range).   Also, the 100kg shell did as least as much damage as anything it contained.  Finally, the V2's primary effect on the war was to increase British morale (or at least resolve).  Generally speaking, terror campaigns such as that cost more to the bomber than the bombed (war over Britain*, US bombing Viet Nam) and would be a disaster in a war of attrition like the Great War.

* the terror war against the English population.  The original attacks against the RAF were dangerously effective.  However the V2 simply didn't have the accuracy to directly attack the RAF and could only attack London (or other large cities).

No, I'm saying that a 1000kg warhead on rocket with the kind of guidance system that would be needed to get manned craft in to orbit would be a much more effective weapon of war than an unguided long range artillery shell, and that you don't need nukes for missiles to make sense.  Precision fires is a central concept to modern warfare, and the technology advances required to put a man in to orbit would also enable equipment that would massively change the conduct of WW1 and WW1

[fredinno]

2 hours ago, RizzoTheRat said:

No, I'm saying that a 1000kg warhead on rocket with the kind of guidance system that would be needed to get manned craft in to orbit would be a much more effective weapon of war than an unguided long range artillery shell, and that you don't need nukes for missiles to make sense.  Precision fires is a central concept to modern warfare, and the technology advances required to put a man in to orbit would also enable equipment that would massively change the conduct of WW1 and WW1

I think he's saying the guidance systems were not invented back then necessary to make missiles effective weapons.

[DerekL1963]

6 hours ago, RizzoTheRat said:

No, I'm saying that a 1000kg warhead on rocket with the kind of guidance system that would be needed to get manned craft in to orbit would be a much more effective weapon of war than an unguided long range artillery shell, and that you don't need nukes for missiles to make sense.

Something which can be seen by all the precision guided long range conventional missiles deployed...  or not, since pretty much only one was ever deployed (Pershing II) and it's precision came from radar rather than inertial guidance.  In fact, that's true of all 'precision' guided conventional weapons - the precision comes not from inertial guidance, but from terminal guidance using either external sources (GPS, ARMs), or non-inertial sensors (lasers, TV cameras, radar).  The inertial system is only present to stabilize the weapon and to steer it into the 'basket' where the non inertial system takes over for the terminal phase.   Inertial guidance, even the most expensive and sensitive and modern systems, simply isn't accurate enough for conventional explosives.   And you can get a man into orbit with a system good to only a few inches per second - which is hopelessly inaccurate for all but a fair sized nuke.

 

6 hours ago, RizzoTheRat said:

Precision fires is a central concept to modern warfare, and the technology advances required to put a man in to orbit would also enable equipment that would massively change the conduct of WW1 and WW1

Precision artillery fire today depends on technology that isn't required for putting a man into orbit.    While there are some technologies that would change the conduct of warfare, none of them will do to any huge degree - the modern battlefield is a child of the microprocessor revolution, not the space program.

[RainDreamer]

19 hours ago, fredinno said:

I think he's saying the guidance systems were not invented back then necessary to make missiles effective weapons.

I assume we would have this instead:

 

[fredinno]

11 hours ago, RainDreamer said:

I assume we would have this instead:

 

That's not useful for space, though.

[ChrisSpace]

On ‎3‎/‎3‎/‎2016 at 7:54 PM, RizzoTheRat said:

Fair enough for your storyline but I still think the difference in available technology would have a huge impact on how those wars were fought.  Just look at the different air power and armour made between WW1 and WW2 as it is.  I reckon there could be a fascinating side story there as an alternate history of the wars.

How the wars are fought may change, but the reasoning behind the wars, and to some extent the duration of the wars, would stay the same.

On ‎3‎/‎3‎/‎2016 at 11:21 PM, lugge said:

When you have your 1895-space-object and your 1905-man-in-space, THIS WILL have an impact on WW1 and WW2.

I never said it wouldn't.

On ‎3‎/‎3‎/‎2016 at 5:25 AM, insert_name said:

I belive that due to the fact that Bellona would be visible orbiting mars, the heliocentric model would have been disproved sooner, making the scientific revolution happen sooner

I'll take not of that.

Also, interesting discussion about missile accuracies, but how is that relevant?

[fredinno]

5 minutes ago, ChrisSpace said:

How the wars are fought may change, but the reasoning behind the wars, and to some extent the duration of the wars, would stay the same.

I never said it wouldn't.

I'll take not of that.

Also, interesting discussion about missile accuracies, but how is that relevant?

The discussion about missile accuracies isn't really all that relevant, TBH.

I had an idea to turn Bellona into a ring in the Alt. Solar System Thread. Look there.

 

The main problem was that we knew very little about aeronautics and how flight worked- let alone the supersonic flight required for rockets.

[ChrisSpace]

2 hours ago, fredinno said:

The main problem was that we knew very little about aeronautics and how flight worked- let alone the supersonic flight required for rockets.

Then how could such knowledge be acquired earlier?

[fredinno]

38 minutes ago, ChrisSpace said:

Then how could such knowledge be acquired earlier?

You'd likely have to bring airplanes into the field earlier. Unfortunately, internal combustion engines were needed, which were invented in 1876, and first commercialized in 1885. The full calculations on the basics of how much you needed are not made until 1889, and the first wind tunnel for aerodynamics research was completed in 1871. I would say we can push it up 10 years at the most, from 1905 to 1895 due to required development time. This would only get us to the point where the first military airplane would be developed, but that was pushed heavily by WW1.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airplane#Early_powered_flights

https://www.quora.com/Why-did-it-take-so-long-to-invent-manned-heavier-than-air-flight

So likely not much, unless you want to take men on each sounding rocket flight, something that would likely make sounding rockets unviable.

[sevenperforce]

Could hybrid rockets have been used in place of ICEs for earlier manned controlled HTA flight?

[wumpus]

On 3/4/2016 at 0:35 AM, fredinno said:

Would Mars gravity be enough? : Note.  Thanks to the wonderful new forum software, it doesn't appear that I can reply any other way but in this quote. 

My guess is is that it Mars would work fine, but am really gasping at straws at 1900s rocket science.  Since Mars has an escape velocity similar to Mars and less atmospheric issues, it would at least be plausible for a steampunk to orbit vehicle on Mars.

[Emperor of the Titan Squid]

Are we alowed to switch which sides countries were on in wars?

[fredinno]

9 hours ago, sevenperforce said:

Could hybrid rockets have been used in place of ICEs for earlier manned controlled HTA flight?

No, they don't offer a low enough mass to allow a plane to take off. It needs to be air-breathing, at least, to reduce mass enough.

A sounding rocket has to go straight up, so simpler spin-guidance would enough for those.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spin-stabilisation

http://cosmos.ucdavis.edu/archives/2010/cluster3/CARD_Heidi-Mae.pdf

Invented in 1812.

Is this enough to allow for a sounding rocket for space travel, or do we still need more aeronautics knowledge?

2 hours ago, Emperor of the Titan Squid said:

Are we alowed to switch which sides countries were on in wars?

Why naut?

2 hours ago, wumpus said:

On 3/4/2016 at 9:35 PM, fredinno said:

Would Mars gravity be enough? : Note.  Thanks to the wonderful new forum software, it doesn't appear that I can reply any other way but in this quote. 

My guess is is that it Mars would work fine, but am really gasping at straws at 1900s rocket science.  Since Mars has an escape velocity similar to Mars and less atmospheric issues, it would at least be plausible for a steampunk to orbit vehicle on Mars.

Hmm, ChrisSpace, note this. Let's switch humans from Earth to Luna.

[ChrisSpace]

20 hours ago, fredinno said:

You'd likely have to bring airplanes into the field earlier. Unfortunately, internal combustion engines were needed, which were invented in 1876, and first commercialized in 1885. The full calculations on the basics of how much you needed are not made until 1889, and the first wind tunnel for aerodynamics research was completed in 1871.

From that information, I say we could have our first plane in the late 1880s if the calculations were made sooner.

7 hours ago, Emperor of the Titan Squid said:

Are we alowed to switch which sides countries were on in wars?

To some extent, but only when the change is plausible (eg the USSR was thinking about joining the axis before 1941).

4 hours ago, fredinno said:

Hmm, ChrisSpace, note this. Let's switch humans from Earth to Luna.

No.

[fredinno]

3 hours ago, ChrisSpace said:

From that information, I say we could have our first plane in the late 1880s if the calculations were made sooner.

To some extent, but only when the change is plausible (eg the USSR was thinking about joining the axis before 1941).

No.

Still, that leaves ~15 years removed from the IRL airplane development. It took 30 years for guidance and aeronautics knowledege to develop a supersonic missile (V2),which is likely the bare minimum for a orbital unmanned rocket.

[insert_name]

maybe due to the fact that luna retained more mass from the earth-theia collision, you could decrease earths mass some