The Great British Space Adventure (A light-hearted AH RP-1 Story)

[Julexus Quandem]

 

The Great British Space Adventure

Having captured a number of rockets from the defeated Germans at the end of WW2, the government of the United Kingdom turns its focus to the skies. Despite an economy still recovering from war, it is felt “very important” that the UK joins the space race, with assistance from members of The Commonwealth who are willing to let the British government build launch sites in their territory. The UK Space Agency (UKSA) is born and the adventure begins…

It’s the 1^st of January 1951 and the first UKSA launch site at Woomera in Australia is ready for use. No one seems too concerned about how far away Woomera is from the UK. In fact dropping rockets on the Australian desert is seen as much preferable to dropping them on Slough. Or France.

After some months of designing and building, “Aston”, UKSAs first rocket is ready to launch. Based on the V2 this uses a less powerful “Armstrong” engine which requires smaller fuel tanks than those on the V2 for similar performance. At 00:50 GMT on Thursday 31^st May, Aston launches for the first time:

Aston works fine until suffering structural failure of the main tank after 52 seconds at 35km.

The core of the rocket still makes it to 93km, before crashing back down in the Australian desert after 6 minutes of flight. Much science is done though and many milestones have been reached.

The goal with Aston 2 is to reach the Karman line. To achieve this Aston 2 will have an avionics system that is able to control the rocket’s trajectory via the Armstrong engine’s gimbal. Research also begins on upgrades to both the engine and our avionics tech.

Aston 2 launches on Sunday 14^th October at 04:04GMT and reaches a height of 204km, though loses a fin just after engine cut off. The mission is hailed as a great success and more science is done.

UKSA engineers are concerned though, that while Aston is good at going straight up, modifications to the design may need to happen for missions that involve going sideways in any way…

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I am using the wonderful RP-1 suite of mods on KSP 1.7.3, installed as via the instructions in the RP-1 wiki, though with limited part mods but notably Simple Procedural Engines. I have played various previous versions of RP-1/RP-0 so am hoping I have some vague idea as to what I'm doing. I'm having issues with "Aston" flying itself apart in simulations, but do have some ideas on how to solve that, mainly involving a less "V2" and more conventional rocket shape.

 

 

[Julexus Quandem]

A Tasty New Rocket

With advancements made to their engine technology, and after the consumption of a lot of tea, UKSA engineers upgrade the Armstrong engine and rebuild the Aston to accommodate both a payload and a parachute for return missions. The new craft is named Bacon, but takes about 8 months to build despite some upgrades to the VAB. 

Bacon launches for the first time on Tuesday 17^th June 1952 at 00:55GMT, carrying a payload of 102 units. A successful flight it reaches a height of nearly 455km, breaking all previous records.

Due to the rather gentle nature of this rocket, plans are made to launch a person atop it, in what definitely isn’t a re-purposed airplane cockpit. More strident voices comment, that having recently successfully nuked some small Australian islands, that a nuclear bomb could likely be launched on top of this rocket as well.

Bacon 2 launches on Thursday 8^th January 1953 at 01:13 GMT. As this mission is to be recovered, it is decided to aim the rocket north, avoiding potential areas of population and to make for land-based recovery, rather than potentially having to fish the rocket out of the sea. The motor is purposefully cut early to avoid going too high and suffering overheating during re-entry. The parachutes deploy as planned for a landing about 390km north of the launch site.

Bacon 3 launches on Thursday 11^th June at 00:54 GMT with Jeremy Kerman on board. Kerman steers the craft to a 45 degree angle not long after launch, with the aim being to break multiple speed records, rather than go too high. In fact UKSA engineers advise that he doesn’t go above 30km as his definitely-not-an-airplane-cockpit isn’t rated for any greater height. The flight tops out at just above 30km but all is fine. Some say that this is UKSA's crowning achievement so far. Other's say this sort of thing is just in the British DNA.

Jeremy touches down safely 8m43s after launch, 120km from the launch site, despite there clearly being some confusion over the correct sizing of the parachutes.

Bacon 4 launches on Thursday 12^th November 1953 at 04:16 GMT with the aim of returning a biological sample from above the Karman line. After some concerns when the craft tops out at 370km, the capsule still manages to survive re-entry and brings lots of science with it.

Some discussions are had at UKSA about how useful the Woomera launch site is in the long term. Plans to send probes to the moon and other planets are already being discussed and Woomera is far to far south to be useful for launches that really need to be much closer to the equatorial plane. Eyes are turning to India and investment in Woomera may end up being more limited.

Bacon 5 is another biological return flight, launching on 23^rd April 1954 at 23:25GMT. Containing a heavier payload this flight still tops out at 364km and lands successfully. UKSA scientists continue to be surprised at the reliability of the Armstrong engines, with there so far being no serious failures.

Bacon 6 is the third and final biological return flight, launching on 4^th October 1954 at 00:43GMT. Even with a yet heavier payload it tops out at 410km and returns safely. UKSA scientists conclude that this area of research is exhausted for now. Next up UKSA plans to totally not spy on the Russians by taking photos of Earth from space.

[Julexus Quandem]

Photos, People and a Puny Rocket

UKSA decides to name the actual missions after something other than the rocket, starting with the Felvennis series of launches, which aim to return photos from space.

On 10^th March 1955 at 01:04, Felvennis 1 is launched. Reaching a height of 250km and landing 705km downrange the mission to photograph bits of the outback is successful. A second mission is planned.

In the aim to launch rockets further, higher and faster than before a new, very tiny, engine is designed, as backwards as that might sound. It is designated “Brunel” and will launch the “Crane” rocket. Though it won’t do much on its own, it is hoped that Crane can be placed atop Bacon for a two-stage design. The first test flight, Crane 1, is launched on 6th April 1955 at 00:56 GMT. Crane 1 reaches a height of 245Km and the new engine works well. Some may note that UKSA have finally learnt where to place fins correctly. Further tests are planned as this is the first UKSA design not based on the old German A-4 engine.

The UKSA manned program takes on the name “Taranis” for the first flight in a new upgraded cockpit that it is hoped can reach 75km. Valery Smith takes on this flight, which launches on 2nd August 1955 at 03:40. She breaks various height records, eventually reaching 73km before safely returning to Earth. Still having issues with getting the parachutes the same size though.

Felvennis 2 launches on 11^th January 1956, at 01:01. Another successful mission, very similar to Felvennis 1, producing more really exciting pictures of desert.

As the launch crews had been off work during the Christmas holiday, but the VAB workers had barely had a break, Crane 2 launches 4 days later, on 15^th January at 01:02. It reaches 238Km and the engine works brilliantly. Crane 3 follows on 8^th February and, after another successful launch, the now rather cocky engineers suggest that “Bacon-Crane” is prepared for its first launch.

Bacon-Crane 1 launches on 20^th June at 06:59, with the aim of breaking various speed and height records. With 6500m/s of delta-v hopes are high. A new height record of 1800Km is reached and the 5000m/s speed record is also broken. A second launch is now planned, after the government give UKSA the task of sending a rocket over 3000km downrange from the launch site.

The final Felvennis mission launches on 12 November 1956. Another success, but the focus is now on Bacon-Crane 2, followed by a new rocket that it is hoped will be able to launch a probe into orbit. As long as UKSA can get the fuel for it.

Edited March 1, 2020 by Julexus Quandem