EuroStar - RSS/RO/RP-1/P&LC European run

[jimmymcgoochie]

It's me again, starting yet another mission report when I already have several on the go. I just really like how Programs and Launch Complexes works, plus it recently got updated to include the latest changes from RO and RP-1. In an attempt to do something different, I'm going to use only European engines as much as possible and launching from Australia. Obviously.

Rather disappointingly, there are only two Europeans in the roster of P&LC Leaders- Wernher von Braun and Val Cleaver. I'm hoping there will be more options in the future to make playing as someone other than the USA or USSR more practical.

Rockets only Programs.

The options for European engines are either a) the A-4 aka V-2 ballistic missile, b) the Veronique which was based on the Wasserfal (another WW2 German missile program) or C) the Sprite, not a part of normal RP-1 but I grabbed the configs that @seyMonstersposted on the RO/RP-1 discord a while ago and it's a real British rocket so it qualifies. I ended up with two sounding rockets using the Veronique and A-4 as the Sprite just doesn't have the overall impulse to be useful right now.

Here's the Veronique-powered SR-3 Verity:

Did I mention that the Veronique has absolutely terrible reliability? Out of the first six launch attempts I had two failures on the pad, two failures within a second of releasing the clamps, one loss of thrust and ISP and one loss of thrust that caused an overburn failure.

The first launch had an engine failure on the pad, then when it was replaced and relaunched the engine lost performance. A partial success as it completed the "first launch" contract but didn't go nearly as high as I'd have liked and the science gains were reduced.

The second launch had an engine failure just off the pad and it landed back on the clamp, but KCT didn't let me roll it back to the VAB so I reverted and somehow it worked perfectly the second time around:

Launch three had the thrust loss followed by overburn failure, but still gained some science.

The fourth launch was going quite well until a stability issue raised its ugly head, probably because I was messing with fuel flow priorities and caused the CoM to shift too far down at the end of the burn where the fins were least effective.

Spoiler

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/MVLwoIf

Next time: Biological sample returns from space!

[jimmymcgoochie]

Obligatory handwave-y alt-hist-y bit:

In the closing stages of World War 2, American and Soviet forces scrambled to find as many German rocket scientists as they could and whisk them off to their respective nations to start up their own rocketry projects to develop ballistic missiles. Amidst the chaos, a team of SAS commandos executed a daring raid as part of Operation Papercut and managed to grab Wernher von Braun and a number of other key personnel, along with schematics for the A-4 rocket engine that had powered the infamous V-2. The nascent British rocketry program was quietly shipped across the world to Woomera, Australia, partly to keep the top secret work away from prying eyes but also to avoid public outcry over using valuable public funds to build rockets rather than rebuild the war-ravaged nation- and collaborating with the enemy to boot!

The remainder of the 1940s was a dark time for much of Europe: Britain was rebuilding after six years of war including several years of relentless aerial and later rocket attacks; France was rebuilding after several years of occupation and the aftermath of the battles fought to liberate it; Germany was in ruins, its industries destroyed, its cities in rubble, completely occupied by its enemies and split in two as the Soviet Union converted its conquered territories in Eastern Europe into puppet states, taking around a third of Germany with it.

Following the betrayal (as many in Britain saw it) of the McMahon Act effectively locking Britain out of the nuclear technologies it had played a crucial role in developing through the Manhattan Project and seeking to forge closer ties with European neighbours as a result, a joint British-French project was established to combine their rocketry and missile efforts. With the Woomera testing range already established and lacking a better alternative, the French side of the operation moved to the Australian site, bringing their partially-developed Veronique rocket engine- a development of the Wasserfal created by Germany during the war- to join the larger A-4. A variety of other rocket technologies including those being developed by Bristol Siddeley and de Havilland were considered, but ultimately found to be unsuitable- for now.

And so, in January of 1951, the European Research Organisation for Scientific and Technological Applications of Rocketry (EuROSTAR) was born.

Early versions of the Veronique-powered sounding rocket, codename SR-3 Verity, had decidedly mixed results: multiple engine failures on the launchpad, immediately after liftoff or during flight were hardly reassuring, but by examining the telemetry radioed back from the rockets as well as the wreckage from those that managed to get airborne and the failed engines of those that didn't, improvements were made that improved the Veronique's reliability considerably.

Spoiler

Don't ask me to make the French version of that acronym, it will only end in tragedy...

/waffle

Having demonstrated that it's possible to go up really high, the next step was to prove that you can go up really high and then come back again. Preferably in one piece. Refitted with monitoring equipment, a small capsule containing a rabbit (because if there's one thing Australia has too many of, it's rabbits; well, and spiders, and snakes...) and a parachute to bring the bunny back down for a soft landing, the Verity S first took to the sky in November of 1951.

Reaching over 150km altitude, the bemused bunny endured almost a minute of harsh acceleration, enjoyed a few minutes of weightlessness before being crushed into the floor of its capsule once again during the descent and then jostled by the parachute descent to the outback below.

Having demonstrated that small animals can be launched on rockets and brought back with minimal harm, a series of launches with increasingly elaborate test equipment were carried out:

A slightly different rocket, designated Verity P, was created to carry the instruments but not the live cargo, though this was only flown twice.

The team were feeling pretty confident by now- the initial teething problems with the Veronique had largely been solved and it was now reasonably reliable with no failures on five successive launches.

At long last, the first of the heavier SR-2 Adler rockets- broadly similar to the A-4 prototypes that led to the V-2 but with a more sophisticated payload and onboard control systems- was ready for launch.

The launch carried a large camera and a small capsule containing a variety of microorganisms including nematode worms and amoebae, launching them to well over 200km and almost as far to the east of Woomera by the time it came down again.

A flawless launch that provided a wealth of scientific data (and some rather confused worms).

The second Verity P suffered an engine fault that cut its thrust by half, however it was still able to carry its payload to the desired altitude and the mission was a success.

A second Adler rocket was built far quicker than the first, though in the haste to get it ready for launch the team didn't have time to paint the detailing onto the rocket. (read: conformal decals glitched out and the decals were invisible)

This launch was deliberately sent to the east and covered a considerable distance downrange to simulate the flight of a ballistic missile, as well as demonstrating the utility of rocket-borne photoreconnaissance.

At this point some senior military figures arrived and were far from impressed at "giving joyrides to rabbits". They wanted a demonstration of a long-range ballistic missile that could be launched from the UK or France to hit Moscow, with a launch to at least 3000 kilometres from the launchpad to demonstrate that such a thing was feasible.

The obvious solution would be to stick the Verity on top of the Adler and call it a day, however calculations showed that it would be some distance short of the required distance. The addition of a third stage using the Sprite, a rocket engine being developed by de Havilland for rocket-assisted takeoff (RATO) use on the Comet jet airliner, along with building the fuel tanks and structures out of lighter but more expensive aluminium would make up the difference.

Spoiler

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/zrkpFyN

Next time: 3000km downrange?

[jimmymcgoochie]

The brass want a ballistic missile, but that'll take time and a coordinated effort to create a multi-stage rocket. Some very long meetings later the military delegation gave their begrudging approval to a gradual build-up to the 3000km effort, thoroughly testing as many parts of the system as possible before the big day.

This meant a series of Verity sounding rockets carrying a variety of payloads, with a few minor mishaps along the way:

An engine malfunction reduced thrust on this launch, but fairly late in the burn and it still made it to its target altitude. Engineers say they're working on an improved Veronique that should boost performance and reliability, but it's still in the early stages and will take time to be ready.

The larger Adler rocket was also put through its paces, launching some increasingly heavy payloads on top to prove that it was up to the task of lofting the Verity to altitude while still gathering scientific data.

As launch day approached, concerns were raised about the third stage Sprite engine and the fact that the planned long range launch required it to burn for twice its tested duration- in fact during static firings the engine had failed every time. The Sprite was only intended to be a RATO motor to help Comet airliners get off the ground in high-temperature, high-altitude conditions where its jet engines were less effective and so only needed a relatively short burn time. 

These concerns were raised with de Havilland, who came back with a modified model they'd already been developing called the Super Sprite, trading some thrust for a significantly longer burn time that made it fit perfectly into the new DR-1 Horizon rocket's launch profile.

With the new engine fitted, the first Horizon was rolled out to the pad ready for launch.

Starting a rocket engine in flight had never been tested before so there was some trepidation as staging approached, but the repeated tests of the Veronique paid off and it worked perfectly.

The Super Sprite also did its job to perfection

The mission was a complete success, reaching over 900km in altitude and surpassing the 3000km target distance by a healthy margin. It was spotted by a Royal Navy destroyer as it burnt up in the upper atmosphere almost 3500km from Woomera.

Of course, a rocket that could fly itself 3000km from its launchpad and then burn up in the atmosphere wasn't much good as a ballistic missile! The military bigwigs were soon back with an even more ambitious target: launch something a whopping 4500km away with a mass simulator to represent a warhead; surviving re-entry wasn't required, yet.

With the experience gained launching rabbits on the Verity sounding rocket, the science department suggested launching a larger capsule with a larger animal- a dog or something similar- on top of a Horizon rocket with the Sprite third stage removed. It made for a slightly ungainly looking rocket with the oversized capsule on top, but the launch went without a hitch.

The capsule came back down within sight of the Woomera facility and was quickly recovered.

One of EuROSTAR's first development programs was now complete, however funding had been secured for six years and it had only taken three and a half to meet all the requirements. This could have been the end for the Verity, however further launches were still carried out to continue the study of Earth's upper atmosphere.

Another Adler rocket carrying a much heavier mass simulator was launched to simulate the launch profile required for the 4500km flight as well as gathering more photographs from the upper atmosphere and exosphere for research teams the world over to study.

The engineering team are in a bit of a quandary: the A-4 rocket engine hasn't really been improved since its wartime use and upgrading it is estimated to be prohibitively expensive; an upgrade for the Veronique is on the way but the improvements will be relatively minor; and the Sprite has already been pushed to its limits. Something new may be required in order to meet the more challenging requirements of a 4500km flight with a dummy warhead.

Spoiler

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/91bHbNe

Next time: What's next?

[jimmymcgoochie]

Getting back from space seems to be every bit as difficult as going there in the first place, the heat of re-entry is just too much for most materials to handle without failing. To further study this phenomenon, a DR-1 Horizon S took a dog on a suborbital flight to monitor the effects of a plunging re-entry profile on mammalian physiology.

The capsule was outfitted with twelve retrorockets to slow it down before atmospheric entry, set to ignite when the external temperature reached a critical threshold. One of the motors failed to ignite and destabilised the capsule, then the structural adapter between the capsule and rocket came apart under the heat and stress of re-entry, but the capsule itself held up well and the dog, rather winded by the punishing G-forces, parachuted down to the surface.

The extreme G-loads are far from ideal, but it's valuable data in the quest to get something to fly really fast in space and still come back in one piece- whether that thing is an animal or a nuclear warhead.

The research team have been hard at work and their efforts have paid off with an improved Veronique engine: though no more powerful than its predecessor, the use of a new fuel mix (turpentine-IWFNA as opposed to kerosene-IRFNA) has boosted the specific impulse, while the burn duration has also been improved slightly. The startup sequence is different to the original engine and still has a few kinks to work out, but reliability should be improved in the long run.

The new engine was put through its paces on a Verity Mk2 S carrying instruments from several universities into the upper atmosphere.

The launch went better than expected, smashing the previous altitude record for a Verity and getting close to 200km, though the data from the engine suggested it had come perilously close to failing on ignition.

Another Horizon S launch was sent on a much shallower trajectory, covering much more horizontal distance than the previous launch and reaching a higher overall velocity due to reduced gravity losses.

An SR-2 Adler was launched north over the outback as part of a photoreconnaissance experiment, aiming to take pictures of targets positioned on the ground. Additional instruments were included to study the upper atmosphere and exosphere during the flight, the capsule was returned safely and the images studied.

And then came perhaps the strangest launch yet- an enterprising salesman at a local electronics store wanted to stage a publicity stunt by launching a television into space. The TV was lighter than the Verity P's usual payload and so the team used it as an opportunity to try and beat 200km altitude.

Mission successful, though the salesman wasn't entirely thrilled when he realised that the rocket was going to fall back and crash, destroying the TV in the process and leaving him to cover the cost.

And then the military bigwigs came back, complaining about launching TVs and such when they wanted a ballistic missile with a 4500km range. Current technology doesn't allow for such a thing without some rather drastic design choices...

Artist's rendering of one proposed design, using estimated performance figures for the prototype Gamma-201 kerosene-HTP rocket in the second stage. While calculations suggest it would be able to fly over 6000km with the dummy payload, it's also considerably larger than anything launched so far and neither the construction facilities nor the launchpads at Woomera could handle it. A thirty-ton rocket that can't make orbit isn't worth doing and with the A-4 proving to be a developmental dead-end a more powerful first stage engine will be required in the near future.

Spoiler

Hence the focus on orbital rocketry research, though at current rates it'll still be a couple of years before the Gamma-8, Gamma-2 and RZ.2 (British LR-79) are available.

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/nHvcfGk

 

 

 

 

[jimmymcgoochie]

Operations continue at Woomera as Verity and Adler sounding rockets complete a variety of missions.

Both rockets are now being retired from service- Verity because it's no longer able to keep up with the ever-increasing payload and altitude requirements and Adler because the science gains are increasingly small, and both because the operating and construction costs will be better spent building a new and much larger launch complex and then tooling up new and much larger rockets.

The research teams have been hard at work to make said new, larger rockets a reality and British technology will be at the heart of the next generation rockets. Well, if you include British-built copies of American engines, at least. A lot of EuROSTAR's research and development efforts have been focussed on accelerating the development of British kerosene-HTP rocketry which has led to the creation of the Gamma series of rocket engines much sooner than would have been possible otherwise.

While 'keroxide' rockets can't compete with kerolox in terms of ISP, they have some advantages: decomposing HTP can spin the turbopumps without the need for a preburner or gas generator, allowing for a simpler closed-cycle design; the decomposed HTP is also hypergolic with kerosene which removes the need for a complicated ignition process, greatly increasing reliability; HTP can also be used in RCS thrusters, simplifying upper stage design; the combustion is both cooler and cleaner than kerolox, reducing the risk of engine damage for longer burn durations which again improves reliability; and HTP is more dense than liquid oxygen which combined with the ratio of kerosene to HTP required makes for a much denser and therefore smaller stage, reducing the cost and mass of fuel tanks required.

The first design, working name Penumbra, features a first stage powered by an eight-chamber Gamma-8 keroxide engine which is slightly less powerful than the A-4 but also significantly lighter; the second stage uses a two-chamber Gamma-2 with a nozzle extension to improve performance at altitude, while the third stage is a Verity with the fins removed. Two additional Verity rockets serve as boosters to help the 20-ton rocket climb off the launchpad.

For the larger rockets, a deal struck between the UK and USA to license-build S-3 engines for the British Blue Streak IRBM means that the powerful kerolox powerplant is available to EuROSTAR and will power the first stage of both designs.

The first, working name Goliath, weighs in at around 60 tons on the launchpad and was designed to minimise tooling costs by re-using as much as possible from the Penumbra. The second and third stages of Goliath are the first and second stages of Penumbra, with the same nozzle extension applied to the Gamma-8 as it won't need to work at sea level. Once again the Verity is pressed into service as a strap-on booster, with four of them giving the first stage a helping hand in the early stages of flight.

Calculations suggest a payload of half a ton to low Earth orbit should be feasible with this design.

The second design, working name Princess, uses a first stage that's much more akin to the aforementioned Blue Streak with two engines providing significantly more thrust to lift the 100-ton rocket off the pad without the need for additional boosters. The same engines are used on the second and third stages with a different second stage shape to bridge the gap between the 3m diameter first stage and 1.5m diameter third stage.

While noticeably heavier than the Goliath and with a much higher upfront cost to start manufacturing the three metre tanks, the Princess is also estimated to carry double the payload to orbit per launch.

Spoiler

Shameless rip-off of Black Prince, you say? Do you think I called it "Princess" for nothing?

In order to both build the new launch complex and afford the considerable upfront costs of tooling the new rocket parts, Project EuROSTAR has publicly announced that it will launch a series of satellites into orbit within six years, a move that has attracted a considerable influx of funding as well as turning a few heads in Washington and Moscow. It remains to be seen who will be first to reach orbit, but it's a three horse race now.

Spoiler

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/y5s3jBc

Next time: Going for orbit?

[jimmymcgoochie]

This Europe-only malarkey is a lot harder to do in P&LC than I thought it would be- for one thing the RZ.1 engine for the Blue Streak uses a completely separate unlock cost tree than the Gamma engines and it's impossible to afford both, so I had to cheat in the necessary funds to unlock the RZ.1 to use it. The lack of leaders is another issue, the relatively small array of engines yet another...

P&LC also feels significantly slower than normal RP-1 to me with a lot more waiting around for things to be ready. In this case, 1958 Orbital Rocketry took nearly a year to research and I didn't launch anything at all in that time to save up enough money for the tank tooling for the new rockets I'd need for orbital launches.

But eventually, the first (and only!) DR-2 Penumbra was ready on the launchpad.

It used the cheaper aluminium fuselage tanks previously tooled for the Adler and Horizon rockets on the second stage to save some tooling costs, but that didn't hinder its ability to complete the mission.

Work continued on the new OR-1 Goliath and the Nova satellite it would carry to orbit, however getting it ready to launch faced repeated delays due to a lack of funding (I think I lost about 2 or 3 months due to being out of funds for the duration of the rollout which stalled everything). An engine problem was also encountered which delayed the launch even further.

At last, on 12-12-1957, it was ready to launch. Instead of the fairings originally planned to enclose the payload, a simpler hollow nosecone was used instead and jettisoned via a pair of small solid rockets when the third stage decoupled.

This was the first test of the vacuum-optimised Gamma-8V configuration and it didn't disappoint, performing exactly as intended.

The relatively light satellite was sent to a polar orbit to complete two contracts at once and even then it had a significant delta-V margin.

Alas, Sputnik 1 won the race to orbit due to those pesky funding-related delays. A few more Goliath Nova missions are on the cards to do a sun-synchronous orbit, scientific satellite and solar-powered satellite, hopefully allowing the expensive tooling for the even larger OR-2 Princess to be purchased and the necessary technologies unlocked to carry on.

Spoiler

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/YZVZxkq

I may revisit the idea of a Europe-only run in normal RP-1 as it might work better there; P&LC definitely feels significantly slower than regular RP-1 even without the limitations I've added here and I'm a couple of years behind in pretty much every major milestone in both of my P&LC attempts so far compared to It's Only Rocket Science which was in normal RP-1 on the same difficulty. Maybe X-planes are worth doing after all?

[jimmymcgoochie]

Only a couple of launches to go, but not this time:

With a new engine installed everything went fine and Goliath Nova 2 completed its objective.

Apparently the guy that paints the detailing on the probe was off sick that day...

Some time later (and a lot of delays due to lack of funding) Goliath Nova 3 launched to a more sensible inclination to complete two contracts at once.

It was only after this flight that I noticed I could have completed the final prerequisite for the Program at the same time, but too bad.

This is still one of the better parts of P&LC.

And to finish, Goliath Nova 4 completes the atmospheric analysis satellite contract.

I'm ending this career here. The basic premise is good and I intend to start a 'normal' RP-1 save with the same limitations, but I don't think it's viable in Programs and Launch Complexes just yet.

Spoiler

Full album: https://imgur.com/a/Z5UNoec