Historical
aspects of creation of ballistic support of
the first carrier rockets and space vehicles launches designed
by S.P.Korolev L.N.Lysenko N.E.Bauman MSTU 2-nd
High rates of
space-rocket engineering development and appearance of new problems of national
defense potential increase and outer space exploration have demanded creation
of perfect and highly effective ballistic support (BS) of carrier rockets (CR)
and space vehicles (SV) launches. The solution of this
complicated scientific and technical problem has been carried out in our
country during the shortest time, and with the rates essentially exceeding the
development of corresponding engineering tools. However, the considered
aspect, as any scientific and technical problem, has its
"beginnings", sources and background which are closely connected with
the history of rocket and space engineering creation in the Though analysis of historical
aspects of solution of any scientific and technical problem represents a part
of a strict science "History of engineering", for the most part it is
associated with subjectivity of its author. This circumstance is quite obvious
if we take into consideration that the initial sources of information are
rather incomplete and often so far inaccessible archival materials and memoirs
of witnesses. The latter, even at aspiration to absolute reliability of an
estimation of what they went through, cannot be fully objective, by definition.
The events reproduced by them, are always transmitted through their own
perception, and by virtue of passing years, are always represented in some
other light, than in what they had occurred. If we speak about history of
creation and practical application of ballistic support of rocket launches
designed by S.P.Korolev, since R-1 and up to ballistic support of the legendary
"seven" launch which carried the first spaceship with Y.A.Gagarin
aboard into space, then certainly, the multivolume set of memoirs [1] of an
outstanding pioneer of rocket engineering in general and astronautics in
particular the academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences B.E.Chertok
should be considered the most exhaustive and authentic. It should be noted, however,
that the aspects of ballistic support of launching the first rockets, according
to the known reasons, were not fully depicted in this fundamental work which
includes the description of wide variety of historical events connected with
rocket engineering creation. In this sense it seems
interesting to try to reconstruct them professionally, using the accessible
archival and technical references and memoirs of other authors who took part in
creation and practical application of ballistic support of launches of the
first native missile complexes and SV rockets-carriers, from modern positions
and the representations which have settled during almost a semi-centennial
term. Thus it is expedient to limit
the discussed period of time to an interval of 1946-1963. The reasons of such a
choice will become clear from the following discussion. It is known [2] that the
purpose of BS is arrangement, and in case of need, development of absent data
and theoretical positions, representing the sources of initial ballistic
information which is necessary and sufficient for the solution of the whole set
of problems of managing the CR and SV movements. Being focused on the operative
solution of problems of concrete flight of concrete type of CR or SV, BS should
reflect the features of given concrete type of an aircraft as an object of
management, and also the features of a concrete flight regarding the decision
of such problems as the control of an active site, division and falling of
stages of CR, definition of parameters of trajectories and orbits, forecast of
movement, definition of illumination and ranges of radio visibility, target
designation for probes, "correction of passage" of orbits for
overlapping the path on the certain coils with landing polygon, etc. By the way we should note that
"ballistic support", generally speaking, is not quite successful
term. It appeared with distribution of concept "ballistic software of
electronic digital computing machine" on direct process of the decision of
ballistic problems. The substrate of BS is its software mathematical support
(MS), and its operating tool is program-algorithmic support (PAS). The main requirements for BS
are defined by the type of current problems and reduced to maintenance of
demanded accuracy and reliability of solution results, and also to exclusively
high efficiency of their reception. It is necessary to accept that
both the roots of practical rocket production in the As is generally known [1, 3,
4], from July till August, 1945 the group of the Soviet experts including
S.P.Korolev, V.P.Glushko, V.P.Barmin, N.A.Pilyugin, V.P.Mishin, M.S.Pyazanskiy,
V.S.Kuznetsov, A.M.Isaev, B.E.Chertok, G.A.Tyulin, M.K.Tikhonravov, etc. were
directed to Under the direction of the
experts detached to To the middle of 1946s the
problems which the detached Soviet experts had been faced with, were mainly
solved. They returned home, taking with them ten ready for assembling sets of
"V-2", restored on the basis of the engineering specifications which
were detected by V.P.Mishin's group in military-technical archive in Prague
(series "T") and ten assembled and certified rockets ready to flight
tests (series "N"). Together with our experts a
group of German missile specialists (altogether about 150 experts) was sent to
the Among listed, the name of Dr.V.Wolf,
who was the main expert on ballistics in "Krupp", and headed the
works on creation of ballistic support of "V-2", also attracts
attention. In May, 1946 the Soviet
government passed the Resolution on creation of rocket production industry in
the country, which played the defining role in development of missile weaponry
of distant range. According to the Resolution, Head Ministries, special design
bureaus (SDB), scientific research institutes (SRI), polygons, etc. were
formed, both in system of the Ministry of Defense and in the industry. On the
basis of the Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU and Council of
Ministers of the Together with this fact,
careful analysis of S.P.Korolev's activity gives reasons to approve that this
outstanding person possessed a huge scientific potential and aspiration not to
solve the problems simply in the best way, but also to understand physical
essence of studied problems thoroughly, and to find their scientific decision.
Materials on the meetings of the Technical commission on rocket engineering [6]
which took place in Generally speaking, S.P.Korolev,
being sent to The first launch of ballistic
missile from the set of assembled at the development plant of SRI-88 from units
and details of "V- Side deviations of falling
points resulted from low accuracy of onboard gyroscopic devices and defects of
used BS regarding inadequate definition of perturbing factors, mainly, thrust
misalignment of propulsion unit. Assembled completely of
details and units of native production, BR R-1 passed the flight tests in 1948
(10 launches) and 1949 (12 launches). In 1951 it was added to national armory.
Its range was After becoming the Design
manager of ballistic missiles of distant range, and then the head of Design
Bureau-1, S.P.Korolev was obliged to solve a great amount of
organizational-economic, building, personnel and other problems practically
excluding an opportunity of carrying out his own scientific developments. Moreover, possessing state
thinking, he perfectly understood, that time of ingenious single scientists had
passed long ago. It was necessary to create scientific collectives capable of
solving the most complicated scientific problems, set by the Design manager as
the leader who had overrun his nearest colleagues by a level of knowledge and
ability to realize purposes of scientific-technical prediction. This circumstance can explain
involving in 1950- Already during this work S.P.Korolev,
as its supervisor, aspired to use creative potential of members of Academy of
Sciences, missile branch of Academy of artillery sciences (AAS) (being himself
a correspondent member since 1947), experts of CAHI, CIAM, military and
academic institutes and high schools and, naturally, first of all the employees
of close and well-known for him SRI-88. Naturally, BS of added to
armory missiles was developed, in particular during the mentioned research
work, by Russian engineers, though taking into consideration some experience of
German experts. It is possible to judge about
the level of BS of that period of time uppermost by published, first in a
confidential variant, and then in publishing house "Nauka" (1966)
fundamental work of employees of Design Bureau-1 S.S.Lavrov, R.F.Appazov and
V.P.Mishin "Ballistics of guided missiles of distant range" [7]. The first native
intercontinental ballistic missile R-7 (8k71) was tested in 1957, and added to
armory in R-7A modification in 1960. R-7 missile is known as the
"legendary seven", which carried out the space launch of the first
artificial satellite, and then the first man, our compatriot Yu.A.Gagarin. While creation of BS of the
first ballistic missiles launches, as it was already mentioned, was based on
experience of German missile specialists, creation of BS of space flights was
practically carried out by native experts from "fresh start". A significant role in solving
this problem at the initial stage of outer space development was played by a
collective of the 4-th missile SRI of Ministry of Defense (SRI-4 MD) organized
in 1946. This institute substantially executed functions of an original
incubator of the staff in the field of space ballistics. The first steps
connected with the origin of space ballistics in SRI-4 at that time were defined
by activity of the head of ballistics and control of liquid-fuel ballistic
missiles branch Mikhail Klavdievich Tikhonravov. Under his management the group
of enthusiasts of outer space exploration was formed. At the beginning of 50--s
the experts of this group, only by their initiative, executed a number of
investigations arranged as reports on scientific research and directed to
Design Bureau-1 to S.P.Korolev, in which the problems of ballistics of CR based
on "the batch scheme", which was capable to carry payload into satellite orbit,
were considered. Acquaintance with these materials gave S.P.Korolev reasons to
order "Researches concerning creation of the artificial satellite of the Earth"
which officially began in 1954 at SRI-4 MD. In this research for the first time
the substantiation was given concerning an opportunity of creation of IBM BS
with range of 8...10 thousand km with its simultaneous application as BS of
artificial satellite CR. It took, however, about 10 years before semi-official
activity of enthusiasts of the military SRI was converted into the strict
frames of administrative structure. Indeed, only in May The artilleryman and participant
of the Great Patriotic War, decorated with battle orders and medals, who
subsequently became a skilled expert in ballistics, Pavel Efimovich was quickly
accepted as one of principal space engineers of the country. He not only
rendered a defining influence on development of the discussed scientific
direction, but also brought up a significant group of the first class experts
not only in SRI-4 where he had worked for many years, but also in the
Lomonosov's MSU where in the beginning of 60s he read a corresponding course at
an engineering stream of mechanic-mathematical faculty. In absence of high-speed
electronic computer facilities (a computer center based on EDCM M-20 was launched in SRI-4 MD only in April,
1960), the developed BS was meant for allowing manual simplified operating
techniques (in the last resort, with application of computing automatic devices
of mechanical type). This is the reason for the widest application of
graph-analytic methods of calculation implemented by means of special pads and
charts at that time. Their creation demanded talent, truly Russian sharpness,
and often even an exclusive intuition, because it was required to combine,
generally speaking, incompatible requirements of simplicity of usage and acceptable
accuracy of calculations. At such level of BS development all main ballistic
problems for the first artificial satellite were solved. A monograph written by P.E.Eljasberg
"Introduction in the theory of flight of an artificial satellite" [8],
published by "Nauka" in 1965 after a long term of tryout of the course, read by him in MSU, was
a great generalization of this stage of BS of an artificial satellite creation. Alongside with M.K.Tikhonravov
and P.E.Eljasberg, we also should mention M.D.Kislik, A.V.Brykov, I.M.Jatsunsky,
I.K.Bazhenov, V.D.Jastrebov, G.R.Uspensky, O.V.Gurk, A.V.Tsepelev as the
developers of the BS of the first artificial satellites launches. With creation of the first
examples of electronic computers in the The first computer centers
(CC) based on EDCM "STRELA-1" with performance of approximately 2...3
thousand operations per second were created in the Ministry of Defense (CC-1),
Academy of Sciences (CC-2 and CC-3) and Lomonosov's MSU (CC-4). As it was already mentioned,
in April As a result there appeared an
opportunity of creation of program complexes for full automation of
calculations at trial launches of ballistic rockets of distant range and
maintenance of flights of both pilot and pilotless aircrafts, artificial
satellites put into orbits, and also function formalization of coordination of
the works assigned to coordinating computer centers (CCC). At various times
Y.A.Mozzhorin, G.A.Tyulin, G.S.Narimanov, A.A.Bolshoy headed the first CCC
based on SRI-4 MD. Expansion of computing
facilities led to natural aspiration to complication of used mathematical
models and their high adequacy to real physical processes. It demanded
specification of gravitational field of the Earth (GFE) and its atmosphere,
influence of Sun activity on variations of atmospheric density, parameters of
magnetic field of the Earth, radiation fields (belts), etc. Many organizations
were involved in the corresponding works and first of all the systems of The
results of initial work on creation of BS of space means were highly estimated
by the Native land. For services in maintenance of the first artificial
satellite launch P.A.Agadzhanov, I.K.Bazhinov, A.V.Brykov, M.D.Kislik,
G.I.Levin, Y.A.Mozzhorin, G.S.Narimanov, A.I.Sokolov, M.K.Tikhonravov,
G.A.Tyulin, P.E.Eljasberg and I.M.Jatsunsky were honoured with the Lenin award. Preparation for the first
piloted flight demanded realization of some additional measures on increase of
reliability of both BS itself, and ballistic calculations carried out on its
basis. BS technology was being
continuously improved. Its tryout was preliminarily carried out during five
pilotless launches of the first "Vostok" spaceships. The fourth and
fifth launches were carried out strictly under the program accepted for the
piloted flight [9]. The choice of orbit parameters
was uniquely determined from those reasons, that life-support of the cosmonaut
on "Vostok" spaceship was intended for 10 days. Therefore according
to reliability maintenance, the orbit was selected so that time of ballistic
existence of the space vehicle in the worst case (the least possible real
atmospheric density during the flight) did not exceed 8 days. Alongside with the requirement
on terms of ballistic existence of the spaceship, the problem of the guaranteed
landing at the expense of only aerodynamic braking in case of retropack failure
on safe territory for the cosmonaut was set. Descent control in an
off-optimum situation caused by retropack failure assumed manual reorientation
of the module for change of the effective area of its cross section, normal to
incident flow of the rarefied atmosphere. The schedule of swings had to provide
an aerocapture of the spaceship on the orbit passing above the territory of the
-
uncertainty of knowledge of
atmospheric density parameters during the real flight; -
impossibility of exact practical
realization of a real orbit in relation to the chosen nominal one by virtue of
rather significant mistakes of ascent; -
discrepancy of knowledge of
terrestrial gravitational field; therefore, errors of radio system binding were
defined for the European part of the USSR by tens of meters, and for remote
from the European part centers - by hundreds of meters; -
essential errors of measurement of
orbit parameters by used probing technologies; -
low performance, small memory capacity
and low reliability of computer facilities. Naturally, all
possible steps for reducing negative consequences of the specified factors were
undertaken [9]. Along with the head role of CC SRI-4 MD, all existing at that
period CC were involved as duplicating ones. During launch preparation all
programs for solving problems of preliminary processing of trajectory
measurements, definition of orbit parameters by trajectory measurements,
forecast of motion parameters, forecast for multidaily intervals and
calculation of lifetime, calculation of data on descent from an orbit in a
regular mode, calculation of control parameters of descent from an orbit in
case of retropack failure, calculation of illumination, visibility ranges and
target designation for measuring centers, etc. were worked through and tested. Interaction with measuring
centers (MC) was fulfilled. Principles of duplication of the most responsible
calculations in CC SRI-4 MD and verifications of the most significant results
with other CC were specified. The program of angular motion control in case of
an off-optimum situation caused by retropack failure was developed for a
nominal orbit on all admissible interval of flight. It was delivered to
Y.A.Gagarin before the launch. And though it was clear, that
for such situation calculation of concrete settings should be made directly by
results of measurements of orbit parameters, the developed technique was
perceived by its authors, as capable to render, first of all, positive effect
on a cosmonaut [9]. We know, however, that the
reality exceeded all predicted negative conditions. Because of errors in action of
the CR control system when the functional reached the demanded value the
propulsion of the second stage engine was not terminated, therefore the speed
of the spaceship at the point of separation was by 23 m/s up on the nominal
speed, and the height of apogee exceeded the nominal one by more than The modifications and
practical application of BS of subsequent flights of "Vostok"
spaceships were also accompanied by serious complexities. During G. S. Titov's
flight there was a failure at binding the measurements to universal time that
led to a very complicated situation. The formation flyings of A.G.Nikolaev and P.R.Popovich,
and then V.F.Bykovsky and V.V.Tereshkova were also not trouble-free. However,
the high level of BS tryout, selflessness of the task groups, who provided
these flights, allowed successful solving of the problems. The first (initial) step of
development of space flights BS came to an end with the flights of
"Vostok" spaceships. As a result of carried out works on ballistic
support of the first artificial satellites and "Vostok" spaceship
launches and flights an invaluable experience of their realization was gathered
up and the information, allowing to guarantee the further progress in practical
astronautics was received. The next years gave the
applied space ballistics the further development. The circle of the
organizations taking part in solving the discussed problems essentially
extended. The role of the Central Research Institute for As for the
"beginnings" it is unconditional, as it follows from the stated, that
with participation of many experts from different organizations, the defining
role in solving the problems of ballistic support of CR launches and spaceships
flights at this stage was played by the experts of SRI-4 MD and the experts of
corresponding departments of Design Bureau-1 who took an active and interested
part in coordination and practical application of the offered decisions. Lev Nikolayevich Lysenko, graduated
from N.E.Bauman MHTS. Since 1987 he is a Head of Ballistics and aerodynamics
department of N.E.Bauman MSTU. Dr. Sci. Tech., professor, the Honoured Science
Worker of the Russian Federation, the Honoured Inventor of RSFSR, the laureate
of the President of the Russian Federation Award. The author of more than 300
published works, including 16 monographs, textbooks and manuals, a number of
which reissued in foreign countries. The author and the co-author of more than
100 copyright certificates and patents for inventions. He is a Full member of
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