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Rocket Design Agency - A Playtesting Quest

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Cast and Characters
  • Informational
    • NASA
    Brad L. Whipple - Director, New Alleghany Space Administration

    Payload Design - +1
    Rocket Design - +2
    Engine Design - +3
    Mission Planning - +1
    Flight Control - +2
    Damage Control - +0
    Spacecraft Activity - +0
    Extravehicular Activity - +0
    Experimental Activity - +2

    Flight Objectives
    - Continue scientific launches, progressing to probes into the space beyond orbit by year end 1959.
    - Begin experiments which will allow a progression to human spaceflight before year end 1960.
    - Cooperate with the Armed Forces in developing their abilities through the application of spaceflight.

    Mission Schedule - Current Date: January 1960
    - Low Orbit 1 (Summer 1958) - Hope-2 (Partial failure)
    - Re-entry test 1 - Sub-orbital - Full Success, August 1958
    - Low Orbit 2 - Partial Failure, Hope-3 , October 1958
    - Re-entry test 2 - Failure, November 1958
    - Military Communications - Success, ARTS, December 1958
    - High Orbit 1 - Success, Hope-4, January 1959
    - Re-entry test 3 - Success, March 1959
    - Bio-sciences - Launch Failure, July 1959
    - Discovery 1, Success, September 1959
    - High Orbit 2 - Success, Hope-5, October 1959
    - Lunar Probe - Launch Failure, Artemis-Lunar, November 1959
    - Bio-sciences - Success, Astrocaphe-Chuck, December 1959
    - Discovery 2 - Failure, January 1960
    - Astrocathe test - Success, animal in space, February 1960
    - March lost due to Artemis redesign
    - NAN payload - April 1960 - First Hermes Flight
    - Crown 3 - Spring/Summer 1960
    - Commercial payload - Summer 1960
    - IRVOS 1 - Summer 1960
    - NAA Communications - Summer/Fall 1960
    - Space Camp test - Summer/Fall 1960
    - NAN payload - Fall/Winter 1960
    - Commercial payload -Winter 1960
    - Astrocathe test - Winter 1960
    - NAA Communications - Spring 1961

    - Astrocaphe phase 1 (3 crewed flights)
    - Astrocaphe phase 2 (3 crewed flights)

    Hardware
    - Prometheus (1M to LEO)
    - Hermes-L (6M to LEO)
    - Hermes-B (8M to LEO)

    Andre Larkin - Team Lead at EPL
    Rocket Design 0
    Engine Design +2


    EPL Design Team
    Antony Miratha, Aerodynamics
    Susan Stone, Astrophysics
    Michael Cole, Rocket Engineering
    Amy Mathews, Trajectory Planning
    Simon T. Harrison, Chemical Engineering

    +2 Rocket Design, +2 Payload Design +1 Engine Design, +1 Fuel Selection, +1 Flight Planning

    Side Characters
    Dr. Evan Hart - Research Director at EPL
    Arthur Ley, proponent of Lunar flight.
    Franz Haber, Doctor and researcher.
    Dieter von Markand, Pacifist and astrophysicist.

    EPL Facilities
    Design workshop
    Chemical research laboratory
    Launch analysis equipment
    (Please note that EPL has neither rocket nor engine manufacturing facilities)
     
    Last edited:
  • Informational
    • Shadows said:
    We should know something about supersonic heating, though, if Not!Chuck Yeager has made his supersonic flight.
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    Absolutely! We definitely know that things heat up when they travel really fast.
    The problem is not with that. The problem is with understanding how dramatic heating is, the densities of the upper atmosphere and the best shapes for re-entry payloads. This world is a little behind ours was in terms of rocketry, probably on the order of 3-5 years. Rocket planes are barely a thing beyond the X-1 and so we're barely into mach 2 or 3 flight regimes.
    This is mostly because of the lack of a German drive for a ballistic weapon and the subsequent spread of that technology. Not only is everyone starting almost from first principles but they don't have that glut of post-war funding coming after it.
    So tactical ballistics are the order of the day and I'll be shocked if we see an orbital flight before 1960.
     
    After thinking about it, we should be able to reach about 900kg for a suborbital flight up within the 150-200km, and that seems like it should be the maximum kind of scientific payload that would be wanted to be sent up around this time? So going to go with these two options:

    [X] We will go higher than ever before (priority: reaching 150-200km altitude).
    [X] We will maximise payload (priority: Maximise payload mass).
     
    [X] We will go higher than ever before (priority: reaching 150-200km altitude).
    [X] We will maximise payload (priority: Maximise payload mass).

    There should be a different warning when you only have a quote in a post, damnit.
     
    [X] We will go higher than ever before (priority: reaching 150-200km altitude).
    [X] We will maximise payload (priority: Maximise payload mass).
     
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    C1P5
  • Threadmarks
    • "What's the flight altitude record at the moment, thirty kilometres?" you ask, actually a little uncertain. Jet powered aircraft have pushed aircraft to the limits of their capabilities and you are certainly no plane builder. But now that rockets are getting involved, it's a different matter. Now you're actually excited by the prospect of flight.

    "Around that. A little more with the new mach speed fighters the Army has been building, possibly, though they've not really pushed zoom climb capabilities yet." Anthony Miratha is the real aircraft geek on the team, fascinated by aerodynamics and always willing to share some knowledge on the newest developments in air combat.

    "And we made fifty with a half baked rush job."

    "That can lift fifty kilos at best. You're not going to convince anyone that's a serious altitude record holder." Simon points a finger before tapping it on the table.

    "Then let's put a man on it." You say, hands in the air, "There's no reason we can't."

    "There's plenty of reasons why we can't." Anthony snaps back, counting them off on his fingers, "We don't know if a person can survive outside the atmosphere, we don't know if they can survive the G-forces at launch, we know it'll get hot on the way back down but we have no idea how hot."

    Hmm. He's not wrong. And you suppose that killing your very first pilot would not be the way to deliver the future as it should be seen. Perhaps, then, another option.

    "Then how about this. We design a rocket that could, in theory, carry a person. Say a ton of payload, and we make it so that the payload is separable so that we could redesign it in future. How about that?"

    It's amazing how simple it is to design a rocket once the engine is together. You just hand a set of requirements off to your team and wait. They have all the maths sorted faster than you can blink.

    Payload - 4M required, including recovery system and avionics.
    Rocket - Heavy Duty Tank (1M, 1C), Hydrazine/LOX fuel (10M, 2650kg's), XMR-1 (1.2M, 2.25C), Carbon Vanes (0.12M, 0.24C), Explosive bolt staging (0.061M, 0.0305C)
    Wet/Dry Mass: 16.381/6.381 (4065.25kg)
    Delta-V: 1737m/s
    TMR at launch: 1.245 (-2 stability)
    Drag/Mass Ratio: 1/1 - 0 Stability
    Cost: 3.5205$

    Of course, that doesn't make for a good rocket, just a functional one. The crudely titled MISIT, or Man-In-Space-In-Theory design, has a lower launch TMR than the Scout and barely more delta-V. All your calculations show that it would go to space - just - but that it would be a rocky ride. Of course there are things you can do. Make it fat to improve the things stability, though that would increase drag losses. Increase the tank size to have a longer burn time to sacrifice even more TMR. The whole thing was a whole host of tradeoffs which is going to need a whole lot of late nights to get working.

    This is an effective design, but it needs more work. What will you do? (pick any/all!)
    [ ] Increase drag to increase stability, sacrificing delta-V (+1 stress)
    [ ] Increase tank size, losing TMR. (+1 stress)
    [ ] Reduce payload size, sacrificing the designed mission (+2 stress)
    [ ] Radically redesign the rocket to achieve your goals (+2 stress)
     
  • Threadmarks
    • [X] Radically redesign the rocket to achieve your goals (+2 stress)

    This thing looks a bit questionable for a manned vehicle. We don't seem to have the margins to improve it without shooting ourselves in the foot either.
     
    [X] Radically redesign the rocket to achieve your goals (+2 stress)
     
    TortugaGreen said:
    I see new Allegheny has yielded to the rest of the world and actually adopted sane units in this world.
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    Given that New Alleghany wears the "had a Bad Time with their late 18th century revolution" hat, for all we know, they're the people who invented the metric system.

    Although the Gallians had very good reason to do so, if their prior measuring system was the same as the one used by the ancien regime in France.
     
    [X] Radically redesign the rocket to achieve your goals (+2 stress)

    I will have this win, because reasons.
     
    C1P6
  • Threadmarks
    • It was no good. There is no proper way to achieve your goals with a simple, compact design. If you are going to really get anywhere, you're going to have to get creative about all of this.

    You set the team to work, to coming up with new ideas. You make it very clear to them that you'll take essentially anything they have, even the most out there, most under examined options if they thought that it might get you closer to that magic limit you'd set for them. A hundred a fifty kilometres, that's all it's going to take to make real history. You'll get your name in the papers. It's going to be incredible.

    Of course, you hadn't quite expected what you were handed when you assemble the team after the deadline hits.

    The first design, presented mostly by Amy but backed by Simon and Susan, is ingenious purely in it's size. Ten tons of rocket feeds three XMR engines which provide massive thrust at launch. And it needs it - the entire thing is estimated to mass in at around ten and a half tons and would, quite simply, be the largest rocket ever launched in New Alleghany. You can feel a buzz of excitement coursing through you as you look over the plans.
    Payload - 4M required, including recovery system and avionics.
    Rocket - Heavy Duty Tank (3M, 3C), Hydrazine/LOX fuel (30M, 7950kg's),3x XMR-1 (3.6M, 6.75C), Carbon Vanes (0.36M, 0.72C), Explosive Bolt Staging (0.03696M, 0.01848C)
    Wet/Dry Mass: 40.99696/10.99696 (10699kg)
    Delta-V: 2242m/s
    TMR at launch: 1.5 (0 stability)
    Drag/Mass Ratio: 1.5/1 - +1 Stability
    Cost: 10.48848

    And then you see the other design. Brought by Michael and Anthony, it is like nothing else you've ever seen. A smaller rocket is strapped to either side of the original MISIT rocket that you were involved in designing, each powered by a four chamber variant of the XLR-11 that lofted your scout. As far as you can tell, they will be detached as soon as they expend the tiny quantity of alcohol based fuel they are supplied with.
    Payload - 4M required, including recovery system and avionics.
    Rocket (Main stage) - Heavy Duty Tank (1M, 1C), Hydrazine/LOX fuel (10M, 2650kg's),x XMR-1 (1.2M, 2.25C), Carbon Vanes (0.12M, 0.24C), Explosive Bolt Staging (0.0616M, 0.0102C)
    Rocket (Booster 1) - Heavy Duty Tank (0.1M, 0.1C), Alc/LOX fuel (1M, 250kg's),x XLR-11-4 (0.6M, 1.5C), Parallel Staging (0.017M, 0.034C)
    Rocket (Booster 2) - Heavy Duty Tank (0.1M, 1C), Alc/LOX fuel (1M, 250kg's),x XLR-11-4 (0.6M, 1.5C), Parallel Staging (0.017M, 0.034C)
    Wet/Dry Mass: 19.8156/6.3816 (5103.9kg)
    Delta-V: 2105m/s
    TMR at launch: 1.8 (0 stability)
    Drag/Mass Ratio: 1/1 - +1 Stability
    Cost: 6.7682

    Of course, both rockets have problems inherent to their designs. Both experience quite a lot of drag due to the nature of their designs. The second, boosted design requires a full nine chambers to be ignited all at once on the launch pad while the first is much simpler. The second would also require the development of a way of safely separating the parallel boosters from the centre rocket so it could continue its flight unhindered. But, even if the first was more technologically simple, it is considerable heavier at over twice the mass and significantly more expensive.

    Both would be hard sells. Both would achieve their intended missions. But you are by no means sure which to choose.

    Which rocket do you prefer?
    [ ] More Power (Less engineering, harder to sell)
    [ ] More Boosters (More engineering, easier to sell)
     
  • Threadmarks
    • I wouldn't be surprised to see this also determining whether we prefer fewer, more individually capable stages, or more, individually less capable stages.

    That being said...

    [X] More Boosters (More engineering, easier to sell)

    Boosters have a huge advantage over single stage or stage and a half designs in terms of capabilities.
     
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