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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
    • [x] Develop more efficient engine technology before anything else, reducing time for design.
    [X] Boosted single engine multi-stage - requiring structural research (estimated 100 cost, 85 tons) (Plan @Usili 2.0 )
    Top two, people.
     
    Okay, so just to clarify I have this right, the top vote would rank as 'pick 1', with the one underneath it being 'pick 2' (for approval voting), right?

    [X] Boosted single engine multi-stage - requiring structural research (estimated 100 cost, 85 tons) (Plan @Usili 2.0 )
    [X] Develop more efficient engine technology before anything else, reducing time for design.
     
    [x] Develop more efficient engine technology before anything else, reducing time for design.
    [X] Boosted single engine multi-stage - requiring structural research (estimated 100 cost, 85 tons) (Plan @Usili 2.0 )
     
    [X] Develop more efficient engine technology before anything else, reducing time for design.
    [X] Boosted single engine multi-stage - requiring structural research (estimated 100 cost, 85 tons) (Plan @Usili 2.0 )
     
    [X] Boosted single engine multi-stage - requiring structural research (estimated 100 cost, 85 tons) (Plan @Usili 2.0 )
    [X] Develop more efficient engine technology before anything else, reducing time for design.
     
    [X] Boosted single engine multi-stage - requiring structural research (estimated 100 cost, 85 tons) (Plan @Usili 2.0 )

    Structural steel tanks are probably the best immediate upgrade we can get right now.
     
    [x] Develop more efficient engine technology before anything else, reducing time for design.
    [X] Boosted single engine multi-stage - requiring structural research (estimated 100 cost, 85 tons) (Plan @Usili 2.0 )
     
    4WheelSword said:
    Project Ajax Objective:

    • Payload: 16 mass not including guidance
    • Cross- Range: 4000 kilometres

    • May include unique engine design
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    How much is a "mass" again? Can we just use kilos?

    4WheelSword said:
    around 5-6000 or thereabouts. Maybe a bit less.
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    Hm, that'd work well as a first stage for a launch vehicle.

    Question, what sort of industries, resources and transport network does New Alleghany have?

    Should we, like the Soviets, be designing rockets to fit through train tunnels? Or is there a good canal network to barge big rocket parts down?

    What sort of fossil fuels does New Alleghany produce? Does it have wells that produce the needed stuff for making rocket kerosene? Does it have gas fields and the technology to start to exploit them?

    Where are the main industrial hubs relative to our design center?

    fasquardon
     
    fasquardon said:
    Question, what sort of industries, resources and transport network does New Alleghany have?

    Should we, like the Soviets, be designing rockets to fit through train tunnels? Or is there a good canal network to barge big rocket parts down?

    What sort of fossil fuels does New Alleghany produce? Does it have wells that produce the needed stuff for making rocket kerosene? Does it have gas fields and the technology to start to exploit them?

    Where are the main industrial hubs relative to our design center?
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Similar to the OTL USA. There's decent industry, excellent resources and the transport network is... alright. The trains are good though.

    Train tunnels would likely be a decent limitation but I'm not going to introduce that at this point since we're so early on.

    See: 1950 USA re: availabilities. Once someone figures out RP-1, it'll absolutely be available.

    Centre of design is in Califia on the West Coast. Production centres are mostly commercial or military and they are not as large as in OTL due to a lack of WW2.
     
    4WheelSword said:
    Similar to the OTL USA. There's decent industry, excellent resources and the transport network is... alright. The trains are good though.

    Train tunnels would likely be a decent limitation but I'm not going to introduce that at this point since we're so early on.

    See: 1950 USA re: availabilities. Once someone figures out RP-1, it'll absolutely be available.

    Centre of design is in Califia on the West Coast. Production centres are mostly commercial or military and they are not as large as in OTL due to a lack of WW2.
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    West coast of N.A. hm? We probably want to design rockets that are easy to transport by rail then. Also if it is like the USA, there should be plenty of aerospace countries within easy reach of us here (due to cheap hydroelectricity).

    I was hoping we'd be near an oil field with a high volatile fraction, so we could play around with propane or MAPP gas as rocket fuels.

    Does your system deal at all with the mass efficiency you get when making rockets wider? I couldn't see anything like that when I looked through the rules just now... One of my ideas was to make a really wide rocket - say 5m wide on a rocket 20m tall (and so gain mass efficiency that way, rather than through investing in thin tank walls).

    fasquardon
     
    fasquardon said:
    Does your system deal at all with the mass efficiency you get when making rockets wider? I couldn't see anything like that when I looked through the rules just now... One of my ideas was to make a really wide rocket - say 5m wide on a rocket 20m tall (and so gain mass efficiency that way, rather than through investing in thin tank walls).
    Click to expand...
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    So, because it only measures rockets based on their mass it doesn't do this, no. What a 'wide' rocket effects is drag losses and stability.
     
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    C3P2
  • Threadmarks
    • In discussion with your team, you identify three key areas of technology development that you're going to need to make any sort of rocket design, especially a long range multi-stage design, carry the sort of payload that the Army wants.

    First, the engine. Both the cycle and the injectors that you are currently using could be much better optimised to improve mass flow, increase fuel vaporisation and raise combustion rates. A more efficient engine is a more capable engine and a more capable engine will lift more rocket more easily.

    Second, fuel. The fuels you have currently are capable - but they are also dangerous and difficult to use. Already there are reports of corrosion of the trucks you use for fuelling and there have been a few near misses with the Nitric acid. A fuel that isn't toxic but is better than alcohol would be a godsend.

    Finally, the rocket's structure itself. You have been using heavy, tough hulls to ensure that the designs suffered no drag or compression issues - but the more you launched, the more data you have on the atmosphere and the less it is looking like you need to overbuild the missiles. A lighter hull would give a better mass fraction, a better mass fraction would give a better results in flight.

    It would take months of research to refine these basic concepts into actual, buildable ideas, and that would seriously cut into the time you have to design a rocket for project Ajax - but nonetheless, it is necessary work.

    Please roll 2d10 4 times.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • rolling first time

    Aww, and I got so excited when I rolled a 10.
    Rockeye threw 2 10-faced dice. Total: 12
    10 10 2 2
     
    I'll throw another set since it's been a few minutes and nobody's done #s 3/4

    Huh, what are the chances of that? (About 1/50 I think.)
    Rockeye threw 2 10-faced dice. Reason: R&D Total: 12
    2 2 10 10
     
    Aight, you're coming out of this with gas-generator cycles and structural hulls. Update incoming. Tech post done as well.
     
    Usili 2.0 said:
    EDIT: But, I sort of wonder what the odds of getting twelves three times out of four for a single bit.
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    0.265356%, I think. There's a 9% chance of and given set of 2d10 adding up to 12, one of the sets of dice has to add up to anything other than 12, and there are four different dice that that one could be. 0.09*0.09*0.09*0.91*4
     
    C3P3
  • Threadmarks
    • You spend four months in deep, intense work with your team. Theories are tested, fuels are burned, miniature rockets are designed and fired hundreds of metres into the air. When you finally sit down, exhausted by the stress already, you have a handful of months left before the design submission deadline and more than half of it gone on research and experimentation. The rumour is that O'Connel already have a booster ready to fly and are constructing demo prototypes even as you sit down to a meeting.

    But you are very proud of what you have managed. So, perhaps you couldn't find a better fuel, and perhaps refined injectors escape the team, but you have a massively improved closed gas turbine cycle ready to go and a much lighter hull design just waiting for prototyping to check its strength. Whatever you build for the Ajax project, it's sure to draw a lot of attention purely for it's promises.

    The first step is an engine. There are not many options on the scale of what you are looking at, but Usili Aeronautics has at least one that you believe can be upgraded to fit what you are looking for.

    Fuel: N2H4/LOX
    1M Multi-Feed Cycle with Dual Impingement: .28 Mass Flow
    1.12M Atmospheric Nozzle
    ISP Atmospheric: 235s
    ISP Vacuum: 265s
    Atmospheric Thrust: 128.3kN
    Vacuum Thrust: 144.7kN
    Mass: 2.12M
    Cost: 4.64

    A simple step up design to the Multi-Feed rather than Single Feed system gave an increase of thirty kiloNewtons in the engine for only a relatively small increase in cost. But, it wasn't as advanced a design as you can manage and you know it. Not only that, but it uses the extremely corrosive hydrazine fuel.

    There is, however, the question of time. Do you have months to spend on designing your own engine? Or is the UA design the way to go?

    Well?
    [ ] Usili Aeronautics - we don't have the time
    [ ] Custom engine - we must have perfection.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • I vote we go with the UA design. Using the UA design, we pretty much just need eight engines on the first stage (with a 10M Structural Tank and getting us to 1.23 for a TWR) and two engines on the second stage (with a 4M Structural Tank and getting us to 1.10 for a TWR), and we get to 5.85km/s of delta-v (with a cost of 77.1885). It's honestly just perfect for what we need right now in terms of winning this contract.

    [X] Usili Aeronautics - we don't have the time
     
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