Discussion Megaroc

Which nation will become the 4th manned space-faring power?

  • Argentina

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Brazil

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Ethiopia

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • North Korea

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Pakistan

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • South Africa

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • South Korea

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    13

Soheil_Esy

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25 August 2015

The “Megaroc” man-carrying rocket proposal had been put forward by R.A. Smith in 1946 after H.E. Ross observed that the V-2 was “nearly big enough to carry a man.” The objective was to provide manned ascents to a maximum of 304 km (one million feet). During flight, it was proposed that scientific observations could be made of the Earth and the Sun, that radio communication through the ionosphere could be tested, and that data should be collected on human performance over a wide range of g-conditions. The project was submitted to the Ministry of Supply on 23rd December 1946, but rejected. The proposal has remarkable similarities to the subsequent American Mercury project. Where differences do occur, they generally arise from the fact that Megaroc was much less ambitious, not being designed for orbital flight.

The Ross and Smith Megaroc was a modified, enlarged and strengthened V-2. The normal motor was retained but the tank diameter was increased and the end walls strengthened to accommodate enough propellant for 110 sec at full thrust, and a further 38 sec at constant acceleration. This brought the maximum hull diameter up to 2.18 m. The graphite efflux control vanes were retained, enlarged, and given the extra duty of imparting a slow stabilizing spin to the rocket. On the other hand, the big aerodynamic fins and associated controls were omitted, saving some 320 kg of weight. This was, indeed, one of the first big rocket designs in which aerodynamic fins were omitted – a feature not generally adopted in practice for another ten years.

The standard turbo-pump was retained but turned through 90°, rotating about the major axis of the rocket to prevent the turbine promoting tumbling after fuel cut-off. In place of the instrument bay and warhead there was a pressurized cabin, enclosed in a streamlined, jettisonable nose cone. This brought the overall length of the rocket up to 17.5 m. The launch weight was 21.2 tonnes.

The cabin, with a return weight of 586 kg, had two large side-ports for access, observation and egress. There was also a “strobo-periscope” (a modified form of the BIS’ pre-War coelostat) for rearward viewing after the rotating cabin had separated from the hull. Mercury’s one-ton double-walled titanium cabin started off with a topside escape hatch, two small ports and a periscope. However, the hatch was later more conveniently situated, like Megaroc’s, in the side of the cabin and arrangements were made for picture-window visibility.

Megaroc’s observer was to wear a standard high- altitude g-suit, with its own air-conditioning unit and personal parachute. No other air-conditioning was proposed owing to the short duration of the flight. Although both used a cradle-type seat with integral controls, the Mercury cradle was fixed while Megaroc’s was counterbalanced and designed to tilt. The cabins of both rockets were attitude-stabilized by hydrogen peroxide jets, and both were fitted with automatic, manual and emergency controls, differing mainly in that the Megaroc was designed for a less hazardous mission.

Mercury’s cabin was provided with a heat shield against frictional heating upon re-entry to the atmosphere, retro-rockets and parachutes for braking and descent. Megaroc needed no special heat shield and relied on a reefing parachute ejected by spring flaps and a compressed air charge to provide constant drag irrespective of air-density and velocity of descent. Megaroc’s cabin was suitable for either sea or land impact and was fitted with a crumple skirt to absorb some of the shock and avoid bounce with a quick-release mechanism for the parachute.

The maximum ascent acceleration imposed on the Megaroc observer was 3 g (for Mercury the figure was 9 g). It would be launched from a tower inclined at an angle of 2° from the vertical with an initial acceleration of 9.8 m/sec2. Constant thrust would be maintained for 110 sec when the rocket would have reached 46,000 m,and the effective acceleration would have become about 20 m/s2. At this point the pilot would be experiencing 3 g, the limit at which it was thought that operational duties could be satisfactorily discharged. The pilot would actuate the fuel controls at this point to progressively reduce thrust and keep the g-meter reading constant. In case of emergency at any stage of the flight, relaxation of the pilot’s grip would switch the rocket from manual operation to automatic radio-telecontrol from the ground.

When the air-density had reduced to a point where drag was negligible, a pressure operated release mechanism would unlatch the nose-cone sections ready for jettisoning. At some subsequent moment the pilot would operate a compressed-air charge to drive the cabin and hull apart. This would also initiate operation of a delay mechanism for ejection of the hull-recovery parachute. The control connections between cabin and hull would uncouple automatically on separation and the communication system would be switched from the four-dipole arrays arranged in blisters near the stem of the hull to arrays situated under the floor of the cabin. Cabin attitude and rate of spin would be controlled by hydrogen peroxide jets. It was thought that the pilot would therefore be able to carry out experiments with various values of g, down to zero, including free movement inside the cabin, and would be able to turn the cabin stern-down for re-entry into the atmosphere. The apex of the trajectory would be attained about 6 min 16 sec after launch and the cabin’s constant-drag parachute was to be ejected in descent at an altitude of about 113 km, the maximum deceleration imposed on the pilot being calculated as 3.3 g. The parachute would be fully extended on approaching touchdown, when it would be released to prevent the cabin from being dragged along.

It was appreciated that the Megaroc project would need to progress through a series of preliminary experiments to test the practicality of the design. For example,the modifications to the turbine and fuel control, and the endurance and reliability of the motor under the prolonged running conditions would need to be verified. The efficiency of other special innovations, such as the crumple skirt, variable-area parachutes and strobo-periscope were also to be tested. An operational mock-up of the cabin was proposed, to be suspended by a cable so that the pilot could be trained in control of orientation and spin. The pilot would also be trained in the telecontrol of an unmanned rocket and cabin assembly in free flight. Manned ascents to progressively increased altitudes were to be undertaken before attempting the maximum terminal altitude of over 1,000,000 ft (304 km).

The information on Megaroc is from the BIS book “Interplanetary” and incorporates edited information from articles from the August and September 1967 issues of the BIS Magazine, Spaceflight.

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http://www.bis-space.com/what-we-do/projects/megaroc
 

RGClark

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Thanks for the info on the Megaroc. It is interesting in your poll that no European countries are listed. What's also interesting is that it is understandable to Europeans that they are not.

On the lasting importance of the SpaceX accomplishment, Page 4: how the Ariane 6 can beat both SpaceX and the Russians.
http://exoscientist.blogspot.com/2013/06/on-lasting-importance-of-spacex.html


Bob Clark
 

ISProgram

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USSR, USA, EU...

Isn't China potentially the 4th manned space-faring power, they have alot more expertise and technology to aid in that goal then virtually every country on your poll.

:goodnight:
 

RGClark

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USSR, USA, EU...

Isn't China potentially the 4th manned space-faring power, they have alot more expertise and technology to aid in that goal then virtually every country on your poll.

:goodnight:

He means countries that have their own manned launchers. So the EU is not included, but China is.

Bob Clark
 

Soheil_Esy

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Thanks for the info on the Megaroc. It is interesting in your poll that no European countries are listed. What's also interesting is that it is understandable to Europeans that they are not.

On the lasting importance of the SpaceX accomplishment, Page 4: how the Ariane 6 can beat both SpaceX and the Russians.
http://exoscientist.blogspot.com/2013/06/on-lasting-importance-of-spacex.html


Bob Clark

I'm surprised at people's mental confusion:

  • EU is not a nation, period. :tiphat:


USSR, USA, EU...

Isn't China potentially the 4th manned space-faring power, they have alot more expertise and technology to aid in that goal then virtually every country on your poll.

:goodnight:

 

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Out of all the choices in the poll, India and Iran are the only ones that have plans for manned spacecraft.

Maybe Japan could do it if they really wanted to, but they currently have economic/demographic issues.
 

Urwumpe

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:rolleyes:

*kein Kommentar*
 

Soheil_Esy

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Out of all the choices in the poll, India and Iran are the only ones that have plans for manned spacecraft.

Maybe Japan could do it if they really wanted to, but they currently have economic/demographic issues.

It's only about political will; under General Tojo, during the 1940s, the Empire of Japan developed the world's first manned space program.

Key data:
Harbin Unit 731 Japanese Warfare Museum - vacuum experiments in preparation for manned outer space missions

8428461383_82e25096b6_c.jpg
 

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I don't consider cruel experimentation/war crimes to be the same as a legitimate manned space program.
 
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Soheil_Esy

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Okay, that is just inaccurate.

I don't consider cruel experimentation/war crimes to be the same as a manned space program.

Third Reich Germany did the same with live human subjects for their own space program, and later, both the US and USSR*1 certainly had to explore vacuum effects on their own with living animals like monkeys, dogs or pigs.


*1
RAPID (EXPLOSIVE) DECOMPRESSION EMERGENCIES IN PRESSURE-SUITED SUBJECTS
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
WASHINGTON, D. C. NOVEMBER 1968

by Emanuel M. Roth

http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19690004637.pdf
 
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Soheil_Esy

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Citation needed.

---

A Scientist's Nazi-Era Past Haunts Prestigious Space Prize

In a book on Nazi medical practices between 1927-1945, author Hans-Walter Schmuhl, a German scholar, recounted in detail those experiments, explaining how the tests had initially begun on rabbits. He described how Dr. Strughold had several "vacuum chambers" and the children were subjected to experiments that simulated altitudes of nearly 20,000 feet.

P1-BJ345_PRIZE_DV_20121130171439.jpg

Dr. Hubertus Strughold, dubbed the 'Father of Space Medicine,' in an early chamber designed to simulate the conditions in space. Some scientists want his name removed from a medical prize.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052970204349404578101393870218834

9 Nazi Scientists Who Helped Build The American Space Program

The experiments he allegedly oversaw included performing surgery without anesthetic and depriving people of oxygen in vacuum compartments, as well as human experiments related to hypothermia. These experiments were meant to determine the effects of high altitude and supersonic flights on human beings.

http://www.businessinsider.com/nazi-scientists-space-program-2014-2

Miltary Medical Ethics, Volume 2

A Luftwaffe experiment performed at Dachau by SS (Schutzstaffel) ["protection echelon"] physicians working in the context of aviation medicine. The subject was placed in a vacuum chamber to simulate the effects of explosive decompression. Approximately 70 to 80 people died in the course of the experiment (mostly Soviet and Polish prisoners of wars), designed to explore the limits of human survivability in such circumstances.

https://books.google.com/books?id=A...erman vacuum experiment on live human&f=false

The A-9/A-10 rocket represented one of the earliest detailed studies of a multistage rocket, capable of crossing the Atlantic Ocean.

image-of-A9-10-in-flight.jpg


036_zpsd4908039.jpg


http://www.russianspaceweb.com/a9a10.html
 
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Urwumpe

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And where is the manned space program?

That was aeronautics research. High altitude bombers. Something that all countries researched during war, but only few with human research subjects.
 

Soheil_Esy

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And where is the manned space program?

That was aeronautics research. High altitude bombers. Something that all countries researched during war, but only few with human research subjects.

Another concept called for a manned version of the A-9 stage piloted by a semi-kamikaze pilot.

Maximum altitude of the upper stage: 160 kilometers

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/a9a10.html

That's in space according to modern standards and also to the 1942's definition; a sub-orbital manned flight.
 

Urwumpe

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That's in space according to modern standards and also to the 1942's definition; a sub-orbital manned flight.

Yes, but the A9 was never getting anywhere even in its early developments. Sure mostly because of the war.

Also, please note that Nazi Germany had a quite different understanding of "suicide" attacks as for example Japan, so mixing the two kinds up in wild nazi fiction does not really show you any Germany in history.

Not one of the past, not the one of today and not the one of the future.
 

Soheil_Esy

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Yes, but the A9 was never getting anywhere even in its early developments. Sure mostly because of the war.

Also, please note that Nazi Germany had a quite different understanding of "suicide" attacks as for example Japan, so mixing the two kinds up in wild nazi fiction does not really show you any Germany in history.

Not one of the past, not the one of today and not the one of the future.


Sonderkommando Elbe: German Kamikazes

Little-Known WWII Tale of Suicidal Pilots Over Europe

22.03.11

Towards the end of World War II, the German Luftwaffe airforce resorted to a series of deadly suicide missions. Die Welt journalist and historian Sven Felix Kellerhoff examines a little documented chapter in Germany’s military history.

The attack came from above. On April 7, 1945, as more than 1,300 four-engine, U.S. Air Force bombers began their approach over northern Germany, on a mission to target factories and freight stations, they were suddenly challenged. At 1:35 in the afternoon, German single-engine planes began to fall out of the sky from above them. But instead of closing in from the usual distance of about 600 meters, firing, and then turning away, the German planes set themselves on a collision course.

The U.S. pilots of the B-17 and B-24 bombers were left with only seconds to quickly maneuver their comparatively slower planes out of the way. Nearly two dozen of the Flying Fortresses and Liberators did not succeed: they collided with the fighters. Various reports cite that between eight and 15 U.S. planes were torn apart or so badly damaged that they had to be abandoned. Another 28 bombers were shot down by German fighters.

It was the only major attack undertaken by the "Sonderkommando Elbe", a special unit whose mission illustrated the total despair that had befallen the Luftwaffe during the last months of the War. Ten days later, the group launched another attack - this time the pilots dove into Soviet troops crossing bridges over the Oder River east of Berlin. The full details of these attacks are lost in rumors and myths. Similarly, legends are told of a SS special unit with the same mission that was known under the code name "Leonidas." Whether this group actually existed or whether it was a post-War invention still remains unclear.

What is known, however, is that the idea for the "self-sacrifice" missions using fighter aircraft came from the pilot and Hermann Goering confidant Hajo Herrmann. He was also the inventor of “Wilde Sau,” the technique that engaged British night bombers with single-seat fighter planes. Day fighters were used during these attacks, and their rapid surprise attacks were enabled by light grenades that lit up the night sky. The initiative suffered such great losses that it was given up after just a few months.

When it became clear that a new mass production of British and American planes would begin no earlier than mid-April 1945, Herrmann suggested the creation of a special unit of relentless young pilots. They were to ram enemy bombers with stripped versions of the older Messerschmitt Bf-109 aircraft. The men were ordered to abandon their planes at the last moment with a parachute. However, because there were no ejection seats, their chance of survival was only 10 percent.

The "Sonderkommando Elbe", which began recruiting at the end of 1944, consisted mostly of young volunteers who had grown up under the Nazi regime and were ready to sacrifice their lives for their leaders and their country. Their use, however, remained limited. The only official use of the Sonderkommando Elbe was over the Steinhude Sea, Germany’s largest inland sea, on April 7, 1945. Most of the pilots died, but the enemy was not harmed as much as had been hoped. The attack on the bridges over the Oder yielded similarly weak results.

A manned version of the "Vengeance Weapon" V-1, the first cruise missile in military history, was never employed. The first 175 copies were built with a cockpit made for flight tests, but the Luftwaffe briefly considered using these simple bombs as suicide weapons.

This device bore a surprising similarity to the Japanese "Oka" ("Cherry Blossom") aircraft, which was essentially a manned glide bomb. These Japanese planes, in contrast with the German ones, were used more than 70 times between March and June 1945. However, only one US destroyer was sunk while half a dozen smaller warships were badly damaged.

Suicide attacks conducted with conventional aircraft were more “successful.” For these, the Japanese equipped type “Zero” fighter planes with heavy bombs and just enough fuel to reach their destinations. More than 3000 such operations were documented, and only a few of the pilots survived. Approximately 360 Allied ships were damaged during the campaign, including several aircraft carriers. But only three of them - the USS Bunker Hill, USS Intrepid, and the already obsolete USS Enterprise - were so badly damaged that they were removed from battle.

It is likely that the German suicide pilot missions were inspired by the Japanese example, but there is no conclusive evidence to confirm that. It is clear, however, that this murderous plan fell short of its goal: though the psychological impact of the missions was immense, the physical damage they incurred was minimal. Once the US Navy was able to recover from the initial terror of the attacks, their effect waned. Any approaching aircraft that were believed to be on kamikaze missions were shot down before they had a chance to reach their target.

Several hundred pilots who were ready to sacrifice their lives still remained in service by the time the Japanese surrendered at the end of World War II. On the day of the Armistice, their commander took his life. Yet Hajo Hermann, who led the German suicide pilots, began a new life after the war. Following a decade of prison in the Soviet Union, he became a lawyer, before dying last November at the age of 97.

image-619788-breitwandaufmacher-ghus.jpg

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Sonderkommando Elbe in action against US bombers over Germany

Original article in German

http://www.worldcrunch.com/world-af...-tale-of-suicidal-pilots-over-europe/c1s2859/

Leonidas Squadron: The German Suicide Squadron


Named for the legendary ancient Spartan king who died in action with his 300-man army at Thermopylae, the Leonidas Squadron or Staffel 5 was organized in 1944 as part of the elite bomber/recon wing Kampfgeschwader 200.

The group was comprised of 70 volunteers, all of whom were required to sign a contract in which the recruits essentially forfeited their lives. The document specifically referred to “suicide missions” and “human glider bombs”. “I fully understand that employment in this capacity will entail my own death,” the agreement read. [1] Pilots in the Leonidas Squadron were trained to fly the experimental Fi-103R Reichenberg, a manned version of the V-1 flying bomb. The volunteers would steer the 26-foot long aircraft, which could fly 350 km (200 miles) at speeds approaching 800 km/h (55 mph), into enemy targets like ships or bridges. The Nazis hoped that the pilots would be able to bail out before impact, but if it proved necessary the fliers were expected to die with their aircraft. In any event, the proximity of the cockpit to the Fi-103R’s jet engine made the chances of survival after bailing out less than 1 percent. [2]

The idea of the suicide squadron was first proposed by senior SS official Otto Skorzeny and Hajo Herrmann, a veteran Luftwaffe bomber pilot and tactician. Like the kamikaze, it was conceived as a means of redressing the gaping military imbalance between Nazi Germany and the Allies as well as a way of demonstrating the regime’s commitment to the cause. Surprisingly, Hitler was wary of the concept at first but as the war continued he finally embraced it, so long as he alone decided when suicide bombers would be ordered into battle. [3] While consideration was given to unleashing manned missiles on the Normandy invasion fleet and Soviet power stations, problems with the Fi-103Rs kept Staffel 5 grounded. It wasn’t until the final days of the war that 35 of the volunteers flew a random assortment of Luftwaffe aircraft into Soviet-controlled bridges over the Oder River near Berlin. The Nazis claimed to have destroyed 17 bridges with their so-called “self-sacrifice” sorties between April 17 and 20; historians have found evidence of only one successful strike. The unit was grounded permanently when the Red Army captured its airfield.

fi-103.jpg

242BD83E5479680F1BDE4F

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Video

[ame="http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=975_1405290995"]LiveLeak.com - Leonidas Squadron - Secret Nazi Suicide Unit HD[/ame]

http://militaryhistorynow.com/2014/...ikazes-werent-the-only-suicide-pilots-of-ww2/

Neger human torpedo

Although volunteers for Neger operations - a mixed bunch of soldiers and sailors; recruiting from U-boat arm was forbidden by Grossadmiral Doenitz- were warned at the outset that they had no more than a 50 per cent chance of survival, the fact that the operator was literally imprisoned during his mission savoured too greatly of openly suicidal tactics. A cupola-release was fitted within the cockpit, although this led to losses when pilots opened-up for fresh air and were swamped. A self-contained Draeger breathing-apparatus with a face-mask, like those issued to aircrew, was provided, but cases of carbon-dioxide poisoning were not uncommon.

Although reliable figures are unobtainable, it is probable that more than half the operational losses of the Neger were caused by accident rather than enemy action. As well as the hazards already detailed, the Neger was highly unstable after its lower torpedo was fired - and there were occasions when the lower torpedo, once started, failed to separate from the carrier body and dragged the whole craft to destruction at high speed.

The German naval historian Cajus Bekker (who gives an overall loss rate of 60-80 per cent for German manned-torpedoes) states that Doenitz favoured limiting the craft to such employment but was overruled by Adolf Hitler, who wove fantasies of the "enormous strategical consequences" if Small Battle Units were to sink "six to eight battleship in the Seine estuary".

https://books.google.com/books?id=O...rman for Negro) was a German torpedo-&f=false
 
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Urwumpe

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And still, after only one action, Elbe was disbanded and its pilots turned into infantry.

Your "Leonidas" (which never existed in German sources) was even cancelled during testing because it was useless. As much as History Channel tries to inflate it ... in reality the projects ended quickly because such suicide units had been considered as sign of desperation and defeatism, harmful for the moral of the people.

EDIT: And Neger was no suicide weapon. Despite piloting it was deadly, it was planned to turn around and return to the home base after firing the torpedo. Again - no comparison to Japanese culture with its emphasis on death before dishonour. The successor of Neger was the Marder, which had the same mission:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marder_(submarine)

But what are you arguing about anyway?
 
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Soheil_Esy

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And where is the manned space program?

That was aeronautics research. High altitude bombers. Something that all countries researched during war, but only few with human research subjects.

Here, the Third Reich's Manned GEO Solar Concentrator WMD:yes:

Secret Nazi plan to blow up cities, boil oceans with ‘sun gun’

April 03, 2013

secret-nazi-plan-to-blow-up-cities-boil-oceans-with-sun-gun-1364920790-5895.jpg


IT may sound like a something a Bond villain would propose, but these amazing picture reveals the secret plans drawn up by the German army to create a mile-wide ‘space gun’ powered by the sun.

The giant mirror could be used to focus the sun on a target - rather like the magnifying glasses often used by children to create fire. The pictures, from Life magazine in 1945, reveal to its readers how ‘US Army technical experts came up with the astonishing fact that German scientists had seriously planned to build a ‘sun gun’.’

The giant orbital mirror would ‘focus the sun’s rays to a scorching point on the earth’s surface.’ The German army, readers were told, ‘hoped to use such a mirror to burn an enemy city or to boil part of an ocean.’
The idea is the brainchild of renowned rocket scientist Hermann Oberth, in 1923. With an estimated cost of three million marks and taking 15 years to construct, the original purpose of the space mirror was to provide the people of earth with sunshine on demand, anywhere on the globe. As late as 1957, he was still convinced that his space mirror would become a reality, but also described it as the ‘ultimate weapon’.

In 1945, when the victorious Allies began sifting through captured Nazi war plans, it emerged the Nazis had updated Oberth’s proposals and begun looked into the possibility of the Third Reich building a mirror weapon in geosynchronous orbit 22,236 miles above the Earth - which was then reported in Life Magazine’s 23 July 1945 issue.

‘My space mirror,’ he wrote, ‘is like the hand mirrors that schoolboys use to flash circles of sunlight on the ceiling of their classroom. A sudden beam flashed on the teacher’s face may bring unpleasant reactions. I was a schoolteacher long enough to have collected certain data on the subject.’
Although there were no official details of the construction of the project, Life magazine believed it would we put into orbit in preassembled sections.

The entire surface of the mirror-front, back and edges-would be mirrored, ‘otherwise [the sun’s rays] would burn occupants of disk to death instantly,’ the magazine claimed.

The Life version of the mirror would also contain a manned space stations, with 30-foot holes in which supply rockets could dock, hydroponic gardens to provide oxygen and solar powered generators for electric power. Once in orbit, the ‘master rocket’ for the project would unreel six long cables, each only 1/2 to 1 1/2 inches thick. Spinning the rocket on its axis would extend the cables radially, allowing construction to begin.

http://nation.com.pk/entertainment/...an-to-blow-up-cities-boil-oceans-with-sun-gun

LIFE Jul 23, 1945

KkZbroe.jpg

Third Reich's WMD in GEO focussing beam attack on New York City!

u4Leckl.jpg

Third Reich's man-made satellite weaponry

hb85njx.jpg

Building of WMD; WMD with crew and resupply

URXNPjF.jpg

Greenhouse producing oxygen supply for the crew

pM1jJOf.jpg

Solar electric generator and micro thrusters for attitude control assisting the targeting of the WMD

MAfOJLV.jpg

Centuries old of Archimedes hoax debunked

uugXCE4.jpg

Relation between focal lenght and size of image at focal point

https://books.google.com/books?id=3...result#v=onepage&q=german space mirror&f=true

Reply to Life Magazine arguments:

Of course a single lens/mirror optical apparatus would not be able to concentrate enough the image of the Sun at focal point, but multiple lens/mirrors certainly would! (sorry Archimedes:rofl:)

Proof, the world largest solar concentrator in Odeillo, France. No less than 3 optical elements before focus point.

S☫heil_Esy

The world's largest solar furnace is located in Font-Romeu-Odeillo-Via, a commune in the sunny Pyrenees mountains on the French-Spanish border. The furnace consists of a field of 10,000 mirrors bounce the sun's rays onto a large concave mirror which focuses the enormous amount of sunlight onto an area roughly the size of a cooking pot which reaches temperatures above 3,000 °C or 5,430 degrees Fahrenheit. The solar furnace itself isn't exactly new. The first modern solar furnace was built in Mont Louis, in 1949 by professor Félix Trombe, and the current one was constructed in 1970.

image.jpg


http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/worlds-largest-solar-furnace

VIDEO

Stop at 1m10s


China mulls 20 meters diameter telescope GEO satellite

2014, (9)

Thermal control scheme for ultrahigh resolution imaging system in geosynchronous orbit

This imaging satellite would be placed into a geostationary orbit: 20 m diameter thin-film mirror with total length of 100 meters, one meter resolution.
Summary:

Geostationary orbit very high-resolution imaging system using a thin film diffraction imaging system can achieve a ground resolution of under a meter. Analysis of the deployable conical hood in four extreme temperature distribution conditions is to determine the feasibility of thermal control scheme.

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