Rockets and people, rocket development history in USSR (4 book set)

Very comprehensive view of rocket development and history from the russian side written by one of the "insiders" Boris Chertok (USSR/russian rocket control systems scientist)
freely available from NASA website: (O tempora, o mores!)

History e-Books | NASA

On the first volume the beginning is bit boring as I remember but the last half gets better when things really started to roll: Evacuating V2 technology from Germany, first test runs in Russia and so on. Later on there is a interesting stories about Sputnik, development problems during moon race and so on.
Was a suprise for me how advanced the German production was compared to anything what they had available in soviet union and also how well russians did after all.

Some parts of the later volumes are excruciatingly boring to read so I suggest freely skipping the parts where there is 4 pages long government department names
4 volumes total about 2400 pages so should keep you busy for a while even if you skip most of the department name orgies.

Last month I was in Peenemunde Germany where the whole rocket thing started, or at least got serious. I forget if it was 12,000 or 24,000 people working out there in the late 30's to early 40's. The RAF leveled most of it and now what stands is very nice museum on rocketry and other war related subjects in the old power plant. That is really the only building still standing from the period and it was rebuilt and used as a power plant till 1990, complete with its B & W Ameircan made boilers.

I did buy a neat looking book in English on what went on there but haven't had time to even look at it.

One thing that was neat, most museum captions were in German, Russian (remember it was in the old east) and English. Some were Polish too.

Someday if I can figure picture hosting I'll post pictures. But not now...

MattiJ said:

Very comprehensive view of rocket development and history from the russian side written by one of the "insiders" Boris Chertok (USSR/russian rocket control systems scientist)
4 volumes total about 2400 pages so should keep you busy for a while even if you skip most of the department name orgies.

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I eventually succeded in reading through just 2 pages at the beginning, but these were very interesting. Will have a go at the rest of the 2400 when time allows.
Thanks for posting, MattiJ.
Did you read Tom Wolfe's The Right Stuff?
Regards, fusker

fusker said:

I eventually succeded in reading through just 2 pages at the beginning, but these were very interesting. Will have a go at the rest of the 2400 when time allows.
Thanks for posting, MattiJ.
Did you read Tom Wolfe's The Right Stuff?
Regards, fusker

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You're welcome.

Even if the Chertok's book can be heavy read there is also hidden gems like the part where they are struggling with insufficient liquid oxygen production. Soviet union steel factories get mad as there is not enough oxygen left for their production needs because half of the soviet production is shipped to Baikonur Cosmodrome by trains. Year or two later they fiqure out that if they actually "add" the vacuum to the vacuum insulated train vagons they can cut their consumption by 90%

The Right Stuff looked interesting, have to try to get hold of it.

Talking about rockets I have to mention "Ignition!" An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants:
http://www.sciencemadness.org/library/books/ignition.pdf
Written by: John Drury Clark - Wikipedia

Lighter to read than Chertok's bibles but very intresting and you wouldn't believe what sort of crazy stuff they have attempted to burn as a rocket fuel!

Robert Goddard of the US was a pioneer of liquid fueled rockets:

Robert H. Goddard - Wikipedia

May be covered in "Ignition" above.

Paul

Took a while to remember the lovely rocket oxidizer name: Chlorine trifluoride
Sand Won’t Save You This Time | In the Pipeline

If anyone is harassed by company's safety officer over some spray can solvent tell them that you need handling instructions for 2 pounds of Chlorine Trifluoride.

MattiJ said:

Took a while to remember the lovely rocket oxidizer name: Chlorine trifluoride
Sand Won’t Save You This Time | In the Pipeline

If anyone is harassed by company's safety officer over some spray can solvent tell them that you need handling instructions for 2 pounds of Chlorine Trifluoride.

Click to expand...

Matt -

I spent a good portion of my working career in a 'wet process' plant building printed wiring product. Never was responsible for any of the 'wet' stuff, but knew the basics on what we had that was not friendly. Your link raises that to a whole new level and reminds me why I stayed away from chemistry!

Dale