Interestingly, this was a problem with early aviation as well (including
Langley, though it wasn't the only one). One of the key insights and
achievements of the Wrights was being able to control the aircraft
(albeit unstably). Their feat wasn't getting into the air -- anyone
could that. It was landing safely.
On 2019-03-17 07:40, JOHN HALPENNY wrote:
How did Goddard steer his rocket? Liquid fueled rockets were not very
useful until they developed a steering mechanism with vanes or
gimbals, and that couldn't be done until there was some sort of
autopilot. Control system failures doomed a lot of early rockets.
John
On Sunday, March 17, 2019, 8:05:20 a.m. EDT, Nels Anderson
<nels.anderson@xxxxxxx> wrote:
On 3/16/19 4:57 PM, Henry Spencer wrote:
93 years ago today, on 16 March 1926, Robert Goddard flew the verythat
first liquid-fuel rocket....
(Apart from its general pioneering importance, Peter Alway noted
it was also advance notice of a shift in the center of gravity of
rocket technology: it was the first significant innovation in
rocketry to appear in the United States, rather than Europe.)
Aside from the invention of the rocket itself, which took place in
Asia. And, because Goddard's secrecy, some of his innovations had to
be
re-invented in Europe before others, even Americans were able to take
advantage of them. To some extent, Goddard seems to have imposed upon
ITAR upon himself, where the 'I' stands for "intranational"!