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Rocket, v. 1, issue 1, March 1940
Page 28
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28 The pilot has complete control of the force fields by a system of switches, knobs, and a series of rheostats. Normal earth gravity is maintained inside the ship at all times. A gravity field in the bottom of the ship is controlled and increased automatically regardless of the force of the gravitational pull on the outside of the ship. This is of course insulated from the force fields which power the cruiser. Presently "last call" is heard for visitors to leave the ship. The huge air locks slide silently into place and at last the order to depart is given. The pilot gradually moves the take-off rheostat thereby bringing the repulsion field slowly into play. In other words as the field is applied the ship gradually becomes lighter until the gravitational field of the earth and the repulsion field of the ship exactly balance or neutralize one another thereby making the ship weightless. Upon moving the controls past this point the repulsion field will take effect and our cruiser will slowly rise from its landing position and head for space. Upon applying still more control until one gravity is reached the ship will be literally falling away from the earth at a force exactly opposite to the gravitational pull on its mass when in a normal state. All this takes place so smoothly that if it weren't for the earth swiftly dropping away from us we would think we had not yet left the ground. Very soon we are completely out of the reaches of the earth's atmosphere and whole continents and oceans are spread out before us. At this time the captain will order the deflecting shield of force into operation which every ship must be equipped to guard against meteoric fragments and the like. After reaching a few hundred miles the pilot increases our speed by increasing our repulsion fields and by taking advantage of the sun's gravitational pull which is far greater than that of the planet's. This is done by operating several banks of controls until we are moving away from the earth with a force of several hundreds of gravities. Many hours after we have crossed the moon's orbit and leave the earth farther and farther behind, we find that the gravitational pull is decreasing. When this occurs that part of our ship facing nearest to our objective is charged with an attractional field instead of repulsion. This will tend to counteract the weakening pull of the earth and possibly increase our speed. It will also help to swing us into the direction of our objective as no allowances were made for the earth's rotation after we took off. And so we are taking full advantage of the tremendous forces that a rocket would have to fight at least until it was near enough to its objective to feel any gravitational effects. Eventually as we near the end of our journey the pilot begins decelerating by reversing the force fields. Soon we cross the orbit of tiny Deimos, the outer of the two Martian moons. Next we pass Phobos and finally reach the outer atmosphere of Mars. In the due course of time we find ourselves landed as smoothly and skillfully as our take-off from earth -- none the worse for our journey. What we find here and what we do now I shall leave to your imagination!
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28 The pilot has complete control of the force fields by a system of switches, knobs, and a series of rheostats. Normal earth gravity is maintained inside the ship at all times. A gravity field in the bottom of the ship is controlled and increased automatically regardless of the force of the gravitational pull on the outside of the ship. This is of course insulated from the force fields which power the cruiser. Presently "last call" is heard for visitors to leave the ship. The huge air locks slide silently into place and at last the order to depart is given. The pilot gradually moves the take-off rheostat thereby bringing the repulsion field slowly into play. In other words as the field is applied the ship gradually becomes lighter until the gravitational field of the earth and the repulsion field of the ship exactly balance or neutralize one another thereby making the ship weightless. Upon moving the controls past this point the repulsion field will take effect and our cruiser will slowly rise from its landing position and head for space. Upon applying still more control until one gravity is reached the ship will be literally falling away from the earth at a force exactly opposite to the gravitational pull on its mass when in a normal state. All this takes place so smoothly that if it weren't for the earth swiftly dropping away from us we would think we had not yet left the ground. Very soon we are completely out of the reaches of the earth's atmosphere and whole continents and oceans are spread out before us. At this time the captain will order the deflecting shield of force into operation which every ship must be equipped to guard against meteoric fragments and the like. After reaching a few hundred miles the pilot increases our speed by increasing our repulsion fields and by taking advantage of the sun's gravitational pull which is far greater than that of the planet's. This is done by operating several banks of controls until we are moving away from the earth with a force of several hundreds of gravities. Many hours after we have crossed the moon's orbit and leave the earth farther and farther behind, we find that the gravitational pull is decreasing. When this occurs that part of our ship facing nearest to our objective is charged with an attractional field instead of repulsion. This will tend to counteract the weakening pull of the earth and possibly increase our speed. It will also help to swing us into the direction of our objective as no allowances were made for the earth's rotation after we took off. And so we are taking full advantage of the tremendous forces that a rocket would have to fight at least until it was near enough to its objective to feel any gravitational effects. Eventually as we near the end of our journey the pilot begins decelerating by reversing the force fields. Soon we cross the orbit of tiny Deimos, the outer of the two Martian moons. Next we pass Phobos and finally reach the outer atmosphere of Mars. In the due course of time we find ourselves landed as smoothly and skillfully as our take-off from earth -- none the worse for our journey. What we find here and what we do now I shall leave to your imagination!
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