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Ember, issue 29, January 20, 1947
Page 3
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More from Norm Stanley on a possible atomic-drive rocket. If you will recall Ember printed some comments from Stanley in regard to "The Man Who Rocked the Earth", by Arthur Train and Dr. R. W. Wood. The spaceship in that story was driven by a ray which caused uranium to disintegrate, the particles shooting off at near-light velocities, and driving the ship accord to Newton's 3rd Law, Stanley continues: "Now no such disintegrating ray is known or likely to be discovered, but it is interesting to consider that a concentrated beam of neutrons (the neutron was quite unknown in 1914 when the story appears) would have almost exactly the same effect if it were trained on a mass of pure U-235 or Pu-239. Compare Campbell's description in the Dec, Air Trails of a hypothetical experiment in which two chunks of U-235, each of less than critical mass but together totalling a mass greater than critical, are made to approach each other slowly. As they come closer and closer a flux of neutrons and disintegration products passes between them and this mutual bombardment results in a strong force of repulsion being set up between them. It's just possible that we have here a means of obtaining a jet of particles of very high velocity which could be used for rocket propulsion without involving necessarily the production of extremely high temperatures. Suppose, for example, that one of the U-235 masses in the Campbell experiment were cylindrical and with one of the end faces made concave, so as to produce a focussing effect on the particles leaving it. The other mass could be toroidal -- doughnut shaped -- as in the diagram at the right. Then if they were forced close enough together to produce a moderately violent chain reaction (but not so violent as to be explosive) the stream of particles leaving the end of the cylinder would mostly go shooting out through the hole in the doughnut, and the whole outfit --with attached rocket hull -- would move in the opposite direction. The actual amount of matter which would be thrown off as particles would be very small, but the high velocity would impart a strong reaction to the rocket. (To be continued. Next it gets technical!) ODD NOTES... Way back in December Ackerman confided tomEmber that he had just had three scientifictional dreams. One concerned the current Argosy which had a story by George Allan England, which puzzled 4E, until inside he saw that it was a reprint from a 1916 issue of Railroad magazine. Another look at the cover and England's first name had become Glannigan, and then a check inside showed it to be Lannigan. "I wondered, in the dream, if Glannigan had been his real name, and Geo. a familiar one he had adopted." The second dream concerned his meeting a new fan with a rare fantasy book with a title 4E had never heard of. The last dream, probably why he told me about them at all, concerned me, your Embereditor. I had drawn a cover for Astounding, and what's more, had it accepted! It was a 4x4, showing 4 kittens with their claws encircling the globe (earth). But upon looking closely at the kittens, you see that they have human faces and are mutants. ((Maybe that cover would go fine on the first Unknown to be revived; the very first one had a globe on it, with encircling fingers. I bet Ralph Rayburn Phillips could paint those faces so that to most they'd look like real kittens, but to those in the "know" they would be mutants.--ad.)) Miles Eaton and Phillips are trying to get up a group of Northwest Fans. Anyone interested please write the former at 10835 N.E. Skidmore St., Portland 13, Oregon. -3-
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More from Norm Stanley on a possible atomic-drive rocket. If you will recall Ember printed some comments from Stanley in regard to "The Man Who Rocked the Earth", by Arthur Train and Dr. R. W. Wood. The spaceship in that story was driven by a ray which caused uranium to disintegrate, the particles shooting off at near-light velocities, and driving the ship accord to Newton's 3rd Law, Stanley continues: "Now no such disintegrating ray is known or likely to be discovered, but it is interesting to consider that a concentrated beam of neutrons (the neutron was quite unknown in 1914 when the story appears) would have almost exactly the same effect if it were trained on a mass of pure U-235 or Pu-239. Compare Campbell's description in the Dec, Air Trails of a hypothetical experiment in which two chunks of U-235, each of less than critical mass but together totalling a mass greater than critical, are made to approach each other slowly. As they come closer and closer a flux of neutrons and disintegration products passes between them and this mutual bombardment results in a strong force of repulsion being set up between them. It's just possible that we have here a means of obtaining a jet of particles of very high velocity which could be used for rocket propulsion without involving necessarily the production of extremely high temperatures. Suppose, for example, that one of the U-235 masses in the Campbell experiment were cylindrical and with one of the end faces made concave, so as to produce a focussing effect on the particles leaving it. The other mass could be toroidal -- doughnut shaped -- as in the diagram at the right. Then if they were forced close enough together to produce a moderately violent chain reaction (but not so violent as to be explosive) the stream of particles leaving the end of the cylinder would mostly go shooting out through the hole in the doughnut, and the whole outfit --with attached rocket hull -- would move in the opposite direction. The actual amount of matter which would be thrown off as particles would be very small, but the high velocity would impart a strong reaction to the rocket. (To be continued. Next it gets technical!) ODD NOTES... Way back in December Ackerman confided tomEmber that he had just had three scientifictional dreams. One concerned the current Argosy which had a story by George Allan England, which puzzled 4E, until inside he saw that it was a reprint from a 1916 issue of Railroad magazine. Another look at the cover and England's first name had become Glannigan, and then a check inside showed it to be Lannigan. "I wondered, in the dream, if Glannigan had been his real name, and Geo. a familiar one he had adopted." The second dream concerned his meeting a new fan with a rare fantasy book with a title 4E had never heard of. The last dream, probably why he told me about them at all, concerned me, your Embereditor. I had drawn a cover for Astounding, and what's more, had it accepted! It was a 4x4, showing 4 kittens with their claws encircling the globe (earth). But upon looking closely at the kittens, you see that they have human faces and are mutants. ((Maybe that cover would go fine on the first Unknown to be revived; the very first one had a globe on it, with encircling fingers. I bet Ralph Rayburn Phillips could paint those faces so that to most they'd look like real kittens, but to those in the "know" they would be mutants.--ad.)) Miles Eaton and Phillips are trying to get up a group of Northwest Fans. Anyone interested please write the former at 10835 N.E. Skidmore St., Portland 13, Oregon. -3-
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