Rocket Lab Historic Documents

A collection of digitized historical documents, narrative histories, reference material, and technical reports related to the history of the Rocket Lab facility.

Histories

• NACA High Energy Propellant Research in 1950s (1971)
• Liquid Hydrogen as a Propulsion Fuel, 1945-1959
• NASA’s Hydrogen Outpost:  The Rocket Systems Area at Plum Brook Station (2016)
• Ideas Into Hardware: A History of the Rocket Engine Test Facility (2004)

Presentations

• Rocket Research Talk at the NACA’s 1947 Inspection
• Rocket Research Talk at the NACA’s 1949 Inspection
• NACA Conference on Fuels (1948)
• Review of Rocket Research at Lewis (1952)
• High-Energy Rocket Propellant Talks at NACA Inspection (1957)
• Materials Research Talk at 1966 Inspection
• Cleaner Skies Presentation at 1973 Inspection

Facility

Rocket Lab Descriptions

• High Pressure Combustion Laboratory description (1946)
• Rocket Lab Overview (1957)
• Rocket Lab Description (1957)
• Rocket Lab Facility Data (1959)
• Rocket Lab Overview (1992)
• Rocket Lab Fact Sheets (2000s)
• Rocket Lab Test Schedules (1945-1950)
• Rocket Lab Renaming (1949-1950)

Cell Descriptions

• Rocket Lab Complex Layouts (1956-2000)
• Rocket Lab Facilities Manual (1991)
• Research Combustion Lab Facilities (1988)
• Rocket Lab Test Cell Descriptions (1993)
• Rocket Lab Space Combustion Facilities (1994)
• Cell 11 Mach 4 Rocket-powered Supersonic Tunnel (1958)
• Cell 11 Combustor Flame Flashback Apparatus (1985)
• Cell 11 Low Thrust Rocket Test Facility (1990)
• Cell 11 Laser Rayleigh and Raman Diagnostics for Small Hydrogen/oxygen Rockets (1993)
• Cell 21 Low Thrust Rocket Facility Description (1993)
• Cell 21 New Test Stands for Cells 21 and 22 (2002)
• Cell 22 A Versatile Rocket Engine Hot Gas Facility (1993)
• Cell 22 Combustion Research Facility for Testing Advanced Materials (2003)
• Cell 22 Characterizing the Chemical Stability of High Temperature Materials (2005)
• Cell 23 Combuster Test Facilities (1995)
• Cell23 Combustor Test Facility (1995)
• Cell 23 Fuel-Flexible Gas Turbine Combustor Flametube Facility (2004)
• Cell 32 Description (1993)
• Cell 32 A New Facility for Advanced Rocket Propulsion Research (2012)
• Cell 32 Chemical Propulsion Research Complex
• Scrubber description (1959)

 Floor Plans

• Cell 11 and 12 Floor Plans (1956-2000)
• Cells 13 and 14 Floor Plans (1956-2000)
• Cells 21 and 22 Floor Plans (1956-2000)
• Cells 23 and 24 Floor Plans (1956-2000)
• Service Building Floor Plans (1956-2000)
• Instrument Building Floor Plans (1969-2000)
• Shop Building Floor Plans (1956-2000)
• Scrubber diagrams

Demolition

• Demolition Fact Sheet (2016)
• NASA Glenn Holds Public Meeting on Upcoming Demolition (2017)
• Public Meeting on Demolition of Rocket Lab (2018)

Test Reports

Ignition

• Starting of Rocket Engine at Conditions of Simulated Altitude (1950)
• Altitude Ignition of Liquid Propellant Rocket Engines (1949)

Cooling

• Internal film cooling of a 1000lb ammonia and LOX engine (1951)
• Evaluation of Ablative Materials as Nozzle Sections (1966)
• Evaluation of Ablative Materials as Nozzle Sections (1969)
• Design and Testing of 1000-pound Thrust FLOX-Propane Ablative Engine (1969)
• Design of Injectors and Ablative Chambers for FLOX-Propane Engine (1969)

Screaming

• Combustion instability in an acid-heptane rocket (1951)
• Photographic investigation of combustion in a transparent engine (1953)
• Effect of Fuels on Screaming in 200-pound-thrust Liquid-oxygen Engine (1956)

High-Energy Propellants

• Investigation of the Diborane – Hydrogen Peroxide Combination (1948)
• Investigation of Liquid Diborane – Liquid Oxygen Combination (1949)
• Investigation of Liquid Fluorine – Liquid Diborane Combination (1951)
• Performance of chlorine trifluoride-hydrazine combination in 100lb engine (1949)
• Investigation of liquid fluorine and liquid diborane combination in 100lb engine (1951)
• Hydrogen-Fluorine and Hydrogen-Oxygen Research at Lewis (1961)
• Investigation of Liquid diborane and LOX combination in 100lb engine (1949)
• Investigation of liquid fluorine and liquid ammonia in a 100lb engine (1953)
• Performance of JP-4 fuel with FLOX mixtures in a 1000lb engine (1958)
• Experimental performance with a FLOX and JP-4 mixture (1955)
• Performance of Liquid Hydrogen and Liquid Fluorine Regeneratively Cooled Engines (1959)

Alternative Fuels

• Ignition and Combustion of Metallized Propellants (1989)
• Subscale Powdered Aluminum and Oxygen Combustion (1993)
• Oxygen/RP-1/Aluminum Rocket Combustion Experiments (1995)
• Oxygen/RP-1/Aluminum Rocket Heat Transfer and Combustion (1996)
• Metallized Gelled Propellants in a Pulse Detonation Engine (2006)
• Carbon monoxide and oxygen ignition experiments (1990)
• Carbon monoxide and oxygen combustion experiments (1991)
• Heat transfer characteristics of carbon monoxide and oxygen engine (1993)
• Overview of Glenn’s Green Propellant Infusion Mission Thruster Testing (2014)
• Green Propellant Infusion Mission Program Development and Technology Maturation (2014)
• Green Propellant Infusion Mission Program Development (2014)
• NASA, Industry Test Additively Manufactured Rocket Engine Injector (2013)

Thrusters

• Temperature Effect on Thrust Buildup in Hydrogen Peroxide Rockets (1960)
• Performance of Bipropellant Fractional-Pound Thrusters (1968)
• Performance of a Water-Electrolysis Rocket (1969)
• 6670-Newton Attitude-Control Thruster using Hydrogen-Oxygen Propellant (1977)
• Design, Fabrication, and Test of a LOX/LCH4 RCS Igniter at NASA (2007)
• LOX-methane glow plug igniter tests (2009)
• Testing of Methane/Oxygen Catalytic Microtube Ignition System (2012)

Combustors

• Gas Turbine Combustor with Air Atomizing Fuel Injector System (1969)
• Effect of Diffuser Designs on an Experimental Turbojet Combustor (1971)
• Performance of Short Length Turbojet Combustor (1971)
• Combustor Liner Film Cooling in Free-Stream Turbulence (1971)
• Study of Spray Characteristics of a Airblast Atomizer (1985)
• Combustor Flame Flashback Report (1985)
• Fuel-rich, catalytic reaction experimental results (1991)
• Hydrogen/Air Fuel Nozzle Emissions Experiments (2000)
• Low emission hydrogen combustors using lean direct injection (2004)

 Power Generation

• MHD Power Generator Facility – Tech Preview
• NASA Lewis H2-O2 MHD program (1974)
• Results and progress on the NASA Lewis H2-O2 MHD program (1976)
• Temperature distributions of a cesium-seeded hydrogen-oxygen supersonic free jet (1978)
• Lewis Pressurized, Fluidized-Bed Combustion Program–Data and Calculated Results (1982)
• Erosion/Corrosion of Airfoil Materials in the High-Velocity Effluent of a Pressurized Fluidized Coal Combustor (1978)

Single-Stage to Orbit

• X-33 Advanced Technology Demonstrator Fact Sheet
• Combustion Wave Ignition for Rocket Engines (1992)
• CWI Test Operational Readiness Review (1998)
• X-33 Combustion-Wave Ignition System Tested (1998)
• Hypersonic engine experiments in a high heat flux environment (1993)
• Integrated High Payoff Rocket Propulsion SiC Recession Model (2009)

Reference

NASA

• National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) overview
• Jet Propulsion Laboratory history
• Space Exploration Initiative (SEI) summary
• X-33 Technology Demonstration
• Energy Research and Development Administration (ERDA) history

Glenn Research Center

• Center Names Evolve article
• Glenn Historic Facilities websites
• John Sloop biography
• Abe Silverstein biography

Technical

• Propellants background information
• Specific impulse description
• Combustor technology description
• Shuttle Liquid Flyback Booster Configuration Options (1980)
• Pulse detonation engine rocket engines summary
• Novel Rocket Fuel Spawned Ferrofluids article
• IHPRP Materials Development Plan briefing (2000)
• Silicon-carbide-based ceramic matrix composites
• Green Propellant Infusion Program mission page