Ignition! : : An Informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants / / John Drury Clark.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Rutgers University Press Complete eBook-Package 2018
• VerfasserIn: Clark, John Drury,
• MitwirkendeR: Asimov, Isaac,
• TeilnehmendeR: Asimov, Isaac.
• Place / Publishing House: New Brunswick, NJ : : Rutgers University Press, , [2018]; ©1972
• Year of Publication: 2018
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (302 p.) :; 2 black and white photographs.

This newly reissued debut book in the Rutgers University Press Classics Imprint is the story of the search for a rocket propellant which could be trusted to take man into space. This search was a hazardous enterprise carried out by rival labs who worked against the known laws of nature, with no guarantee of success or safety. Acclaimed scientist and sci-fi author John Drury Clark writes with irreverent and eyewitness immediacy about the development of the explosive fuels strong enough to negate the relentless restraints of gravity. The resulting volume is as much a memoir as a work of history, sharing a behind-the-scenes view of an enterprise which eventually took men to the moon, missiles to the planets, and satellites to outer space. A classic work in the history of science, and described as "a good book on rocket stuff...that's a really fun one" by SpaceX founder Elon Musk, readers will want to get their hands on this influential classic, available for the first time in decades.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- In Re John D. Clark -- Preface -- 1. How It Started -- 2. Peenemunde and JPL -- 3. The Hunting of the Hypergol... -- 4. ...and Its Mate -- 5. Peroxide- Always a Bridesmaid -- 6. Halogens and Politics and Deep Space -- 7. Performance -- 8. Lox and Flox and Cryogenics in General -- 9. What Ivan Was Doing -- 10. "Exotics" -- 11. The Hopeful Monoprops -- 12. High Density and the Higher Foolishness -- 13. What Happens Next -- Glossary -- Index