The development of space industry is inseparable from rockets, and modern launch vehicles originated from ancient rockets. After a long historical evolution, the ancient rocket was combined with the theory and exploration of modern natural science before it finally developed into a modern launch vehicle. Speaking of ancient rockets, we can't help but mention China's contribution.
Accurately speaking, the rocket was invented by China people, and China is the hometown of ancient rockets. The rocket, which was first created by ancient scientists in China using the reaction principle of gunpowder and gas, has developed into a Hercules carrying a spaceship into space in the hands of contemporary scientific elites, which is a brilliant achievement that every Chinese descendant is proud of.
The word "rocket" appeared in the Three Kingdoms period in the third century. During the Three Kingdoms period in 228 AD, Wei put a torch on an arrow for the first time. At that time, Zhuge Liang, the prime minister of Shu, led an army to attack Chencang (now Baoji East, Shaanxi Province), and Zhao Hao, the commander-in-chief of Wei, burned the siege ladder of Shu's army with a rocket and held Chencang. Since then, the word "rocket" has appeared. But at that time, the rocket just attached flammable materials such as linen soaked in oil to the back of the arrow, lit it and shot it at the enemy with a crossbow to achieve the purpose of arson.
During the Northern Song Dynasty (A.D. 10), officials Feng Jisheng and Yue He presented rockets and their manufacturing methods to the imperial court. At that time, rockets had used gunpowder with better burning efficiency, but they were still fired with crossbows. Thus, the earliest and most primitive "gunpowder arrow" appeared in human history. It pastes paper into a tube, compacts the powder in the tube, ties it to an arrow shaft and fires it with a bow. Later, on the basis of the original rocket, it was improved, and the rocket was directly installed in the middle of the pole, making a loud noise when it exploded, so as to shock the enemy.
The rocket in ancient China has four parts: arrow, shaft, feather and powder barrel. The shell of powder keg is made of bamboo tube or cardboard tube, and powder is filled in it. The upper end of the cylinder is closed and the lower end is open, and the fuse is led out from the small hole on the side of the cylinder. After ignition, gunpowder burns in the cylinder, producing a large amount of gas, which is injected backward at high speed and produces forward thrust. In fact, this is the prototype of modern rockets. The powder cartridge is equivalent to the propulsion system of modern rockets. Sharp arrows have the lethality of penetrating human body, which is equivalent to the warhead of modern rockets. Tail-mounted arrow feathers play a stabilizing role in flight, which is equivalent to the stabilizing system of modern rockets. The shaft is equivalent to the structure of the modern rocket. The outline map of ancient rockets in China was first recorded in the book Wu Bei Zhi compiled by Mao in A.D. 162 1 year.
After the appearance of rockets, they were quickly used in military operations and folk entertainment in China. 10 ~13rd century, muskets, flying guns, thunder cannons and other gunpowder weapons were used in the Song, Jin and Yuan wars. At that time, the flying gun was similar to the modern flame thrower and was a primitive rocket weapon. At the end of the Northern Song Dynasty, in the popular folk fireworks show, people used the reaction of gunpowder gas to make "meteors" (or "flames") and "firecrackers" that could fly high into the air, adding a festive atmosphere to the festival. In terms of working principle, meteor firecrackers have the characteristics of rockets.
12 century later, the original rocket was improved and widely used in the military. During the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, rocket weapons made great progress in the war, and many rockets similar to modern rocket types were invented, and rockets such as the two tigers chasing sheep arrow, the nine dragons arrow and the bee colony appeared one after another, all of which adopted the technology of multi-stage series or parallel connection (bundling) of rockets. There are many kinds of rocket weapons recorded in Ming History, such as thunder cannons, fire dragons coming out of the water, flying crows, flying sand pipes, ten thousand enemies and so on.
The Ming Dynasty was a period of rapid development of rocket technology in China. Military technicians made a variety of rockets propelled by gunpowder reaction for military war. In the early Ming Dynasty, Judy, the fourth son of Zhu Yuanzhang, the prince of Yan, was shot by a "swarming" rocket while fighting against the army of Jianwen Emperor in Baigou River, Hebei Province in the "Battle of South Beijing", which is the earliest record of China using a "jet rocket" in the war. Since then, there have been more and more single-stage jet rockets, including single engines and multi-engines.
Qi Jiguang, a national hero, created three kinds of jet rockets, namely, flying knife arrow, flying gun arrow and flying sword arrow, which are collectively called "three flying arrows". These three kinds of rockets are made of hardwood 6 feet long, and the arrows are 5 inches long. They are made into knives, guns and sword-shaped blades, which can penetrate armor. A powder cartridge 7 to 8 inches long and 2 inches thick is mounted on the back of the arrow. When fighting, put the rocket on the wooden frame, hold the arrow tail in hand, ignite the gunpowder line of the gunpowder barrel and shoot at the enemy. It can be used for land and water operations. These three types of rockets are equipped with more than 2,000 rockets on Qijiajun Water Battalion 10 warship, and 4,760 rockets are equipped in vehicle artillery battalion, cavalry battalion and infantry battalion, with an average of 4 rockets per person. Qi Jiajun is equipped with so many rockets, which is unprecedented in the military history of China and even the world. It was not until more than 240 years later that other countries in the world knew that there was a jet rocket as a firearm in the world.
The advanced products of single-stage rockets are all kinds of "multi-fire rockets", most of which are put in a rocket launcher with a big mouth and a small bottom, and two layers of grids are placed in the launcher for positioning and orientation of the rockets. At the same time, the gunpowder lines of each rocket are tied together. After ignition, the arrow is Qi Fei, and the launching surface is dozens of feet wide. In addition to the aforementioned 32 "swarming" rockets, there are dozens of kinds of arrows, such as two tigers chasing sheep and a hundred tigers rushing together, which can shoot 2 to 60 at a time. Qi Jiajun often fixed multiple rocket launchers on the rocket car to launch, launching hundreds or even thousands of rockets at a time, which was the predecessor of the rocket car later. When Qi Jiguang was guarding the Great Wall in the east section in the north, he was equipped with at least 40 rocket cars, which was unique in ancient times. In some other countries in the world, it was not until more than 360 years later that rocket-propelled vehicles appeared.
Military technical experts in the late Ming Dynasty also created two kinds of "winged rockets": the winged "Shenhuo Flying Crow" and the winged spherical "flying in the air and hitting the thief to the sky". These two kinds of rockets are filled with gunpowder in crow-shaped and spherical bodies respectively, and there are gunpowder lines in the gunpowder, which are connected in series with the gunpowder in the gunpowder barrel of the take-off rocket; When launching, first ignite the gunpowder line of the take-off rocket, make the rocket fly to the enemy, detonate the gunpowder in the crow and the ball, kill and burn the enemy. It is a sharp weapon to break the array and attack the city. Later missiles can be said to be the logical development of this rocket.
At the end of the Ming Dynasty, secondary rockets such as "Fire Dragon Out of the Water" were also built. "Fire Dragon" has a dragon body, a dragon head and a dragon tail. The dragon body is an arrow made of a thin bamboo tube about 1.6 meters long. There is a wooden faucet in front, and the dragon mouth is open, which is conducive to rocket launch. There is a wooden dragon tail in the back. A half-catty take-off rocket is installed on both sides of the lower part of the head and tail of the arrow body, and several rocket engines are placed in the arrow body, and all the leads are twisted together. Four rocket launchers are installed at the front and back of the dragon body, two groups of rocket leads are twisted together, and the bottom of the front rocket shell is connected with the tie wire led out by the faucet. There is a shooting line between the two rockets. When launching, first ignite the four gunpowder barrels at the lower part of the dragon body to push the dragon forward. When the powder line of the take-off rocket burns out, the rocket in the dragon body is ignited and fired at the target from the dragon mouth.
This kind of rocket applies the principle of parallel connection (four powder cartridges) and series connection (two-stage rocket relay). It can be shot into the sky or used in water warfare. Used in water war, it can fly for several kilometers on the water. This is the earliest two-stage rocket, more than 300 years earlier than the modern two-stage rocket. In addition, at that time, three kinds of recyclable two-stage rocket "flying sand tube" were created, which promoted the ancient rocket technology to an advanced stage and inspired the development of modern rockets. This is a great contribution made by the Chinese nation to the development of rocket technology.
In the Ming dynasty, rockets were not only used in the military field, but also tried manned rocket flight. Wan Hu (also known as "Wan Hu"), a scholar of Ming Dynasty in China, is regarded as the originator of rockets in the world and the pioneer of experimental air flight. On the basis of studying the ability of rockets to push objects up, Wan Hu made a chair that can fly to the sky. He installed the largest 47 rockets at that time at the back of the seat, tied himself in front of the seat, took a big kite in each hand, and then ignited the 47 rockets at the same time, hoping to fly forward with the help of the forward propulsion of the rockets and the rising power of the kite. Although the experiment was unsuccessful, he has been recognized as the first person in the world to try to fly by rocket. In memory of Wan Hu, people named the crater near the East China Sea on the back of the moon after him.
From the end of 13 to the beginning of 14, firearms technologies such as gunpowder and rockets from China were spread to India, Arabia and Europe through Arabia. It triggered the introduction of rocket technology to Arab and European countries and promoted the development of rocket technology. By 1805, the British artillery officer W. congreve created a new type of rocket, which was born out of the ancient rockets in China and became the beginning of modern rockets with a range of 2.5 ~ 3 kilometers. After World War II, science and technology developed rapidly, and rocket technology was gradually used in space exploration and development. 19571On October 4th, the Soviet Union launched its first artificial earth satellite, and on April 2nd, 196 1, the first Soviet "Oriental" spacecraft was successfully launched. 1July 20th, 969 to July 20th, 2 1 year, Apollo 1 1 landed on the moon.
Although ancient rockets and gunpowder were invented by China people, due to the long-term neglect of the development of science and technology, ancient rocket technology failed to develop into modern rocket technology in China, and finally only stayed in fireworks. Although Europeans learned to use rockets hundreds of years after they invented them in China, they finally developed modern rocket technology from Europe, which is a pity of China's history.