Word: setting
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Dates: during 1950-1950
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...rocket was a "piggyback" combination : a small Wac Corporal set in the nose of a German V2. An earlier test the week before had been a fizzle (a fuel pump went haywire), but this time the V-2 roared up and turned east over the ocean. In one minute and 20 seconds it reached an altitude of 51,000 ft. and a speed of 1,700 m.p.h...
Then the Wac Corporal, set off by preset instruments or radio control, separated from the V2, adding its speed to that of the larger rocket. How fast and how far it went is still the Air Force's secret, but one spokesman mentioned an intended range greater than 175 miles. According to one informed observer, the Wac Corporal probably jreached a speed of 5,000 m.p.h...
...Office of Naval Research asked Reeves Instrument to set up a combination of its analogue computers* which would be versatile enough to simulate the flight of any guided missile. "Project Cyclone" operated in secret until last week when the Navy declassified some of its activities...
...Knobs Know. The test range of Project Cyclone is a large room lined with tall, many-knobbed cabinets full of electronic apparatus. To simulate a missile, either actual or still-to-be-built, the knobs are set at positions corresponding to all of its characteristics. Some knobs take care of its air drag and the thrust of its rocket motor. Others express the action of its gyroscopic controls. Others account for the motion of its launching site (such as a naval vessel) and of its target (such as an enemy airplane...
When all the knobs are set, the operator presses a button. The brain of the computer starts thinking electronically, weighing all the forces that will affect the flight of the missile. When the machinery stops, the whole story of the flight is drawn as a curve on a sheet of paper. If the rocket misbehaved (went out of control, veered sideways, missed the target), the reason for the error can be found and corrected on the next flight...