We go to the Museum of Cosmonautics and Rocket Technology. Glushko. Not everyone knows this surname. And this engineer is the founder of liquid rocket engine building, the designer of space systems. It was thanks to Glushko’s discoveries in the field of rocket engines that an artificial earth satellite was put into orbit, Yuri Gagarin flew into space, automatic interplanetary stations were launched, and other achievements took place.
This museum is located in the Peter and Paul Fortress. In the northern wing of the Ioannovsky ravelin, back in the 30s of the 20th century, a design department was founded and successfully operated, which developed rocket engines and everything connected with it.
It was the first organization in our country that carried out research and development in this area. And Glushko Valentin Petrovich led this organization.
The exposition of the museum contains the unique developments of the designers of the Glushko laboratory, engines, various parts of spacecraft, models of the first artificial satellite and the Vostok spacecraft, as well as the descent module of the Soyuz-16 spacecraft, which has been in space and returned back. Let’s walk around the museum and find out the details of the work of this unique engineer and the laboratory in which he worked.
To begin with, we dive into the history of the development of rocket engines and rocket technology in the world. The museum has rare books of that time, unique works of pioneers in the development of rocket technology. For example, in Moscow there was a laboratory for the development of inventions named after N.I. Tikhomirov, where from 1921 to 1925 serious research and development was carried out, including in this area.
Since 1929 V.P. Glushko began the invention of precision equipment for the creation and testing of liquid rocket engines. I am not an engineer and I can’t describe all the details of the process, I’m afraid to make a lot of gross mistakes that any person with the appropriate knowledge will laugh at. Therefore, the details can be read on the net or find out the details in the museum itself.
Workplace V.P. Glushko
Workplace V.P. Glushko Workplace V.P. Glushko
What followed was a long showcase of the stages in the development of a liquid rocket engine and the first prototypes of rockets, from simple ones to those that look like we are used to seeing them in their modern form.
From the history that concerns the development, life history and work of the engineer and inventor V.P. Glushko we find ourselves in the second part of the museum, which is more like a classic museum of astronautics, but with a technical bias. Here you can see what stages of development space technology has gone through and how a large and complex mechanism of a spacecraft is formed from small nodes.
And of course, rocket engines have received a lot of attention:
Before you create an apparatus that will actually surf the expanses of outer space or the surface of planets, dozens of prototypes and models are created in a reduced form. It is on them that the performance of certain nodes is checked. The museum has many similar prototypes.
Do you know what the control panel of the Lunokhod-1 apparatus looked like? And this is just a snippet:
The exposition, of course, is very interesting and must be visited with boys of the right age. Of course, if the boy is technically oriented. We spent at least 2 hours in the museum.
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