New scale data project: World War II rockets

[PeterAlway]

Here's the cover graphic for a new project. It should be ready for NARCON. How many of these do you recognize?

 

[aerostadt]

Well, I recognize a few. Of course, there is the V-2 in the background and the black and white Wasserfall on the right. There is the Rheintochter on the bottom row(correction: should be Ruhrstahl X-4), third one over from the right, which has been reported on TRF before

https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/rheintochter-rhine-maiden.62727/

I would suspect that is a bazooka rocket, first one on the left in the top row. I think I remember reading something about the thin green rocket, second over from the left on the bottom row. I think there was something about the propellant that some contemporary builders were going to duplicate. I think the Germans had a rocket called the Taifun, but if it is here, I don't know which one it is. I probably I have seen the rocket between the Rheintochter and the Wasserfall before, but I can't remember anything about it. I think that crazy manned German anti-aircraft rocket (I can't remember the name.) is not here. I remember now. It was the Natter.

 

[aerostadt]

OK, I think the German anti-aircraft rocket Taifun is just to the left of the Rheintochter (I mean Ruhrstahl). I think the Germans may have done an experiment of launching the Taifun from a submarine during WW II. The Rheinbote is not here.

 

[aerostadt]

It looks like I made a mistake. The rocket that I called the Rheintochter is really the Ruhrstahl X-4. They look similar. BTW the Ruhrstahl has been reported on TRF before:

https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/90-ruhrstahl-kramer-x4-1944-1945.52241/

I will venture that one of the cannon shell looking projectiles might be a Nebelwerfer. I have concentrated mostly on what the Germans did. As I do Google searches I see that the Germans experimented with a lot of rockets during WW II. Not all of them became operational. Of course, other countries had some rockets, but not as extensively as the Germans.

Perhaps, the first rocket in the middle row is the Russian Katyusha. The rocket on the far left of the bottom row might be a British 3" anti-aircraft rocket.

 

[kuririn]

Bottom row, fourth from the left is the X-4 German anti-tank weapon.
Correction: Air to air missile.

 

[aerostadt]

Bottom row, fourth from the left is the X-4 German anti-tank weapon.

Yes, the Ruhrstahl X-4, which was wire guided, i.e., it let out a wire from a spool and the operator could guide it to a target. Actually, the Germans developed it to be an air-to-air rocket. The US during the cold war produced the wire-guided antitank rocket Dart. The British used wire-guided torpedoes during the Falklands War.

 

[kuririn]

Yes, the Ruhrstahl X-4, which was wire guided, i.e., it let out a wire from a spool and the operator could guide it to a target. Actually, the Germans developed it to be an air-to-air rocket. The US during the cold war produced the wire-guided antitank rocket Dart. The British used wire-guided torpedoes during the Falklands War.

And let us not forget the TOW anti-tank missile. Instead of a rocket motor it had an electric motor and a realllllyyy long wire.

 

[aerostadt]

The 5th rocket over from the left in the top row might be the WWII German air-to-air R4M rocket.

The 3rd rocket over from the left by the U.S. Tiny Tim rocket.

 

[torkemado]

RS-82 , RS-132(M-13), Wurframmen Granate 21 ,R4M ORKAN,M-31, Rw6-1,HVAR,RP-3 60Lb SAP,Z-Battery AA rocket

 

[PeterAlway]

Lots of good answers here. And a few wrong ones. I wish I had the essential dimensions for the Rheintochter, Nebelwerfer, and Tiny Tim, but alas, no, so they aren't here. There are a few not mentioned here that I wish I could do. A couple of these are super obscure, and I included those just because I stumbled onto data for them.

Just for fun, here's a list (using whatever name or designation I can remember at the moment!): Bazooka projectile, Soviet RS-82, American Sub-Caliber Aircraft Rocket, Japanese Funshin-Dan, German R4M, Japanese Roketto-Dan, American 3.5-Inch Aircraft Rocket. Second row: Katyusha, German 38-cm rocket, American HVAR, Soviet M-131 "Luka." Third row: British UP3, British RP-3, German Taifun, Ruhrstall X-4, Private A, Wasserfall. Of course, it's an outline of a V-2 tail section to the same scale in the background.

 

[aerostadt]

Thanks, Peter! That was fun once I got into it, looking stuff on Google using broad categories. Using broad categories for Google, I could only come so close, but not close enough to getting all of them by any means. I couldn't figure out what that weird-looking "Private A" was, but now I see it on Google.

 

[Crawf56]

Let's see...

1st row, 1st rocket: Bazooka
2nd row, 1st rocket: Katyushka [Russian rocket artillery, "Stalin's organs"]
2nd row, 2nd rocket: Nebelwefer [German artillery rocket]
3rd row, 2nd rocket: British antitank rocket (fired from aircraft)

And then I saw the answers. Good stuff.

 

[PeterAlway]

ERockets and ASP have some of these now!

 

[aerostadt]

Aero Specialty Products is now offering this 42-page booklet by Peter Alway with the eighteen WWII rockets on the cover.

https://www.asp-rocketry.com/ecomme...9D8-A88B-4DB4-85F5ADA3918EEB6D&email=3JE2G6YF

 

[hutch]

How about a new edition of "Rockets of the World", containing ALL of the Peter Alway drawings and scale data?

I NEED THIS!

 

[PeterAlway]

How about a new edition of "Rockets of the World", containing ALL of the Peter Alway drawings and scale data?

I'm chugging along on the task. This booklet is one step, or maybe 15 steps on the way (V-2, Wasserfall, and Private A had already appeared elsewhere). "The FIrst Seven Centuries of Rocketry," "Retro Rockets," and "Eighteen Rockets and Missiles of WW II," are all about extending "Rockets of the World" back in time. "Fourteen US Army Missiles of the Cold War" and "Twelve Soviet Missiles of the Cold War" were about expanding the subject matter. Depending on progress, there might be "Nine (or some other number) US Air Force Missiles of the Cold War" at some coming event, and eventually "Ten (or some other number) US Navy Missiles of the Cold War." Eventually I hope to produce "The Utterly Unaffordable and Too Heavy to Pick Up Edition of Rockets of the World."

Or I'll die trying, and people can pass around bootleg copies of the drawings.

 

[Ez2cDave]

Eventually I hope to produce "The Utterly Unaffordable and Too Heavy to Pick Up Edition of Rockets of the World."

aka "Rockets of the Universe" ? LOL !

Dave F.

 

[aerostadt]

I just got my copy from Aerospace Speciality Products today. Like all of Peter's books it is filled to the brim with information. I just got reading the bazooka and the Wasserfall, which were fascinating.

 

[Bruiser]

Maybe you could market "The Utterly Unaffordable and Too Heavy to Pick Up Edition of Rockets of the World" as a volume of the month club. Each book could be a chapter, like the old school World Book encyclopedia sets. Who remembers them?

-Bob