Date: 1931
Country of Origin: United States of America
Dimensions:
Length, 9.5 in.; max width, 4 in.; dia., o.d., 1.25 in.; length, tank, 5 in.; diameter, o.d., pipes, 0.25 in.; diameter, screwable cap, 0.5 in.
Materials:
Main cylinder, or tank, zinc-plated steel; pipes, adjoining, copper, the longer with brass fittings
This nitrogen pressure device was designed and used by the American rocket pioneer Robert H. Goddard (1882-1945) in a static or non-flying test of a cylindrical rocket combustion chamber at Roswell, New Mexico, on 15 January 1931. It was the first in a series of tests on combustion chambers in which the liquid oxygen was fed tangentially and the gasoline was introduced as a spray at the of the upper cone of the chamber. The propellants were not pumped into the combustion chamber but fed in by inert nitrogen pressure of between 75 and 150 pounds per square inch.
Mrs. Robert H. Goddard donated this object to the Smithsonian Institution in 1959 as part of a large collection of artifacts from her husband.
Gift of Mrs. Robert Goddard
