Titan (rocket family)

Titan family
	The Titan rocket family.
Role	Expendable launch system with various applications
Manufacturer	Glenn L. Martin Company
First flight	1958-12-20
Introduction	1959
Retired	2005
Primary users	United States Air Force; National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Produced	1957-2000s
Number built	368
Variants	Titan I; Titan II; Titan IIIA; Titan IIIB; Titan IIIC; Titan IIID; Titan IIIE; Titan 34D; Titan IV

Titan was a family of U.S. expendable rockets used between 1959 and 2005. A total of 368 rockets of this family were launched.

Titan I

The Titan I was the first version of the Titan family of rockets. It began as a backup ICBM project in case the Atlas was delayed. It was a two-stage rocket powered by RP-1 and Liquid Oxygen. It was operational from early 1962 to mid-1965.

Titan II

Most of the Titan rockets were the Titan II ICBM and their civilian derivatives for NASA. The Titan II used a hypergolic combination of nitrogen tetroxide and hydrazine for its oxidizer and fuel.

The first Titan II guidance system was built by AC Spark Plug. It used an IMU (inertial measurement unit, a gyroscopic sensor) made by AC Spark Plug derived from original designs from MIT Draper Labs. The missile guidance computer (MGC) was the IBM ASC-15. When spares for this system became hard to obtain, it was replaced by a more modern guidance system, the Delco Universal Space Guidance System (USGS). The USGS used a Carousel IV IMU and a Magic 352 computer. ^[2]

The most important use of the civilian Titan II was in the NASA Gemini program of manned space capsules in the mid-1960s. Twelve Titan IIs were used to launch two U.S. unmanned Gemini test launches and ten manned capsules with two-man crews. All of the launches were successes.

Also, in the late 80s some of the deactivated Titan IIs were converted into space launch vehicles to be used for launching U.S. Government payloads. The final such vehicle launched a Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) weather satellite from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, on 18 October 2003. [1].

Titan III

The Titan III was a modified Titan II with optional solid rocket boosters. It was developed by the U.S. Air Force as a heavy-lift satellite launcher to be used mainly to launch U.S. military payloads such as DSP early-warning, intelligence (spy), and defense communications satellites.

The Titan IIIA was a prototype, consisting of a Titan II with a Transtage upper stage. The Titan IIIB and its variants (23B, 24B, 33B, and 34B) were Titan III cores with an Agena D upper stage. This combination was used to launch the KH-8 GAMBIT series of spy satellites. They were all launched from Vandenberg AFB, into polar orbits. The payload was about 7,500 lb (3,000 kg).

The powerful Titan IIIC used a Titan IIIA core with two large strap-on solid-fuel boosters to increase its launch thrust and hence payload mass. The Titan IIID was a derivative of the Titan IIIC, without an upper stage, used to place Key Hole reconnaissance satellites into low Earth orbits. The Titan IIIE, with a Centaur upper stage, was used to launch several scientific spacecraft, including the NASA Voyager and Viking probes to the outer planets and Mars respectively.

The first guidance system for the Titan III used the AC Spark Plug IMU (inertial measurement unit) and IBM ASC-15 guidance computer from the Titan II. For the Titan III, the ASC-15 drum memory was lengthened to add 20 more usable tracks, increasing its memory by 35%.^[3] The Titan IIIC used the Delco Carousel VI IMU and Magic 352 guidance computer. ^[4]

Titan IV

The Titan IV is a "stretched" Titan III with non-optional solid rocket boosters. It could be launched either with the Centaur upper stage, with the IUS (Inertial Upper Stage) or without any upper stage. It was almost exclusively used to launch U.S. Military payloads, though it was also used to launch NASA's Cassini probe to Saturn in 1997. Titan IV was the most powerful unmanned rocket in the United States, and was extremely expensive to operate. By the time the Titan IV was operational the requirements of the Department of Defence for a heavy booster had declined due to improvements in the longevity of military satellites, and the fall of the Soviet Union. As a result, when including the cost of ground operations and facilities for the Titan IV at Vandenberg AFB, the unit cost was very high.

Rocket fuel

Liquid oxygen is dangerous to use in an enclosed space, such as a missile silo, and cannot be stored for long periods in the booster oxidizer tank. Several Atlas and Titan I rockets exploded and destroyed their silos. The Martin Company was able to improve the design with the Titan II. The RP-1/LOX combination was replaced by a room-temperature fuel whose oxidizer did not require cryogenic storage. The same first stage rocket engines were used with some modifications. The diameter of the second stage was increased to match the first stage. The Titan II's hypergolic fuel and oxidizer ignited on contact, but they were highly toxic and corrosive liquids. The fuel was hydrazine and the oxidizer was nitrogen tetroxide.

There were several accidents in Titan II silos resulting in loss of life and/or serious injuries. In August 1965, 53 construction workers were killed when hydraulic fluid used in the Titan II caught fire in a missile silo northwest of Searcy, Arkansas. The liquid fuel missiles were prone to developing leaks of their toxic propellants. Nine airmen were killed at a site outside Rock, Kansas, in the late 1970s when a missile in its silo leaked propellant. Later, another site, at Potwin, Kansas, leaked fuel and was closed, but there were no fatalities. In September 1980, at another Titan II silo (374-7) near Damascus, Arkansas, a technician dropped a wrench that broke the skin of the missile. Leaking rocket fuel ignited and blew the 8,000 lb nuclear warhead out of the silo. It landed harmlessly several hundred feet away.^[5] This marked the beginning of the end for the Titan II as an ICBM. The 54 Titan II's were replaced in the U.S. arsenal by 50 MX "Peacekeeper" solid-fuel rocket missiles in late 1980s. 54 Titan IIs had been fielded along with some 1000 Minutemen from the mid-1960s through the mid-1980s. Most of the decommissioned Titan II ICBMs were refurbished and used for Air Force space launch vehicles, with a perfect launch success record.

Current status of Titans

File:Last Titan Rocket-Vanderburg AFB.jpg

The last Titan rocket launched, a Titan IV B

As of 2006, the Titan family of rockets is obsolete. The high cost of using hydrazine and nitrogen tetroxide, along with the special care that was needed due to their toxicity, proved too much compared to the higher-performance liquid hydrogen or RP-1-fueled vehicles, with a liquid oxygen oxidizer. The current owners of the Titan line (Lockheed-Martin) decided to extend its Atlas family of rockets instead of the more expensive Titans, along with joint ventures to sell launches on the Russian Proton and the new Boeing-built Delta IV class of medium and heavy-lift launch vehicles. The next-to-last Titan was launched successfully from Cape Canaveral on 29 April 2005. The final Titan launched successfully from Vandenberg AFB on 19 October 2005, carrying a secret payload for the National Reconnaissance Office. There are approximately twenty Titan IIs at AMARC in Tucson, Arizona set to be scrapped or used as monuments.^[6]

A replica of a Titan II rocket is the centerpiece of the Kansas Cosmosphere and Space Center aerospace museum in Hutchinson, Kansas.

Specifications

For the specifications, please see the articles on each variant.

References

David K. Stumpf. Titan II: A History of a Cold War Missile Program. The University of Arkansas Press, 2000. Pages 63-65
USAF Sheppard Technical Training Center. “Student Study Guide, Missile Launch/Missile Officer (LGM-25).” May 1967. Pages 61-65. Available at WikiMedia Commons: TitanII MGC.pdf
Larson, Paul O. “Titan III Inertial Guidance System,” in AIAA Second Annual Meeting, San Francisco, 26-29 July 1965, pages 1-11.
Liang, A.C. and Kleinbub, D.L. “Navigation of the Titan IIIC space launch vehicle using the Carousel VB IMU”. AIAA Guidance and Control Conference, Key Biscayne, FL, 20-22 August 1973. AIAA Paper No. 73-905.

Notes

^ Barton, Rusty (2003-11-18). "Titan 1 Chronology". Titan 1 ICBM History Website. Geocities.com. Retrieved 2005-06-05. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
^ David K. Stumpf. Titan II: A History of a Cold War Missile Program. University of Arkansas Press, 2000. ISBN 1-55728-601-9 (cloth). Pages 63-67.
^ Paul O. Larson. "Titan III Inertial Guidance System," page 4.
^ A.C. Liang and D.L. Kleinbub. "Navigation of the Titan IIIC space launch vehicle using the Carousel VB IMU." AIAA Guidance and Control Conference, Key Biscayne, FL, 20-22 August 1973. AIAA Paper No. 73-905.
^ "Light on the Road to Damascus" Time magazine, 29 September 1980 accessed 12 September 2006
^ Government Liquidation

External links

Video of a Titan II missile launch
Video of a Titan I missile launch
Photo of the last Titan launch, at the APOD archive. See also
Titan missiles & variations
Explosion at 374-7

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This Template lists historical, current, and future space rockets that at least once attempted (but not necessarily succeeded in) an orbital launch or that are planned to attempt such a launch in the future Symbol ^† indicates past or current rockets that attempted orbital launches but never succeeded (never did or has yet to perform a successful orbital launch)