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From Behind Sandbags
by Hal Burton
150 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #01-0536; ISBN 1-55369-134-2; US$18.50, C$22.95, EUR15.00, £10.40
The author was one of many pioneers in the U.S. space program and worked on the development of the Lunar Roving Vehicle. Missiles and space were his specialties throughout his 40-year career; first in the U S Air Force, and later as an Aerospace Engineer at 'the Cape'
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About the book About the author Sample excerpt Catalogue info
About the Book Author Burton says, "How do you measure success? Money? Power? Satisfaction with a job well done? Dreams fulfilled?"
Unsolicited comments by other space enthusiasts after reading the book:
From Leo Grear -
From Ernie Louvar -
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From Cy Varnum - From Non-technical enthusiasts -
From Gladys Naber -
From Pat Hart -
From Jane Walsh -
From Harriet T. Truman - The author was my student in the mid-sixties at seventeen. He was bright and alert, but of few words. I often wished I knew what he was thinking. He experienced the bloodletting of Vietnam, and returned to learn the masonry trade. An artist today, with heavy hammer, wedge, stone, and mortar. Then found his work in adulthood, on the written page, the ode style. I know him better now, and much appreciate his friendship and wisdom. In a world so torn, his thoughts are valuable. You'll be a better person for having read "Stepping on Toes." Alden Bretl, Pitcherville, IL. Dear Hakon, it takes a special person to look beyond the norm and develop a keen perception into ordinary happenings that become extraordinary events in your eyes, mind and pen. Perhaps there will be an ode to Ole' in the morning, in your next book. Many thanks again, from Chuck and Ole. Stockton, IL My cousin, of whom I am very proud, has a new book. You can't find him with the other Larson's or Jur's, but under the name Hakon Revheim. Well he writes good stuff and you can get this one at Barnes &Noble, or Amazon.com, or Trafford Publishing. Go look for it and tell me what you think of my cousin, Hakon Revheim. Big bad Bill Jurs, Decorah IA Hakon, I got you note about your new book, "Stepping On Toes". I'll make a point of finding it. I appreciate you being Stockton's official poet. Pastor, Marvin Thill, Pitcherville, IL |
About the Author Hal Burton was born on a farm near Jewell, Iowa in 1930, just before the Great Depression. He went into the business field after high school. He served honorably in the Air Force from 1951 to 1955, subsequently obtaining a BS degree in Electrical Engineering from Iowa State College in 1958. In 1961 he earned a Masters Degree in Business Administration from Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida. Missiles and Space were his pursuits over a 40 year career in industry. |
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Sample Excerpt
INTRODUCTION These are some of my memoirs from a career in Aerospace, spanning the early days of missiles to the Apollo moon landings and on well into the Space Shuttle program. Some of the events are a little misty after all these years, but I've touched upon them so as to round out the picture: all are factual to the best of my knowledge. Many, many, many friends and associates were, of course, a part of all this; unfortunately, too many of the names have been forgotten. We were all like a bunch of Nomads, moving about between companies and locations frequently, but still working continuously in Aerospace. It was a revolution in the mobility of the engineering work force.These were days when time was forgotten, with long demanding hours and barely tolerable stress. Individuals suffered, families suffered, children suffered. No one was spared. Marriages, those that were fragile without cohesive strength, ended in the divorce courts unfortunately, casualties of the space race.
The launch philosophy changed as radically as the hardware and missions involved. The pioneer spirit was replaced by conservative think tank analyses and sophisticated thinkers.
There are times when I feel wistful for not realizing what really good times are and were. They come and go and you wonder what hit you. Let every day be recognized for what it is, for you may never come this way again.
"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth."
And so, here I was in 1961, in the middle of the cotton fields in Alabama, about to embark upon a part of my career that will stick in my mind forever as I look to the moon in the heavens and remember the APOLLO program.
1962
The Structural Test was to be performed at MSFC, in the Redstone Arsenal, under contract to NASA of course. The testing was of all the structural loading on full scale specimens. That doesn't ring the bell very loudly until one finds out the test articles were 33 feet in diameter and about twice that in height. The first test article was the fuel tank from the Boeing built S1C first stage. It was an awesome thing to go up inside of, being so vast. It required over a thousand test instruments on the inside and outside, as well as equipment specially designed to perform the test. It was a big test, and I eagerly received the role of Supervisor, Test Operations.
1963
ULTIMATE TESTING
President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, May 25, 1961
The President had directed the NASA to perform a feat which had never been performed, for which no design or hardware existed, and indeed, for which technology did not yet exist. It was the biggest technical challenge our country had ever faced. To meet this challenge head on, NASA established centers across the country to design, develop and test the hardware and systems necessary to accomplish the mission. The launch vehicle would be called the SATURN V. The Army Redstone Arsenal, on the edge of Huntsville, was chosen for the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) which was designated responsible for the SATURN V vehicle. The Johnson Space Center was set up at Houston, Texas and given the task of providing the mission hardware and astronauts. A new facility was to be built at Merritt Island, Florida to support launch activities. This facility was named the Kennedy Space Center (KSC). Instrumental in all the decisions required as the program got off the ground were Werner Von Braun and Kurt Debus. Virtually every large contractor in the United States got significantly involved in the program, as did thousands and thousands of talented people. Things were of a "can do" attitude as the program began to take shape in an incredibly short period of time. There would be scarce time for problems and even less for errors.
Even a group of doctors got involved as they set up the Huntsville Industrial Complex and offered office space to aerospace companies and NASA. The complex was one of very large, old, two story cotton warehouses, five or six total, providing many tens of thousands of square feet of floor space. Notice I did not mention the quality of the space. The only thing good about it was the strength of the floors. We fondly referred to it as the HIC Center. In relatively short order it would all be leased with the lessee doing all the required renovation. The owners had a real lucrative deal going, but they were the only source for quick office space.
Preliminary design of the launch vehicle had demonstrated the need for three stages of propulsion; these were identified as the SIC, the SII and the SIVB (See Illustration 4-1), to be stacked in that order on the launch pad. The SIC contract was awarded to The Boeing Company. It was to be 33 feet in diameter, about 100 feet tall, with five 1.5 million pound thrust engines on the aft of the vehicle. It was to burn kerosene and liquid oxygen, a combination which had long since proven its reliability and NASA felt comfortable with that design on the accelerated development program.
My initial assignment was to erect, equip and staff an electronics laboratory which would support the electrical/electronic engineering designers. With the engineers and technicians once on board, we worked closely with the facility designers to construct about 25,000 square feet of laboratory space and properly equip it with store rooms, test benches and electrical test equipment. My right hand assistant was Paul Malone. We carefully developed a max-min parts list of all the parts to be maintained in stock, then called on the procurement organization to provide them.
Ed Foster was in and out every week or two, working far flung, back of the moon activities on new business, and defining the job that we already had under contract. His main office was in New Orleans, where mechanical and electrical design of the vehicle was being undertaken. No nice motels existed yet, so he would put himself up at some incredible old timey hotels, either downtown in Huntsville, or in adjacent communities. I wound up getting involved in the travel soon enough, going to and from New Orleans frequently.
Most of our work was testing of critical portions of electrical circuits to assure adherence to the design engineer's specifications. Occasionally we would do some mechanical job. One such was worth talking about - a 1/10 scale Interstage of the SATURN booster first stage. That scale model interstage would therefore be 3.3 feet in diameter and about the same in height. It was to have the two domes in it, also, which were to be shaped like the two tank bulkheads on the flight hardware. Pretty neat, huh? The designers would use it later to design cabling and all sorts of other hardware that would be installed on flight items. Anyhow, we decided the interstage should be constructed out of plexiglass around the outside and balsa wood which would be shaped like the two domes. Balsa wood, of course, was easy to cut and didn't weigh much: WRONG!! It was not only quite heavy, it was also almost impossible to carve into domes, as was needed. The technicians tried razor knives, rasps, planes, routers, and hardly fazed it. We finally gave up and contracted to Hayes, a machine shop downstairs, who attacked it with machine tools to achieve the needed products. Wow! Reminds me of the story about the guy that was in the whore house when it got raided - he'd sneak out the back way if he thought he could and not get caught!
It was interesting work, helping shape the grass roots of the enterprise it would take to put the man on the moon. One Boeing Manager, Bob Elbert, was forever in and out of Huntsville, like the Red Baron, negotiating with NASA officials and performing God knows what productive work! Wonderfully talented laboratory technicians Ed Shoup and Keith Dilsaver were there all the way helping in any fashion they could. The laboratory matured and I concentrated my efforts by planning the tasks that would be coming along for us to do. That was extremely difficult: the design engineers wanted a hobby shop where they could just come and dabble. We could not adequately provide for them if they did not help give us the foresight we needed to be ready when they were. In the end, we gave the management of the laboratory to the Design Engineering organization and the Technician Supervision. We had it up and running, with facilities, equipment, parts and super technician people. I felt very satisfied with what I had been able to accomplish . Since the laboratory had matured it was time to move on to the next challenge, which was just on the horizon. It was the Major Structural Test Program.
Ed Foster had hired two prime people from Seattle to take the top positions in the Structural Test Program organization; they were John Lee, who was to be the Program Manager, and George Hardwick, who had the assignment of Engineering Design of the test setup. These two were experienced, seasoned men; well chosen and very capable. I had never known them before, but they were good to work with. I learned a lot from them in the coming months that blended well with my own past experience. George Mauer was one of the first engineers to come on board with me, and he was one fine engineer.
The fuel tank was set upright on a circular stand about 6 feet off the ground. The technicians would go up inside the tank and install all the instruments, a formidable task I might add. There were four individual wires on each instrument. These wires were grouped into bundles and routed out of the bottom of the tank to an instrument panel on the outside. The Government had provided only the most primitive trailers for test conduct, which proved to be totally inadequate. I explored all the options with the Government representative. A new building, which was appropriate, could not be funded on the time scale needed. I finally came up with the idea that we could design a wood frame building, build it ourselves, put it on skids and call it a Portable Test Station. Well, that met all the requirements and the Government agreed we could buy the parts out of regular Program funding, so now we had to design this thing, whatever it was going to be. Every engineer on the Structural Test team (approximately 20) had a regular assignment during the days and each was already pressed for time, let alone design a wood frame building about 20 feet square and come up with a detailed parts list for procurement. To solve that I asked them all to come over to my house one evening, and in the course of that evening we did that complete design and parts list, all on my kitchen floor and the kitchen counter! Somewhat out of the ordinary, but the job was done and we soon had the technicians wielding saws and hammers and the Portable Test Station became a reality!
After an enormous amount of work the test setup was finally completed for our first big test, the Hydrostatic Test of the tank. This was to be performed with colored water filling the tank and brought up to flight pressure to verify the basic pressure integrity of the tank. My team had installed not only all the instruments, but the mechanical accessories, pumps, etc. preparatory to the test. One Saturday morning I was working on site by myself and saw someone walking around the test tank. I investigated only to find out it was Dr. Wehrner Von Braun. After casual introductions I toured him around the facility and explained what we were doing. It was an extraordinary experience I shall never forget. Then the big day came with everything complete, verified and readied for test.
The Test Conductor opened valves and filled the huge tank, then brought up pressure slowly and only got a short ways when the instrument readings were erratic, so he stopped the pressurization. We waited a few minutes only to find it getting worse, so we agreed to depressurize and investigate. He opened the emergency overboard valve to let the excess water out of the tank, and it started draining, then kept on draining and draining and the instruments were going absolutely crazy, so I ordered the valve secured and the flowing stopped. I grabbed a headset and headed for the tank. I scaled the ladder to the top to see if there was any evidence of the problem there, which there was. There was a dimple in the dome of the tank about 1200 gallons in size! Boy, what a dilemma!
Well, I thought about it for a little bit, had the Test Conductor on the intercom with me and we talked about it and it boiled down to this: if we stopped at that point we would be mired down for months of investigation. So I instructed the Test Conductor to get the team on station and ready again, that we were going to blow that sucker back out! I knew it wouldn't be easy, you could see
those terrible krinkles all the way around the dimple, so we really didn't know what would happen. I told the Test Conductor to start the pump to refill the tank very slowly to see what we could do. His readings were erratic, so we were really flying by the seat of our pants! Anyhow, after what seemed an eternity, the tank slowly started coming back to normal. It would send out loud bangs as it regained its shape. I was the only one in the area, so I kept them informed as to the status and after about 30 nerve-racking minutes we had restored the dome to as close as it wanted to go to normal. Then we took an alternate detanking method and slowly got rid of the water in the tank.
Next came the resolution of the problem and assessment of damage to the test specimen. It turned out that all the wiring that had been used inside the tank had microscopic holes in it from manufacturing. It was such that when the pressure was elevated the water fed into the wire conductors and from there went outside and into the instrument panel, shorting it out and otherwise making it a total mess. The other half of the problem; why did we get a dimple in the tank when the emergency overboard valve was opened? Well it turned out that a pipe had been installed from the valve (which was in the middle of the upper dome). That pipe led across the tank and down the side so it wouldn't get the pretty building next door dirty. What had happened is that a simple siphon had occurred and just kept on drawing the water out of the tank! It would have kept on pulling it down if we had not secured the valves.
All the upper management in Boeing and NASA about panicked over the failure of the test. We were then given 6 weeks to correct all our problems and get the test performed. Not an easy one at best, to redesign and install the instrumentation was the biggest pole in the tent, but I committed to them to meet the six week demand. We were standing in the way of the program to land a man on the moon!
We had a portable x-ray machine come over and x-rayed all of the wrinkles in the dome to verify their integrity. The integrity of the dome was still intact, even though it didn't look so pretty. We got lucky on that one. Needless to say we redesigned the overboard drain before the next test.
We worked day and night to get all the work done on time. The paymaster called me one day complaining about one of my employees that I had worked until 2AM, then had him come back in at 6AM because his overtime would continue on when he returned without 8 hours rest. I told him that the man was needed and that's why he worked what he did, so go ahead and pay him and quit crying (or words to that effect).
The 6 weeks was up on a Monday. Everybody had worked all weekend getting all the hundreds of tasks done on time. I had listed them all on the board on Friday with details of each task, who it was assigned to, and titled it "How to get to Monday on Monday". Everybody probably thought I was nuts, but we got to Monday on Monday! So there! The test went off without a hitch and we were back in the good graces of the upper management folks.
Then we started setting up for the next major test when an opportunity arose for me as Test Supervisor for the Dynamic Test Vehicle testing which was just in the planning stages. It was an enormous test, with a flight size SATURN rocket to be installed on several huge hydraulic cylinders. These cylinders were to be controlled by electronics to impart flight type vibrations into the complete vehicle.
It was a huge setup, several hundred feet tall, all inside a big building. Boeing did not yet have a definitive contract for the job, so I was working on the cost proposal to do it all. I presented the results in a document that was well received by our top management and NASA officers.
Our Base Manager, Don Atherly, sent out a memo to all supervision about a high resignation rate of engineering talent. He wanted to know why they were quitting, so I simply wrote him and told him. He asked "What's wrong with Hal"! I thought I would get fired before I put that one to rest! While the job was still being negotiated I was moved to another assignment as Supervisor of the Test Branch, where our job was not to test but to integrate the activities at a high level. After working that for several months I decided it was surely not my cup of tea, so I negotiated for a transfer back to the Cape. That ended several years of challenging assignments and good friends. I hated to part, but felt it was time to move on.
