"Now, let's go back again to the old rockets, and also our present ones. They all use the same principle to get off the ground—blast off with rockets. But let's add a second type of blasting off area, also using rockets, but one that looks like a monstrous rifle barrel, complete to the fields and grooves. We have a launching apparatus that is like a grooved rifle compared to a smooth barreled one. The smooth barrel that we now use, the rockets taking off straight, gives good acceleration but not enough top speed. Our old rockets had that fault and never could get good velocity even when in flight. Our new ones take over with the interstellar drive, but we want to eliminate this last method. The spiral take off though, would give much greater velocity right from the start, would enable the ship to hit outer space with a greater speed than it could attain using the other methods and it would continue on in space at a much faster rate. The lack of friction would keep it from slowing down and if we could hit the speed we want before entering outer space, the ship could go right on at that same rate in space. There wouldn't even be need for rocket power while in actual galactic flight. The initial momentum would carry it through to its destination. The rocket could do all this because this spiral launching would give us more 'muzzle velocity', and in a given time after blast off, the spinning ship would have reached a much greater speed than the regularly fired one. This means operating cost will be confined to blast off, landing and to skirt around any sudden dangers that might arise in space.
"We therefore have a ship that has the velocity of the drive and maybe more, without the cost of drive. It has safety since our old rockets proved to be remarkably accident-free and this design would actually be working on almost the same principle as the old rockets, except for the blast off. The difference in outer space would be this. The old ships used rockets throughout the trip to increase their velocity. The new ones will be traveling so fast when they enter outer space, they won't have to use any power because they will already have the velocity needed."
He paused to swallow the dryness in his mouth and noticed with pleasure that more than one face was twisted in thought. Good. All they have to do is be given a theory to think about, the time to do that thinking and they'd be on their way.
"That's about it for now. I have some ideas of my own for the design of this ship ... and it's really surprising when you think how simple it is. But I'll save that for some other time. Right now, I'd want all of you to think about it. It gets top priority. Report back to me with your ideas. I think we can lick this problem and get our bread and butter, Inter Galactic Enterprises, right on top of the pile. Good luck."
The meeting broke up amidst frantic discussion, wails of misunderstanding, confusion and quiet self-musings. Bronsen smiled to himself, his face almost boyishly radiant in his pleasure. The seed had been planted. Now all he had to do was give it time to grow and bear fruit.
Vern's cry of amazement rang with reverence as he stood with Bronsen looking over the first test rocket as it was slowly wheeled to the launching area. "Boy-o-boy! Look at that beauty! Did you ever see anything like it?" The silver ship lay on its side as it approached the huge tower, but already Vern could see its glistening majesty soaring through the sky.
"She was a lot of work, Vern. Let's just keep our fingers crossed. By the way, that design of yours on the rotating cylinder inside the rocket, working independently of the rocket's forced spin, was good. Tough thing to lick, but now the pilot can keep a steady 'up' and 'down' no matter how much the outside of the ship is spinning. Good work."
Vern shrugged his shoulders. "Just call me the Einstein of the 23rd century, that's all. We'll all see how well everything works pretty soon now."
Bronsen was finding the tension beginning to build up in him. Just a few more hours and his theory would be lauded with success or shattered into the dust. He peered at the rocket, at the tiny black figures of the men that were dwarfed by its size and at the giant, black tube, towering hundreds of feet high, waiting patiently to receive her first charge. The needle-nosed space craft glistened in the early morning sun, her thin beauty tantalizing to the senses of a spaceman. Her lines swept gracefully back across her smooth expanse until they hit the four fin tips sweeping out from the rotating band of the tail piece, the fin tips that would fit into the slowly spiraling grooves of the launching tower. The field and groove construction first suggested by Bronsen had been replaced by lands and grooves when it was found that the fewer grooves gave greater accuracy and better muzzle velocity when tested on the laboratory models. Thus, there were only four fins instead of the originally planned eight.