V1 Launching Ramps - Tech Question

[Agaricus bisporus]

Its well known that the V1 was boosted off its ramp by a piston driven by steam. The piston ran in a tube inside the ramp with a fin projecting up through a slot to which the missile was attached.

How did they seal the slot? I've found reference to a "metal strip that ran through the piston" but no detail that makes it clear how that worked. Must have been quite a trick. Is/was it similar to Naval steam catapults?

Anyone know?

[Load Toad]

WW2 Landmark Scout: V1 Katapult Prüfstände - Peenemünde, Mecklenburg - Vorpommern, Germany (http://www.ww2-landmarkscout.com/2012/09/v1-katapult-prufstande-peenemunde.html)
A close up of a V1 launching ramp at the V2 Éperlecques Blockhouse museum near Watten, northern France. - Alamy Stock Images at Dijitalimaj (http://www.dijitalimaj.com/alamyDetail.aspx?img=%7B3E46DBD1-BBE1-4AE9-915C-B3919BEB4E75%7D)
German World War Two launching ramp with flying bomb / doodlebug at the V1 launch site at Ardouval / Val Ygot, Normandy, France - Alamy Stock Images at Dijitalimaj (http://www.dijitalimaj.com/alamyDetail.aspx?img=%7BF17B9EF3-9266-4249-967D-533BAEB63493%7D)

I don't know but those sites might provide some help.

[bigal1941]

Might have copied Brunel, but used somesort of plastic instead of leather,

[Agaricus bisporus]

Might have copied Brunel, Brunel? Brunel's what exactly?

Loadtoad, thanks. The first link is the only one I've seen with a pic of the piston that gives detail of the "fin". I think I can see how it might have worked.

[Simtech]

Brunel? Brunel's what exactly?

Brunel's atmospheric railway?

Atmospheric railway - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_railway)

[DaveReidUK]

Is/was it similar to Naval steam catapults?Only to a limited extent.

Good diagram of how the seal is achieved on a naval catapult here:

http://www.theengineer.co.uk/Journals/2013/02/06/d/f/i/steam-catapul.pdf

[nacluv]

Brunel? Brunel's what exactly?

Brunel's V1 launch ramp of course!

:rolleyes:

[Noyade]

Is/was it similar to Naval steam catapults?According to Brian Johnson, (The Secret War - 1978 - pp 158)...yes!

http://img560.imageshack.us/img560/4986/img745.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/560/img745.jpg/)

[Fareastdriver]

340 ft/sec is just over 230 m.p.h. in 125 ft. Just imagine what that sort of acceleration felt like to Hanna Reitsch when she was launched.

[DaveReidUK]

This very ingenious steam catapult was to be re-invented with much acclaim several years later by the Royal Navy, for use on aircraft carriers, using conventional steam from the ship's boilers.Actually, the Slotted Cylinder Steam Catapult was patented several years previously, in 1936, by Colin Campbell Mitchell, who was later awarded the US Medal of Freedom for services to USN "for exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding services in the invention and development of the catapult for launching aircraft from carrier vessels".