A Laser Optical Lever System for Measuring the Pitch and Yaw of a Ground Launched Rocket

摘要

The report describes a photo-optical system that has been designed for measuring the pitch and yaw of ground launched rockets during their first twenty feet of flight. The precision of test attitude measurements from the system was within three minutes of arc. The system was based on a one hundred foot optical lever arm consisting of a stationary CW Argon Laser with beam diverging optics, a concave first-surface mirror mounted on the nose of the rocket, and a large reflecting screen. The laser and the screen were each located approximately seven degrees off the rocket flight line. (Author)