Transcript

The Man who made Rocket Science Easy | Vasudevan Gnana Gandhi | TEDxKIITUniversity

[Music] [Applause] it's a great pleasure for me to be here what you are seeing is the launch vehicle of gslv mark it consists of solid liquid and cryogenic stage of course i worked in both all solid and liquid and cryogenic stages well some of you may be you know might have felt proud and patriotic to see the indian flag on the top maybe some of you think the marvelous of the technology advanced technology in this system very few maybe the taxpayer will think how much money might have gone inside this to build so these are all the thinking in that but today i am here to give the glimpse of some of them you know some of the mysteries back slides or thinking what might have gone to bring such things so i will try to tell maybe the fear or failure obviously achievements i come from a very humble beginning i try to help my mother in the field in the morning and some most of the time i will be in a small grocery shop with trying to help my father and maybe it's a small touch the roof school sometimes will go there teacher will be there and kind of thing and high school i have to walk nearly about 10 kilometers from my village well those days it is very common so i also did the same thing during that time only i used to study by walking because that is the time i used to get so time management plus how to do the work with minimum resource maybe those days electricity was not there in my village till my sslc so nothing so i could come up little bit with well fairly a good school education and college i got my mechanical engineering in 1968. maybe there's a very bad time in india no job and even though in whole tamilnadu there was only five engineering college but today if you throw a stone definitely it will follow one of the engineering college of course everywhere and even with the five engineering college we could not get job and it was very difficult i applied and applied and luckily i got some sstc one small this thing i applied somewhere they written what you want to write more here anything you like so i said i see the horizon you know the sky in the night the stars are attracting something i like the invited you know for the interview so i went there and one of the committee members still i remember very well he asked radiation is t to the power of what maybe my lucky number is 4 i said 4. so later only i came to know the question he asked by none other than dr khalam so i got selected i started my working in uh initially under doctor yay mutton he is the father of the propulsion in india so i could get the good we are very few people whatever you want you can do so those days tumba is evacuated from you know the near the seashore and some of the fishermen have been evacuated so i i was given a small timed house so in malayalam they used to call bargain nothing but your ghost house a tiled house so they're giving a small mixture to mix the solid proper length and rubber base you know kerala so i used to be used to get some rubber latex and mixed with ammonium perchlorate and make a small rocket maybe 200 gram and kind of thing i was a young engineer so mixed in every time whenever i see that proper land a lot of blow holes so as an engineer i blow hole put on both sides some plate and tighten it and put it in the oven well it was almost like 11 30 i would walk a kilometer to take my food so i started walking you believe it or not it was a big explosion so the oven got ripped open so there was a commission why this followers done something and kind of thing then later they said okay you start so i carried out in solid propellant like all sounding rockets like rs 7500 200 560 my work was loading the propellant inside the rocket motor very dangerous work but still i like the works why it is very interesting so one day i think you know that slv column was the leader and the fourth stage first time they cast the propellant as usual there was a very big blow hole they want to salvage the casing so they came to me why don't you remove the propellant and give the casing technicians and we removed almost 99 percent of the propellant if you removed it so last day i have brought everybody else appreciated the work you morning eight o'clock i came and gave the instruction to two of my technicians you do how to remove there was a telephone ringing in my cabin it is outside there so i rushed you believe it or not there was a big fire so there was a small spark it ignited the whole engine there was a lot of motor like r 7500 that all started firing inside i started crying running i don't know what to do well then finally there was a very big committee so i was asked and luckily one of the man said if you do work you will do mistake if you keep quiet after all it's like no government office you can go and sit and also you can go but if you do work there is a rest so i learned okay never afraid of any failure so that is the first lesson i could learn from that fire later we made lot of solid more tire and one of the motor i have taken to library those days you know strategically we required without the runway the aircraft has to take off so we made the rocket and take it to rybray and attach it in the belly of the hatch of 24 and as you saw i used to talk little more on the night previous night i know we were all discussing i said i don't know who is the unfortunate pilot who is going to sit tomorrow on the aircraft so you very few minutes somebody tapped on me yes you are standing i am the pilot i am going to sit tomorrow then i said sorry sir my rocket is so good it is reliable you need not worry about it don't worry gandhi we will see tomorrow so next day you believe it or not first success there are the aircraft was took off without the runway it was a beautiful scene and everybody appreciated and all those things around 1985 so the management asked where to start a cryogenic so well from even if you believe it or not i am first time i hear the word also what is so i started i went to library and started collecting and all those things so i started like my solid rocket with a small in so i started the cryogenic so what to use it is only a liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen but we don't have that kind so we start i started with a gaseous hydrogen and gaseous oxygen a single element it will not fire immediately so i started working on that and somehow the americans didn't like okay i should not tell okay geopolitical reasons we were asked to get out from russia so whatever i learned in eight months whatever i have seen i have come back and prepared a project report and submitted to the government to make a cryogenic upper stage and government was kind enough to give me 300 crore project i was the first project director to make you believe it or not the stainless yes cracked like a mirror first time in my life stainless steel cracking like a mirror i have seen so all of us they sat so it's a big blow for us what to do next so i didn't then i called my engineers and sat and we got through the basic fundamentals of from how the bracing time you know capillary actions will take place how much gap finally what i did the mistake in solid propellant i didn't allowed to expand it to explode here it cannot explode it cracks so the dissimilar materials it has to be expanded thousand twenty degree so i allowed next time it has come all right so we built the engine and we have taken it to mahindra degree by the time the out of 300 crore 100 crore i put the you know world-class test facility to bring the hydrogen and 50 crore for producing the hydrogen plant and all those things were ready so we brought it so the first engine we fired kasturian was there at that time well luckily it didn't explode but it melts first engine as usual my this thing so second engine you believe it or not it was it is can i go to the next slide so this is the engine fired of course a lot of videos are available but i am not showing so this is the test facility we fired and the flame you know it removes all our whatever the tiredness for lost so many years we were running everything was vanished we have become fresh so we can be able to go because this is the hydrogen is the future no energy for our automobiles only issue is hydrogen is not available but i have given you solution for that also you can harvest the hydrogen from the fertilizer plant from the refineries you take that itself will come for more than 40 000 buses we can run per day that much gas we are living out so all those things are still under this one it may be coming all right maybe future we can see but at that time maybe two youngsters iit uh gold medalist they worked in vssc for eight years they took voluntary retirements and started a private company called skyroot so they approached me sir why don't you help you have done all three this thing i said fine i don't have any issue so i started four years back i joined in skyroad they want to develop a rocket for putting only a 200 kg satellite in low earth orbit because today a lot of lot of demand is there for a small satellite to put on low earth orbit they all started using lng liquefied natural gas so i also thought why not we will use liquefied natural gas so i started with again a single element here using logs and lng using a thousand newton small test i ask our engineers to design and guide them what are the small test facilities and procure lng and everything and i fired the locks lng last year it went successful no explosion and it has gone can you go to the next step yeah these are all the three launch vehicles they are planning first vehicle is all three solid and first stage there is no cryogeny it has but liquid for roll control and other things that also i already developed second one is the engine which is going to have a cryo maybe next series of vehicle it will have our crayo also can you go to the next slide so this is the one very interestingly why i am telling is adoptability i don't want to tell my engineers hey i have done only like that i will not change my mind no so the present technology is 3d printing so those days you know i have done it um mumbai god rage bracing the copper and stainless steel and struggled and all those things joining the yield is not good but today you see the right standard 3d printed one very nicely with all it is also double wall with all the grooves and everything you believe it or not within 10 days we built the engine generally it will take 6 months so the engine has been built even the injector also a single component so these are all titanium i printed that also so with those two with the liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen sorry liquid lng and the liquid oxygen we fired for more than 20 seconds it went very well now we are having a program to increase to 2000 newton may be next month or within two months i may fire the other engine also it is also almost ready so these are all my thing here that's why i am trying to tell initial period the person's work second time i started learning even at the age is not a factor for learning and more important is whatever you learned you please share it with others that's what i prefer and another one is adoptability to the no mingle with the youngsters they have a lot of new new you know good thing and today computer you know that gives very good challenges and everything can be solved so everything can be simulated you can see whether the engine will work or fail that much you know confidence the youngsters are giving to me so that kind of a thing i have seen can you go to the next we graph so generally i used to tell only two slides towards my talk you could see the goal is very close don't get dejected and you have to work hard maybe you may be tiring you may think we may not achieve no you will definitely achieve that is my thing and second one is always i used to tell attitude attitude is very important if you break a egg a chick dies your life ends but if a egg breaks off its own the life begins so all of you from you has to come i wish all good luck to all my students and have a nice listening thank you for you