This is a nozzle used by U.S. rocket experimenter Robert H. Goddard to static test a liquid fuel rocket. It was to test the feasibility of "curtain cooling," a method of cooling the inside of the combustion chamber wall of rocket motors. The test was made at Worcester, Massachussetts, on 25 May 1929. Liquid oxygen and gasoline were the propellants.
The entire rocket weighed 22 pounds empty and with the propellants, 100 pounds. The rocket developed a thrust of about 300 pounds and used pressure feeding of the propellants into the combustion chamber. The motor fitted with this nozzle was also tested three other times during 1929 but no flights were made. The nozzle was donated in 1959 to the Smithsonian by Esther C. Goddard.
Gift of Mrs. Robert H. Goddard