Ranger, Surveyor, Luna, Luna Orbiter, 1960s Missions to Earth's Moon Options

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

I didn't know that. It is a fact, though, that they decided that the data from the regular engineering sensors on the Surveyors, such as the strain gauges and gyros, were an adequate substitute for the quite numerous sensors they had on that "Touchdown Dynamics" experiment -- which even included a whole second gyro package!

[edstrick]

I could be wrong on that.. I'm working from faded memories.

[Bob Shaw]

Bruce:

Last year you mentioned, more or less in passing, that you had come across details of a an early proposal for a Surveyor sample return mission - but I don't think you ever gave us any more than that. Do you have any more details? It sounded fascinating!

Bob Shaw

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

It was an Aviation Week issue all the way back from 1961, and I'd have to track it down at the Calif. State U.-Sacramento library the next time I get down there. It was quite detailed (including a picture). A little capsule capable of containing 1 pound of samples would have been mounted on a solid rocket sitting on a tiltable spin table fastened to Surveyor. It's an image of how US lunar exploration would probably have developed had we stuck to unmanned exploration.

[Bob Shaw]

Bruce:

Thanks! Sometime soon I hope to have my run of early 'Spaceflight' and JBIS out of storage, and I'll have a look there too - I know there were photos in that of the fully-instrumented Surveyor (two cameras, big vertical box thing (the drill?)) which might be of interest.

Bob Shaw

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

While I'm at the library (whenever I do finally get there), I'll dredge up that 1962 article listing (in detail!) all the science instruments originally planned for Surveyor, which was in "Missiles and Rocket" magazine. By the way, that 1962 National Geographic (October, I think) which had the detailed article on how the Ranger 5 mission was supposed to go followed up its 15 or so beautifully detailed paintings of the mission's very steps with two of that current model of Surveyor (complete with drill).

[PhilHorzempa]

I want to comment on a memo that I saw in the NASA HQ History Office
concerning the Apollo LMSS, the Lunar Mapping and Survey System. I am
including it in this thread as I now think that the cancellation of the LMSS may
have been connnected to the decision to hold off on the flight of Lunar Orbiter 6.

I do not recall who sent the memo, but one of the details in it caught my
immediate attention. One of the reasons for developing the LMSS, this memo
indicated, was that it would enable a detailed photo recon, from lunar orbit, in
case the first manned Apollo landing attempt ended in a crash. The memo
seemed to indicate that the LMSS would provide photographic evidence in
case there were no communications with the Apollo LM crew.

Needless to say, I was flabbergasted by this memo. I had never heard of this
justification for the LMSS. Does anyone in the UMSF community recall anything
of this nature? In addition, does anyone have diagrams, artist's concepts, etc, of the
LMSS? As far as the Internet, the LMSS appears to be a stealth program. I have
not found anyone images of what the LMSS was supposed to look like.

Getting back to Lunar Orbiter 6. According to Bruce Beyers' excellent history of
the Lunar Orbiter, the 6th spacecraft could have been flown very cheaply.
It could have produced complete Far Side photo coverage akin to LO 4's Near Side coverage.
Is it possible that after having cancelled the LMSS, that NASA was holding Lunar Orbiter 6
"in its vest pocket" waiting to see the fate of Apollo 11?

In addition, I find the LMSS crash recon story interesting in today's Mars program
where we all are waiting to see what images from the MRO can tell us about the fates
of the MPL and Beagle 2.


Another Phil

[dvandorn]

Well... all I can tell you is that I've probably read every single scrap of documentation publically available on the Apollo and unmanned precursor lunar programs, and that's a new one on me. I had never read that before.

I assume the LMSS they speak of was the mission module being designed for the Apollo I-series missions? The LM chassis loaded up with a ton of cameras and sensors? That would have been lunar-orbit-only missions? That were never flown (but explain why the Apollo landings went from H missions straight to J missions)?

-the other Doug

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

Gadfry! That's a completely new one on me. I suppose it's possible, but the Lunar Orbiter history ("Destination Moon") says that the decision not to fly LO 6 was actually made before the launch of LO 5 back in 1967. I've had in mind for some time, as a future project, trying to get hold of "Destination Moon's" source documents on that decision -- but, once again, I find it hard to visualize a connection. Still, if there WAS a crash and its cause was uncertain from telemetry, NASA might very well have wanted to fly a reasonably cheap orbital recon mission to investigate the crash site, and dragging LO 6's spare parts out of storage to assemble it belatedly might very well have been a course of action they would have followed. (It should be remembered that LO 6 was never assembled -- they just thought they had enough spare parts manufactured in the LO program by then that they would have been able to assemble another LO for much less than the cost of the previous ones.)

[ljk4-1]

For those of you who may be in the Washington, D.C. area on May 3:

National Air and Space Museum

Curator's Choice

The Surveyor III Camera and the Possibility of Life in the Universe

Roger Launius

Wednesday, May 03

12:00 PM to 12:15 PM

Milestones of Flight - Gallery 100

National Mall Building

Admission: Free

Talks typically last 10-15 minutes and begin at the Museum "Great Seal", in the Milestones of Flight gallery on the first floor.

The Curator's Choice lecture series at the National Mall building is presented every Wednesday at noon. A Museum staff member talks to the public about the history, collection, or personalities related to a specific artifact or exhibition in the Museum.

Web site URL:

http://www.nasm.si.edu/events/eventDetail.cfm?eventID=440

[PhilHorzempa]

Concerning the plan for the LMSS, I may have a photocopy of the memo, but
it may take some time to track it down. As I recall, the purpose of this short memo
may have been to reiterate reasons for continuing the LMSS project, which probably
puts it in 1967. Again, it came as a shock to me to realize that thought had been given
to what to do if the first manned Apollo landing ended with silence.

Also, again I would appreciate any technical info on the LMSS project. For instance,
did the Pan and Metric cameras, used in the Apollo J flights, migrate to the SIM Bay
from the LMSS?

On the subject of the previous post - Roger Launius' upcoming talk about the
Surveyor 3 camera and the Possibility of Life in the Universe, I hope that he will
not be spreading the Urban Legend about Strep microbes surviving for 3 years on
the Moon. The Space History quarterly, QUEST, will be publishing a letter, from me,
in its next issue, in which I expand on the highly questionable "evidence" that
microbes survived in the Surveyor 3 camera for 3 years. In brief, it is highly probable
that a miscue by a lab tech contaminated the sample which indicated signs of life.
In addition, only 1 out of 33 samples so tested showed positive evidence of microbes.
The dramatic suggestion that microbes are tough enough to survive on the Moon for
3 years has been accepted all too readily by historians and scientists, who should know
better.
As Carl Sagan eloquently stated, "Extraordinary claims require exraordinary evidence."
The Surveyor 3 microbe claim does not meet this requirement, and hence my label of
Urban Legend for that claim.


Another Phil

[Guest_PhilCo126_*]

Spacecraftfilms.com is planning a DVD-set of ' Unmanned Explorers to the Moon ' by September 2007:
http://www.spacecraftfilms.com/future.html

[ljk4-1]

There was an earlier request for an image of the original design for the
Surveyor lunar lander with all its bells and whistles.

Here it is:

http://utenti.lycos.it/paoloulivi/sur_b2.jpg


There is also an early design proposal drawing of the Lunar Orbiter:

http://utenti.lycos.it/paoloulivi/lo_early.jpg


Lots of goodies here, including a drawing of Voyager 3 as a Jupiter orbiter:

http://utenti.lycos.it/paoloulivi/never.html

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

That drawing of Surveyor in a 1962 issue of "Missiles and Rockets" -- which I swear by the ghost of Willy Ley I will post here as soon as I can reach a copy of it -- actually labelled all the parts and scientific instruments of the craft on the drawing (and, my God, were they numerous). There's also a nice color painting of it as the very last in the series of excellent paintings in that October 1962 National Geographic article on how Ranger 5 would have worked.

[PhilHorzempa]

I've been thinking lately that it would be neat to try to re-create
the views that Rangers 3 and 6 would have had of the Moon.

To note, Ranger 3 flew by the Moon (instead of impacting it and
deploying the balsa-wood lander) because of over-thrust of its
Atlas-Agena launcher. An attempt was made to photograph the
Moon as Ranger 3 flew by, but, sadly, the spacecraft did not correctly
execute those plans and no images were returned.

Ranger 6 successfully impacted the Moon, in the Sea of Tranquility,
I believe. However, no photos were returned as its camera system
was "fried" during ascent from Florida.

With images from the Lunar Orbiters and Clementine, I think that
those views could now be produced by those with more computer
know-how than I have.


Another Phil