Lunar Spacecraft Images, A place for moon panoramas, mosaics etc. |
Lunar Spacecraft Images, A place for moon panoramas, mosaics etc. |
Guest_BruceMoomaw_* |
Feb 12 2006, 06:11 AM
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#31
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The Soviets remarked on that slight post-landing shift at the time. I imagine it was very delicately balanced on a pebble, and the slight vibration from the rotating camera head dislodged it.
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Feb 12 2006, 03:02 PM
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#32
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Interplanetary Dumpster Diver Group: Admin Posts: 4405 Joined: 17-February 04 From: Powell, TN Member No.: 33 |
The Soviets remarked on that slight post-landing shift at the time. I imagine it was very delicately balanced on a pebble, and the slight vibration from the rotating camera head dislodged it. I read about that, but I always assumed it was in the seconds after landing, not a slow progression. -------------------- |
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Feb 12 2006, 08:59 PM
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#33
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2488 Joined: 17-April 05 From: Glasgow, Scotland, UK Member No.: 239 |
I read about that, but I always assumed it was in the seconds after landing, not a slow progression. No; it was well after landing, and was detected via doppler shift by the Jodrell Bank radio telescope. The fact that it moved made front page headlines in the UK Daily Express, which newspaper had provided Sir Bernard Lovell with a fax machine to print the images. It was as a result of the proportions on the machine being set to standard settings that the Phil-O-Vision surface images came to be. FWIW, in those days fax machines were built round big spinning cylinders and weighed about as much as two journalists! Bob Shaw -------------------- Remember: Time Flies like the wind - but Fruit Flies like bananas!
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Guest_BruceMoomaw_* |
Feb 12 2006, 11:48 PM
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#34
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These days fax machines weigh about as two journalists, too -- albeit in the figurative sense.
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Feb 13 2006, 12:21 AM
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#35
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Solar System Cartographer Group: Members Posts: 10256 Joined: 5-April 05 From: Canada Member No.: 227 |
Doppler, Bob? That doesn't sound right. I'm wiling to be proved wrong, but I can't see it being right.
I guess we ought to rename the old vertical exaggeration technique Bernie-Vision. Pity. Phil -------------------- ... because the Solar System ain't gonna map itself.
Also to be found posting similar content on https://mastodon.social/@PhilStooke Maps for download (free PDF: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm...Cartography.pdf NOTE: everything created by me which I post on UMSF is considered to be in the public domain (NOT CC, public domain) |
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Feb 13 2006, 12:26 AM
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#36
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2488 Joined: 17-April 05 From: Glasgow, Scotland, UK Member No.: 239 |
Doppler, Bob? That doesn't sound right. I'm wiling to be proved wrong, but I can't see it being right. I guess we ought to rename the old vertical exaggeration technique Bernie-Vision. Pity. Phil Phil: It's certainly what they said at the time - I was looking at some press cuttings just a few weeks ago. Perhaps they reported a false positive which turned out positive... ...I really *must* scan the things and post them here! Bob Shaw -------------------- Remember: Time Flies like the wind - but Fruit Flies like bananas!
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Feb 13 2006, 01:05 AM
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#37
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Interplanetary Dumpster Diver Group: Admin Posts: 4405 Joined: 17-February 04 From: Powell, TN Member No.: 33 |
Here is a version I am working on flattening out. Also, a version in which I have artifically expanded the sun glare to hide the missing part of the horizon.
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Feb 13 2006, 02:04 AM
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#38
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1870 Joined: 20-February 05 Member No.: 174 |
I have long looked at the Luna 9 pans and compared them to Surveyor and Apollo pans, and I've been convinced that Luna 9 did *NOT* land in normal mare terrain. The site does not at all resemble the typical flat inter-crater terrain imaged by Surveyor 1, Luna 13 or Apollo 11
The entire terrain around the spacecraft is "rumpled" and rolling-hummocky. The site it resembles most is the Apollo 14 site on the Cayley deposits of Imbrium Ejecta. Either it landed within a cluster of secondary craters, on low relief highland edge terrain, or on a wrinkle ridge like the one on Surveyor 6's horizon. |
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Feb 13 2006, 03:55 AM
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#39
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Solar System Cartographer Group: Members Posts: 10256 Joined: 5-April 05 From: Canada Member No.: 227 |
There certainly is some low to medium scale relief on the Luna 9 horizon... but I'm not sure it's all that unusual for a mare area, if it happened to have a crater rim nearby. Nevertheless, as you can see here:
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2006/pdf/1341.pdf I have argued that Luna 9 cannot lie at the position usually given for it, which would put it among Apollo 17-scale mountains. The most likely position is shown in that reference. It has to be far enough away from the mountains that they cannot be seen. The area I indicate does indeed contain wrinkle ridges, as well as craters of various sizes. Any combination of them could account for the horizon relief. Phil -------------------- ... because the Solar System ain't gonna map itself.
Also to be found posting similar content on https://mastodon.social/@PhilStooke Maps for download (free PDF: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm...Cartography.pdf NOTE: everything created by me which I post on UMSF is considered to be in the public domain (NOT CC, public domain) |
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Feb 13 2006, 05:21 AM
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#40
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Would it be possible to use the Surveyor solar panels as laser reflectors?
-------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Feb 13 2006, 05:56 AM
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#41
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1870 Joined: 20-February 05 Member No.: 174 |
Luna 9 might be in that cluster of secondaries at the south of your candidate landing circle or the rough terrain (probably more secondaries) by the wrinkle ridge at the right edge of the circle, but another good candidate would be that embayed region of uplands just to the left of the candidate circle. The isolated hills and crater further west would probably be below the local horizon and not noticed. Granted, statistically, any mare surface contains regions of more hummocky and irregular terrain, mostly associated with secondary impacts.
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Feb 13 2006, 08:54 AM
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#42
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Founder Group: Chairman Posts: 14448 Joined: 8-February 04 Member No.: 1 |
Would it be possible to use the Surveyor solar panels as laser reflectors? I think the design of a laser reflector is that specifically so that it will return the incoming laser back in the direction it came from - that is the way they are optically designed. A solar panel would just reflect back out at the angle of the incoming laser. You would have to have the solar panel at exactly the right angle to reflect the light back to the source - an almost impossible task. Doug |
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Feb 13 2006, 12:20 PM
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#43
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2488 Joined: 17-April 05 From: Glasgow, Scotland, UK Member No.: 239 |
I think the design of a laser reflector is that specifically so that it will return the incoming laser back in the direction it came from - that is the way they are optically designed. A solar panel would just reflect back out at the angle of the incoming laser. You would have to have the solar panel at exactly the right angle to reflect the light back to the source - an almost impossible task. Doug Doug: Although the panel would not be nearly so reflective as proper LRRR blocks, they ought to reflect sunshine reasonably well. Depending on the orientation of the panel (just one, the other is an aerial) I suspect that at either sunrise or sunset you might get an Iridium-like flare from the surface. Iridium panels must be about three or four times the surface area, however, and are a quarter of a million miles closer to us - but they *do* reach minus magnitudes! It'd all depend on the orientation of the spacecraft, the position of the Moon, etc, etc, and the whole event, if visible at all, might only be seen over small parts of the Earth's surface at a time. Still, if somebody can work it out, it might be worth looking at as an advanced amateur observational project, much like the attempts to discern the shapes of asteroids etc by grazing occultations. Bob Shaw -------------------- Remember: Time Flies like the wind - but Fruit Flies like bananas!
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Feb 13 2006, 01:55 PM
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#44
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2454 Joined: 8-July 05 From: NGC 5907 Member No.: 430 |
Doug: Although the panel would not be nearly so reflective as proper LRRR blocks, they ought to reflect sunshine reasonably well. Depending on the orientation of the panel (just one, the other is an aerial) I suspect that at either sunrise or sunset you might get an Iridium-like flare from the surface. Iridium panels must be about three or four times the surface area, however, and are a quarter of a million miles closer to us - but they *do* reach minus magnitudes! It'd all depend on the orientation of the spacecraft, the position of the Moon, etc, etc, and the whole event, if visible at all, might only be seen over small parts of the Earth's surface at a time. Still, if somebody can work it out, it might be worth looking at as an advanced amateur observational project, much like the attempts to discern the shapes of asteroids etc by grazing occultations. Bob Shaw Perhaps someone should recheck the TLP (Transient Lunar Phenomena) records for any such unusual glints from the various landing sites. http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~rhill/alpo/lunarstuff/ltp.html http://www.mufor.org/tlp/lunar.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transient_lunar_phenomenon http://www.ltpresearch.org/ http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Launchpad/1837/ Wouldn't it be ironic if the Surveyor 2 and/or 4 solar panels happen to fall just right.... -------------------- "After having some business dealings with men, I am occasionally chagrined,
and feel as if I had done some wrong, and it is hard to forget the ugly circumstance. I see that such intercourse long continued would make one thoroughly prosaic, hard, and coarse. But the longest intercourse with Nature, though in her rudest moods, does not thus harden and make coarse. A hard, sensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock. From hard, coarse, insensible men with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft." - Henry David Thoreau, November 15, 1853 |
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Feb 13 2006, 04:22 PM
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#45
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Solar System Cartographer Group: Members Posts: 10256 Joined: 5-April 05 From: Canada Member No.: 227 |
What about the optical reflectivity of the high gain antenna?
I know nothing about this, but my concern about the solar panel is that I might expect it to be left pointing at the horizon - either west for end of day power or east in case it survived the night, for morning power. Apollo 12 images of Surveyor 3, for instance, show the solar panel facing west at a steep angle, but the antenna nearly (probably exactly) perpendicular to the Earth line of sight. I don't know the limits of motion of the panel, either, but I assume it tracked the sun to some extent. Anyway, the antennae might give glints near full moon, if they are reasonably reflective. I've never heard anybody discuss this... there might be equal or better chances for glints off ALSEP or other surfaces as well. Phil -------------------- ... because the Solar System ain't gonna map itself.
Also to be found posting similar content on https://mastodon.social/@PhilStooke Maps for download (free PDF: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm...Cartography.pdf NOTE: everything created by me which I post on UMSF is considered to be in the public domain (NOT CC, public domain) |
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