On January 12 a group of Flight Crew, Flight Control and Mission Planning guys got together to talk about the lunar reentry and some rather interesting things came out which I am recording here for my records and your amusement….
Category: Contingency plans
Tweak burns
If you can stand it I would like for you to hear the latest on tweak burns – the trim maneuvers made after LM insertion from a descent abort. I thought we had this settled and on ice a couple of months ago but some things have happened which probably make it logical to revise…
How the MSFN and sextant data are used to target DOI and Descent
We had a meeting on April 9 which was extremely interesting to me. We discussed and settled on how the MSFN tracking and sextant landmark observations would be used in the MCC/RTCC to produce optimum DOI and Descent targeting for the LM. The big new factor that had to be taken into account somehow was…
F/G Mission Techniques – except for the lunar orbit phase – are ready to eat
Some of the decisions and open items that came out of our F/G Mission Techniques meetings in late January are listed in this memo. Basically, I would say that all mission phases aside from the lunar orbit activity are very well understood at this time – primarily as a result of the C’ mission -…
F Rendezvous Mission Techniques
We had our first F Rendezvous Mission Techniques meeting on November 12. We went through the whole thing rather smoothly with very few open items, probably due to all the past work on D and G. Obviously it is a much simpler exercise than the D rendezvous. This memo is to record a few of…
Post-insertion alignment is lower priority than rendezvous navigation
It has been agreed that it is more important for the LM to obtain rendezvous navigation tracking data than to complete the platform realignment after insertion into orbit if problems occur which prolong it. The point is, an accurate CSI maneuver is vital but it is recognized that bad angle data does not substantially degrade…
LEM radar angle bias correction
As you know, the rendezvous orbit navigation process involves updating the spacecraft state vector based on the spacecraft radar data. However, the radar apparently has unacceptably large angular bias errors for some reason. Instead of fixing the damn radar, someone decided to include in the LEM spacecraft computer program the capability of computing these radar…
Descent Data Select procedures are finalized
On July 7 and 8 we held a final review of the Data Select procedures and Flight Controller interface during the Descent phase of the lunar landing mission. This lengthy memo is to describe briefly some of the items discussed, all of which are being thoroughly documented before the flight….
F mission rule regarding DPS gimbal drive failure indication
This memo is to report how it is currently planned to handle an indicated failure of the DPS gimbal drive actuator (GDA) on the F mission….
APS and DPS operational constraints clarification is needed
Procedures for descent abort (and nominal ascent, too) can be made significantly simpler if we assume it is possible to operate the DPS and APS engines to propellant depletion. You have indicated this is an acceptable way to operate the engines both verbally and in writing, and mission techniques have been developed based on that….