On April 28, 1969 we reviewed the Descent Aborts and subsequent Rendezvous Mission Techniques with the crew and the rest of the world. I think most of this is quite complete and agreeable to everyone concerned, with one major exception. I was shocked and ashamed to find that I had badly misunderstood the situation regarding…
Month: May 1969
CSM rendezvous navigation works fine using just VHF ranging
I made an announcement during the F Operations Review which was absolutely flat-out wrong. This memo is to correct that statement and/or just to make sure you know what capability really exists in the CSM for rendezvous navigation….
Descent Monitoring Mission Techniques – a status report
I think we are beginning to see the light at the end of the Descent Monitoring Mission Techniques tunnel. At the April 24 meeting on that subject we thoroughly discussed the integration of the onboard techniques with the activity at the MCC during powered descent and I feel the resultant is as reasonable and complete…
Ascent newsletter
This memo is to report several interesting things regarding lunar ascent, both nominal and after a descent abort….
Comments on IMU compensation procedures
Attached is an MIT memo I thought you should see. It proposes that the MCC update the gyro compensation terms in the spacecraft computers whenever they are detectably wrong. One benefit, of course, is the possibility of eliminating a bunch of IMU alignments. But more important, it keeps the system right….
Apollo Mission Techniques Documentation Schedule
Here is another Mission Techniques Documentation Schedule, since the last one is three months old and barely reflects real life any more. The Lunar Orbit Activities Document will almost certainly have to be updated to reflect whatever we learn on the F mission. A June 30 release date for that update will be kinda late,…
The LM4 RR/LGC interface may be broken, but that’s okay – sorta
This memo is to document the Data Priority position regarding a recent LM4 systems problem. To wit, it is considered acceptable to proceed with the nominal F mission with a questionable or known interface failure between the rendezvous radar (RR) and the LM spacecraft computer (LGC). It should be emphasized that a properly operating rendezvous…
G mission lunar descent is uphill – all the way
Just in case you didn’t know, I thought I would send you this note about some nominal G mission landing site characteristics which I thought were kind of interesting. First of all, apparently this landing site (2-P-6) is about 9,000 feet lower than the mean lunar radius. The significance of this, of course, is that…
Manual Steering for LM Ascent
Over the years various groups have attacked the problem of if and how the crew can manually steer the LM back into orbit from the lunar surface. These studies were started before GAEC was even selected to build the LM and some analysis is still going on to define the optimum pitch attitude profile, which…
Cis-lunar state vector updating procedure change
A lot of you won’t care – but I want to make sure that those that need to know, do. It deals with state vector updates from the MCC to the CSM during cis-lunar flight on the G mission….