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Post by colinr on Oct 6, 2005 7:56:59 GMT -4
I thought Episode 4 was a touch rushed - but the film of the real N-1 was stunning - and my dear wife who isn't an engineer looked at the 30 engines onthe N-1's firststage , and just shook her head in disbelief !
The F-1 combustion instability problems were alo fasinating , especially the recreation of the injector plate of the F-1 - along with the film of the real F-1's exploding was awsome .. However I think too much of the program was taken up with problems such as these.
I'd loke to get my hands on some of the NASA publicity fils shown during the episode , some of the shots of the S-1 assembly were amazing ....
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Post by PhantomWolf on Oct 6, 2005 8:27:53 GMT -4
Actually I'd say no. It might have still been extremely close, but without the N1 the Soviet's couldn't have got the LOK in Lunar Orbit and the N1 just didn't work. Even the Proton was having serious problems and as late as 1971 they lost their second and third test landers due to Proton failures on launch. The simple fact is that while they had all the equipment to get to the moon from orbit, they had nothing suitable to launch it with, and that's what killed them.
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Post by Jason Thompson on Oct 6, 2005 8:30:38 GMT -4
Colin, I would strongly urge you to get hold of the Spacecraft Films Saturn V DVD. As well as film of every Saturn V launch, it includes several film reports prepared at the time that detail the construction and development of every aspect of Saturn V construction. They include footage of virtually everything from the first S-1C tank construction through to stacking and rollout of the facilities checkout vehicle. In my opinion these films alone make the set worth the very reasonable price.
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Post by gwiz on Oct 6, 2005 8:53:19 GMT -4
The Kamanin diaries: www.astronautix.com/articles/kamaries.htmgive the background story to the Soviet moon programme. Before Apollo 8, only one of the Zond circumlunar flights had been successful. Even this suffered serious attitude control problems that blocked the lunar photography task, though it did return tortoises, insects and plants from lunar distance. Most of the problems lay with the Proton launch vehicle, which gave plenty of exercise to the Zond launch escape system. Only the top stage of the Proton came from Korolev's design bureau, so his death might not have made much difference. Kamanin had no time at all for Mishin, and laid a lot of the blame for the poor Soviet performance on the policy of making the manned spacecraft capable of performing unmanned as well, so that they were over-complex and also suffered test-flight failures that an onboard crew could have fixed.
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Post by Martina W. on Oct 6, 2005 10:15:40 GMT -4
How come we never heard of this before In Germany we were informed and constantly updated as it happened. We get to see a rerun of the special broadcast for Apollo 11 (slightly shortened, about 4 hours running time) every year on one of our TV stations. It's amazing how very well informed and educated people were back then compared to now.
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Post by gwiz on Oct 6, 2005 11:24:55 GMT -4
Something new, I had never heard of was that the Russians tried to send a probe to the moon at the same time as Apollo 11. It crashed in the Sea of Chaos What was the name of that Russian probe again? What was the probe meant to do Was it ever spotted by the US whilst it was on the moon Was there ever any danger it would have collided with elements of Apollo 11, if it had would that have been interpreted as a hostile act? How come we never heard of this before The Soviets announced it at the time, Luna 15, there was plenty of publicity, speculation about effect on Apollo 11, etc. I believe a USA/USSR link was set up to keep each other informed of orbital data. Soviets didn't announce the purpose, just the usual statement after the crash that it had completed its mission, though speculation that it was a an automated sample return machine was confirmed in the Glastnost years. The similar Luna 16 was successful, at about the sixth attempt, in 1970. AFAIK, no-one ever bothered to photograph the crash location. Speed was probably too low to dig much of a crater, I expect it would be more like the debris field after an air crash.
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Post by Jason Thompson on Oct 13, 2005 9:36:19 GMT -4
This just occurred to me while thinking about the series. I found it rather odd that Korolev was frequently shown with completed plans of his new vehicles before half the design work had gone into them! He had a completed plan of an R-7 that he showed Glushko in trying to persuade him to help with the engines, and he had a completed N-1 plan on his desk before he had even found out how many engines the thing would need! Since the number and type of engine were critical elements in designing the fuel tanks, this seemed a little backwards. Artistic licence, but daftly placed.
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Post by Sticks on Nov 14, 2005 10:11:50 GMT -4
Any plans to release this series on DVD.
I have all four programmes on video, but it does seem like a series that lends it self to DVD format possibly with DVD extras.
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Post by Jason Thompson on Nov 14, 2005 12:11:36 GMT -4
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