Wernher von Braun "Round-The-Moon ship"

Disney's "Man and the Moon":

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Hammer Birchgrove said:
The aerodynamics of the ship from the Disney documentary puzzles me.
Von Braun in "Man and the Moon":
"This model will show you how our future moon rocket ship might be designed.
It will be fifty three feet in length, has no wings or tilled surfaces because it will be assembled and operated only in the vacuum of space".
 
Von Braun's other moonship:

paraguay_1979_child_mi_block_336_sh_von_braun.jpg


paraguay_1979_child_mi_block_336_bonestell_across_the_space_frontier.jpg


I have written about this moonship and philately. In Russian:

http://magnus-z.livejournal.com/35859.html
 
and his famous 1952 gigant Moonlander

i got presumption this is here in reality
his Mars Spaceship diverted to go land on Moon !

art from Fred Freeman
 

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The RM-1 sequences from "Man and the Moon" from Walt Disney's Disneyland television series. First aired on December 28, 1955 on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) television network. The RM-1 is introduced by Dr. Wernher von Braun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCK3q8uJoMY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRDIf_3DqtI

Images of completed RM-1 model from Glencoe Models "Mars Retriever Rocket" model kit released in the 1990s.
http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/RM-1%20MOON%20ROCKET%20PAGE.htm
 
Triton said:
The Lunar Reconn Ship RM-1 sequences from "Man and the Moon" from Walt Disney's Disneyland television series. First aired on December 28, 1955 on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) television network. The Lunar Reconn Ship RM-1 is introduced by Dr. Wernher von Braun.
???
In "Man and the Moon" the moonship is called "Rocket Moon - 1" (RM-1). In a film there is no name "Lunar Reconn Ship".

manama_1972_apollo13_mi_292a.jpg
 
magnus_z said:
Triton said:
The Lunar Reconn Ship RM-1 sequences from "Man and the Moon" from Walt Disney's Disneyland television series. First aired on December 28, 1955 on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) television network. The Lunar Reconn Ship RM-1 is introduced by Dr. Wernher von Braun.
???
In "Man and the Moon" the moonship is called "Rocket Moon - 1" (RM-1). In a film there is no name "Lunar Reconn Ship".

I got the name from the Disney and More blog site.
http://disneyandmore.blogspot.com/2009/07/walt-disneys-man-and-moon-and-mars-and.html

I thought that was the name of the craft in tie-in books that were released about the time that this episode of the Disneyland television show aired in 1955.

In the Spaceship Handbook by Jack Hagerty and Jon C. Rogers they refer to it as "Lunar Recon Ship RM-1." The Strombecker model kit released in 1958 names it "Walt Disney's RM-1 Rocket Ship." I will just refer to it as RM-1.
 

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First image is a drawing of the Moon Ship by Dr. Wernher von Braun.

Second image is of Dr. Wernher von Braun with the RM-1 on the cover of Life magazine.

Third image is detail from a painting showing the "Bottle Suit"

Fourth image is from NASA Images.
Dr. Wernher von Braun (center), then Chief of the Guided Missile Development Division at Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, discusses a "bottle suit" model with Dr. Heinz Haber (left), an expert on aviation medicine, and Willey Ley, a science writer on rocketry and space exploration. The three men were at the Disney studios appearing in the motion picture, entitled "Man in Space."

Fifth image is of artist Chesley Bonestell and Wernher von Braun with a model of the moonship.

Sixth image is of the lunar lander from the 1953 book Conquest of the Moon by Wernher von Braun and Cornelius Ryan.
 

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Round-the-moon ship from the book Across the Space Frontier by Wernher von Braun, Heinz Haber, Oscar Schachter, Willy Ley, Fred L. Whipple, and Cornelius Ryan.
 

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RM 1 could also possibly be for Relief Mars 1 as this design was to be used to collect the returning Mars astronauts from their high return orbit to a lower orbit.

Regards,
Barry
 
To all --

Fascinating to see all this material here. Brings back a lot of memories.

I recall reading von Braun's First Men to the Moon back when I was about 12 or so (long after the space program had rendered it obsolete) but enjoyed it immensely. My (vague) memories of the book make me think of some of the art direction for the Ivan Tors series Men Into Space. Whether there was any "cross-pollination" there, I have no idea.

I think Mark Wade makes a good point in his von Braun article:

http://www.astronautix.com/lvfam/vonbraun.htm

... when he infers that von Braun was a bit of a showman. The very boosters he was actually designing at the time of the Disney production and his book The Exploration of Mars were somewhat unromantic cylinders (think Redstone, Jupiter C, etc. ... and it wouldn't surprise me if he was thinking of the "Super-Jupiter" even then) whereas he stuck with the more aesthetically-pleasing tapered conical vehicles I'm sure many of us remember so fondly.

He makes use of Disney's RM-1 in his book The Exploration of Mars as the means by which the crew for the returning Mars expedition get from their high capture orbit back to the Earth (I don't recall what he called it in the book, but Barrington is absolutely correct -- the idea was to derive the vehicle from a standard winged shuttle, by stripping off the wings and adding the additional fuel tanks and reactor at the nose while in orbit.

Disney later used some of the imagery we see in the videos for the "Flight to the Moon" attraction at Disneyland. I did do the Moon version of the ride back in the 1960s (which was a "D" ticket, if I remember correctly), and did the attraction again a few years later after it had been converted to the "Mission to Mars." They recycled some of the same visual elements, but added an audio-animatronic "mission control" in the waiting line to entertain the waiting crowd. The Mars ship was shown on a screen just prior to boarding, and they actually used Bono's ROMBUS as the ship.

I wish we (the USA) as a country had had the sense to pursue something like the ROMBUS instead of the space shuttle, but, alas, "the hand has writ."
 
From "First Men to the Moon"
drawings by Fred Freeman , 1960
POST-1
 

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From "First Men to the Moon"
drawings by Fred Freeman , 1960
POST-2
 

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Now that I'm seeing these, I realize the images from Men Into Space that I've seen of the moon lander and booster resembles this reentry vehicle launched on top of something that looks more like a Saturn I.

The series was pretty low budget, and it looks like they weren't really consistent with their model work, so there might be a lot of variations. I know the crew vehicle exterior was used again in The Outer Limits, in the episode "Specimen: Unknown."

At some point I'm going to have to break down and buy the DVDs to Men Into Space. My memories of the series are very vague -- I was just starting elementary school when I saw it in syndication.
 
Justo Miranda said:
From "First Men to the Moon"
drawings by Fred Freeman , 1960
POST-2

interesting ..

please compare the drawings with this one:

http://www.pr-materiequelle.de/begriffe/riss/risszei/r583.htm

i wonder who was copying whom here ..

at a guess i would say that my drawing (which is a drawing from the german "Perry rhodan" SF pulp series) was inspired by the book
 
agricola64 said:
Justo Miranda said:
From "First Men to the Moon"
drawings by Fred Freeman , 1960
POST-2

interesting .. i have seen this design before

please compare the drawings with this one:

http://www.pr-materiequelle.de/begriffe/riss/risszei/r583.htm

i wonder who was copying whom here ..

at a guess i would say that my drawing (which is a drawing from the german "Perry rhodan" SF pulp series) was inspired by the book - the issue with this drawing would have been published in eptember 1961
 
agricola64 said:
interesting ..

please compare the drawings with this one:

http://www.pr-materiequelle.de/begriffe/riss/risszei/r583.htm

i wonder who was copying whom here ..

at a guess i would say that my drawing (which is a drawing from the german "Perry rhodan" SF pulp series) was inspired by the book

yes it was
the Creator of Perry Rhodan SF series, Karl Herbert Scheer (*19 June 1928-† 15 September 1991)
take Von Braun Ferry Rocket and this Moon rocket for his rocket STARDUST

United State Space Force moon rocket STARTDUST
height 91,6 meter launch mass 6850 tons
first stage 36,5 meter long
42 engine Pluto-D, fuel N-Triäthyl-Borazan and nitric acid, total trust 13600 tons
Second stage 24,7 m
"kernchemisches" Nuclear engine, fuel Hydrogene, trust 1120 tons
Third stage 30,4 meter (Lunar lander and Returnstage)
"kernchemisches" Nuclear engine, fuel Hydrogene, trust 1120 tons
payload 64,2 tons crew 4 men

From Top to bottom
Cabin for 4 men
a small kitchen and sanitary facilities
storage room with hatch (and long, swinging crane with a net basket)
Lunartank similar to Herge Tin Tin on moon comicstrip
"Engineroom" Fueltank powersupply and "kernchemisches" Nuclear engine (similar to NERVA)

Crew 4 men
Major Perry Rhodan: Mission Commader and Pilot
Captain Reginald Bull: Nuclear Engineer and Copilot
Captain Clark G. Flipper: Astro Navigation
Lieutenant Dr. Eric Manoli: Physicians and Geologists

in Perry Rhodan#1 publish 8 September 1961
The STARDUST is launch 19 June 1971, lands 20 June on moon
to find a Alien Spaceship there...
and now ?
i just read Perry Rhodan#2514 and the Series is still cool B)
 
please compare the drawings with this one:

http://www.pr-materiequelle.de/begriffe/riss/risszei/r583.htm


You know..., he couldn't have known at the time, of course, but the booster section in this drawing has a lot of the soviet N-1 about it,
or maybe Korolev......... ;)


cheers,
Robin.
 
robunos said:
please compare the drawings with this one:

http://www.pr-materiequelle.de/begriffe/riss/risszei/r583.htm


You know..., he couldn't have known at the time, of course, but the booster section in this drawing has a lot of the soviet N-1 about it,
or maybe Korolev......... ;)


cheers,
Robin.

NO !
this technical drawing from Ingolf Thaler was made in 1972
in that time the N-1 was still a high Top secret project

the booster section was based on this 1952-56 Ferry Rocket illustration
http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/s_ferroc.jpg
http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/staging02.jpg

or maybe Korolev had Collier's Man Will Conquer Space Soon in bookshelf ;D

by the way
there is a nice Papermodel of STARDUST
1243259925_1.jpg

http://perry-rhodan.net/downloads/diverse/Stardust_Bastelbogen.pdf
http://perry-rhodan.net/downloads/diverse/bauanleitung_stardust.pdf
 
I'm trying to make a CGI model of the Von Braun 1952 round-the-moon ship. I'm wondering if anyone has any other photographs of this model from a JSC NASA exhibition. (The third photo seems to be a different model.)

vb%20lunar%2006.jpg


attachment.php


roundTheMoon4.jpg
 
The third model got landing gear !!!


on moment could Von Braun consider the craft also as lunar lander ?!
 
here copy of Original drawing by Von braun


second picture show the version with landing gear
 

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Thanks - I borrowed some details from the Glencoe lunar lander, and some from the Bonestell paintings of the lunar expedition. And some I made up. I can't figure out how the passive thermal control slats are supposed to look, though.

Here's what I made. I should probably revisit the personnel sphere and model the windows more accurately. The engines too. Ah well.
tumblr_ms4tayfoCW1sz6871o1_1280.jpg
 
Paul Lloyd said:
Thanks - I borrowed some details from the Glencoe lunar lander, and some from the Bonestell paintings of the lunar expedition. And some I made up. I can't figure out how the passive thermal control slats are supposed to look, though.

One thing to note about the "changes" from the original concept is that the propellant and personnel sphere's went from "hanging" in the framework (they were inflatable structures) to being load-bearing. You can see this in the orginal drawing and here:
http://www.ninfinger.org/models/vault/von%20Braun%20Lunar%20Spacecraft/vb%20lunar%2001.jpg

But the illustrations show much less detail and emphisis on this feature, (supports are only shown as "bands" around them in the following) so that the original "inflated" portions had to become "solid" structures shown later.
http://www.ninfinger.org/models/vault/von%20Braun%20Lunar%20Spacecraft/vb%20lunar%2002.jpg

http://www.ninfinger.org/models/vault/von%20Braun%20Lunar%20Spacecraft/vb%20lunar%2003.jpg

As to how the "passive thermal control slats" are supposed to look they would look like individual "slats" that would be hard to see when they are all deployed, (black square) but when retracted there would be alternate black and white-or-silver segments with the black slats slightly raised above the white/silver ones. (The alternate black slats retract behind the primary slats to expose the white/silver ones) IIRC. Since the propellants were non-cryogenic liquids (Nitric Acid and Hydrazine) the main aim was to keep them liquid in space.

Hope that helps.

Randy
 
Paul Lloyd said:
ere's what I made. I should probably revisit the personnel sphere and model the windows more accurately. The engines too. Ah well.


...Not shabby at all for what you have so far. The scale looks about right, as IIRC both Glencoe and Lindbergh claimed this was 1/96 kit. Never would have believed it myself, but apparently the reissues of this kit are getting about as scarce as the original Lindbergh run. The molds the last I heard (2002?) were on their last legs, and whoever's running Glencoe these days may have already scrapped them by now.


...Put any thought about slapping a NASA Meatball on one of those spheres just for giggles? Would be interesting to see it next to an Apollo CSM/LM docked stack just for comparison purposes. Or at least one of those "WTF?" encounter "What if?"s ;D B) :eek:


:OM:
 
The NASA meatball seems like the wrong era. (I know that's illogical, given that it would take years to even build the space station that the round-the-moon ship is launched from). I've tried the USAF roundel, though. It's hard to decide how far to go in making details up.
tumblr_msb5gv6pwS1sz6871o1_1280.jpg


The Bonestell painting has the comms dish and solar power mirror adhecent to each other, rather than opposite each other, and that looks better although it would unbalance the ships center of mass. I might move them on my model.
 
Paul Lloyd said:
The NASA meatball seems like the wrong era. (I know that's illogical, given that it would take years to even build the space station that the round-the-moon ship is launched from). I've tried the USAF roundel, though. It's hard to decide how far to go in making details up.


...The Roundel I didn't even consider, most likely for the possible reason you state in the fact that even with proper funding it would have most likely taken WVB and his fellow "Paperclippers" well into the late 60s if not the early to mid-70s to have pulled off a lander such as this. Whether the N.A.C.A. would have evolved into NASA or not is a good point of debate, but the Air Farce logo is probably a safer bet. I'd almost be tempted to add on an N.A.C.A. logo underneath or on the lower sphere, but as has been pointed out numerous times over the decades, that level of involvement was not "the Langley Way".


...One thing that's come to mind, tho: in OTL, we named our landers. Any thought about what to name this particular lander?
 
Fantastic! Beautiful work, I really wish I'd had these images when I made my computer model of it. Are there any more? Here's my CGI model - I might re-do it now!
 

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