Man in space

what other controls might it have? I imagine the pilot would fulfil combined Pilot/Flight Engineer roles, with the co-pilot fulfilling combined Navigator-radio operator roles.

As for facilities, pilots controls sit around him in the nose, much like the Dynasoar cockpit, whilst to the co-pilot's left, he has a radio set, and a small navigation table and his appropriate instruments (compass, map charts, pockets for slide rules, etc. etc.) And likely to his left he has the spacecraft electrical transfer box, and duplicate dials to the pilot that monitor how the spacecraft is doing, plus some controls for the orientation of the spacecraft.

Given that some missions would be quite long, I reckon they would need a toilet, but it would likely be nothing as advanced as the toilet that the apollo missions were able to exercise. It would probably be something similar to the toilet found in most contemporary bomber aircraft of the time, such as the Lancaster, probably with some straps to hold the man down as he performs his (ahem) business, while the other crewman politely looks the other way.
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At the rear of the crew cabin, you would have the airlock door, and adjacent to it would be various storage lockers. Food would probably be similar to emergency rations found in most RAF planes, although perhaps dry packed to prevent any moisture ruining the fragile electrics.

Does this sound agreeable?
 
also lads, I've been hard at work, and I've managed to bang out the designs for both the American and Soviet spacesuits!


The American suits have been heavily inspired by the XF-5 suit developed in the late 40s by the BF Goodrich company, and amalgamated with the backpack from a Wernher Von Braun concept realised by Fred Freeman (minus the tape recorder, which seems a bit of an odd addition if I'll be honest). The American suits are painted silver on the arms, legs and helmet, with a white paint on the chest, thighs and shoulders. The arm and leg couplings (shoulders and knees on the Goodrich suit), will be blue and red as an homage to the apollo suits of our own timeline

1709136526377.png 1709136555459.png

The soviet suits are more original, but nevertheless bear a similar heritage, this time being leonov's suit translated into a more 50s aesthetic. The Soviet suits will be painted in a blue-grey on the body, with white gloves, boots and helmets. This will be done to make the BIC (british) suits look less out of place with the others, with its black torso and thighs, and silver arms, legs and helmet. IMG_7768.jpg 1709136478792.png
What do you think? Done good?
 
I say, might any of you fine gentlemen know of any good Soviet projects that might serve as their program workhorse? The brits have the BIS Winged orbital Rocket, and the Americans have Von Brauns ferry rocket, but I've so far been able to find nothing for the soviets?
 
Gentleman’s Astronautics said:
I say, might any of you fine gentlemen know of any good Soviet projects that might serve as their program workhorse? The brits have the BIS Winged orbital Rocket, and the Americans have Von Brauns ferry rocket, but I've so far been able to find nothing for the soviets?
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I'm tempted to say that you didn't find anything because at the time nothing in the West was mature enough to give the Soviets something worth of trying to copy, but a potential real life point of departure for dramatic story purposes might be the Keldysh bomber concept, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keldysh_bomber. YMMV, of course.
 
martinbayer said:
I'm tempted to say that you didn't find anything because at the time nothing in the West was mature enough to give the Soviets something worth of trying to copy, but a potential real life point of departure for dramatic story purposes might be the Keldysh bomber concept, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keldysh_bomber. YMMV, of course.
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I have been toying with that idea, but someone on twitter suggested perhaps a massively enlarged and V2/A4-influenced GIRD X serving as the first stage, an anomalous second stage, and a spaceplane on the top? Might this perhaps work??
 
Gentleman’s Astronautics said:
I have been toying with that idea, but someone on twitter suggested perhaps a massively enlarged and V2/A4-influenced GIRD X serving as the first stage, an anomalous second stage, and a spaceplane on the top? Might this perhaps work??
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Depends on the details, but in general, William Moore should be your new best posthumous friend :). In other words, do the (easy) basic math, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsiolkovsky_rocket_equation. Also, what exactly would an "anomalous second stage" be??? And as a general piece of common sense life advice, *never* heed what anyone on twitter suggests...
 
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martinbayer said:
Depends on the details, but in general, William Moore should be your new best posthumous friend :). In other words, do the (easy) basic math, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsiolkovsky_rocket_equation. Also, what exactly would an "anomalous second stage" be??? And as a general piece of common sense life advice, *never* heed what anyone on twitter suggests...
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Actually, I think I have a more reasonable suggestion: an enlarged G-2 acting as a first stage booster, with a G-4 second stage, and a Sänger-Silbervogel derived Mig-105 spaceplane acting as the manned third stage.

How does this sound? A bit more feasible?
1709571762768.png 1709571828649.png
G-4 (first stage) G-2 (second stage)

1709571902579.png
With something akin to this for the manned third stage, with some Silbervogel influences (twin tail, swept wings, streamlined body etc.)
 
If Glushko had cancer instead of Korolev...who knows?

Had they both died---Chelomei might have more of a chance--but that might also depend on Sergei's father surviving "eyebrows."

Chelomei might have gotten a small space plane built if unopposed...that might fit your scenario best.
 
Perhaps, maybe with a bit of political endorsement from Tikhonravov, who has so triumphed in ‘48 placing the first cosmonauts into space, would make sense that Malenkov would be swayed
 
sound more like this cluster of 3 G-4 rocket with Mig-105 spaceplane bolded to third G-4 booster
launch with two G-4, while third G-4 bring Mig-105 into Orbit...
 
publiusr said:
If Glushko had cancer instead of Korolev...who knows?

Had they both died---Chelomei might have more of a chance--but that might also depend on Sergei's father surviving "eyebrows."

Chelomei might have gotten a small space plane built if unopposed...that might fit your scenario best.
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no engines for anybody
 
Not having Glushko would be a hindrance to be certain, but had Korolev lived he would have been easier to work with.

Personalities matter.

In sports they are called “intangibles.”

Hard to predict.

Another person besides Elon might have had the same money or more, and not moved as fast…we saw that with Bezos.

Gary Hudson had drive-but no money.

Having just the right conditions come together is as important in spaceflight as in evolution.
 
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fair enough, I never did say Korolev died, its just that, since this is the 40s-50s, the other scientists would have more precedence over korolev, so he can still be there, just at a lesser capacity.
 
I say, may any of you fine fellows be able to help in the identification of the components in this cutaway? It's a cutaway of the BIS suits' life support backpack, but in the book there was no key, so it's all greek to me. Any ideas?

1714216991485.png
 
Gentleman’s Astronautics said:
I say, may any of you fine fellows be able to help in the identification of the components in this cutaway? It's a cutaway of the BIS suits' life support backpack, but in the book there was no key, so it's all greek to me. Any ideas?

View attachment 727018
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Theres a wired article which describes some of the numbered suit components
https://www.wired.com/2012/09/space-suit-1949/

There was also a rather nice replica of the suit built as well
WiP-48-1200x0-c-default.jpg

BIS-suit-2-e1562079162571.jpg

https://museumcrush.org/the-british-interplanetary-society-lunar-spacesuit/
 
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Sineva said:
I did find this,it still doesnt have great details tho
6a00d83542d51e69e2026bde97dca5200c-pi
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that is very helpful, and aided in my getting the layers of the suit down (until I twigged that only 4 layers probably wouldn't be all that effective for a suit, and so came up with the idea that the astronaut could wear a separate suit underneath as a combined cooling and protection garment, but thats for another time), but alas there is still no real concrete stuff about the backpack
 
Sineva said:
heres a pretty good cg image of the suit in its intended environment
bis_suit.jpeg

https://mat-hill.xyz/bis_suit/
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I must say, I do love that picture, probably as close as we are going to get to a picture of it doing operations on the surface. Although I do think that the boots would probably end up being more in-line with what George Mallory wore to Everest, just made from rubber with asbestos soles (speaking of Mallory, he and Irvine survive their Everest climb, summiting it in 1924, and mallory would go on to be an instructor to the british astronauts for lunar hiking, but thats for another time 1714307547283.png
Maybe have a look at the cutaway, and have an educated guess at some of the items inside? Perhaps if I told of the details of the general supply that could help?
 
Gentleman’s Astronautics said:
I must say, I do love that picture, probably as close as we are going to get to a picture of it doing operations on the surface. Although I do think that the boots would probably end up being more in-line with what George Mallory wore to Everest, just made from rubber with asbestos soles (speaking of Mallory, he and Irvine survive their Everest climb, summiting it in 1924, and mallory would go on to be an instructor to the british astronauts for lunar hiking, but thats for another timeView attachment 727189
Maybe have a look at the cutaway, and have an educated guess at some of the items inside? Perhaps if I told of the details of the general supply that could help?
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Yeah,I had a feeling that you`d like that pic when I saw it.
 
Sineva said:
Yeah,I had a feeling that you`d like that pic when I saw it.
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perhaps if I divulged the actual parameters of the backpack it might aid in picking out the components?

Compressed (bottled) oxygen was regarded as simplest, and Ross recognised that a skin-tight suit with bottled oxygen flushing to waste might be sufficient, the weight of even a 12-hr supply not being excessive. However, a pure liquid oxygen supply was suggested, with the atmosphere maintained at about 160 mm Hg (21 kPa). The suit’s atmosphere was to be circulated through the conditioning units and throughout the dress by an electric fan-pump driven by the electric battery. Respired carbon dioxide was to be removed by chemical means – sodium peroxide being preferred because the reaction yielded oxygen, reducing the generous allowance of 0.78 litres per min by as much as 43% – as against, for example, sodium hydroxide, where there is no regain. The sodium peroxide would also absorb water, of which it was assumed the lungs and skin would yield some 108 gm/hr”
Operation of the suit during the lunar day would require further cooling through the use of a low boiling liquid such as Ammonia or water – which would vaporise to space through a thermostatic valve

I think thats what I can ascertain from their website anyway
 
Rhinocrates said:
Well, good luck. I'd be very interested myself.
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Well, going by the specs I posted earlier, I think I can take a stab in the dark that (10) or (9) is the battery, and that (11) is the fan. (13) might be the O2 bottle, and maybe (5) on the cooler could be the refill point? Given that the cooler is detachable
 
Orionblamblam said:
Mars was thought to have an atmosphere about 7% as thick as Earths up until Mariner in '64, when reality came crashing in.
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Correct! Mariner 4 did a fly by and measured the atmospheric density by radio occultation. Reduced the estimate of the atmospheric density by roughly 90%. That upended plans to use solely oversized parachutes to land spacecraft on Mars. Along with the photos showing craters on the surface, it drastically revised the somewhat romantic vision of Mars with canals and vegetation.

Mariner 2 flew by Venus earlier and the radiometer measured temperature put an end to that as a possible habitat for life, as well.

But, if this is an "alternative" game, one can just go with the prior 1950's notion of Mars. Disney and VonBraun, along with Chesley Bonestell created and alternative vision of the solar system and its exploration. The 1950's vision was far different from the reality of what happened historically.

I should mention that there was a short lived US television series in 1959 (Men into Space) which tried a fairly realistic picture of the near future of space exploration.
en.wikipedia.org

Men into Space - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

And I've attached an advertising poster from the show. It incorporated some of the Von Braun plans for space exploration and had decent effects and models for the late 1950's era it was made in.


For an exhaustive and extremely well researched history of the early Russian Space developments, I highly recommend Asif Siddiqui's "Sputnik and the Soviet Space Challenge".

 

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TJDougherty01 said:
Correct! Mariner 4 did a fly by and measured the atmospheric density by radio occultation. Reduced the estimate of the atmospheric density by roughly 90%. That upended plans to use solely oversized parachutes to land spacecraft on Mars. Along with the photos showing craters on the surface, it drastically revised the somewhat romantic vision of Mars with canals and vegetation.

Mariner 2 flew by Venus earlier and the radiometer measured temperature put an end to that as a possible habitat for life, as well.

But, if this is an "alternative" game, one can just go with the prior 1950's notion of Mars. Disney and VonBraun, along with Cheryl Bonestell created and alternative vision of the solar system and its exploration. The reality was far different.

I should mention that there was a short lived US television series in 1959 (Men into Space) which tried a fairly realistic picture of the near future of space exploration.
en.wikipedia.org

Men into Space - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

For an exhaustive and extremely well researched history of the early Russian Space developments, I highly recommend Asif Siddiqui's "Sputnik and the Soviet Space Challenge".

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Thank you, and you precisely hit the nail on the head for what it is I'm aiming for with this alternate timeline. The moon is quasi-hollow and has aliens living inside, mars has wellsian martians and the canals, Jupiter is a mountainous hell-scape with volcanoes and rivers of lava, Saturn is a vast flat plane of snow and ice with 340 mph, and not much is known of Neptune and Uranus.

As for the timeline itself, I have been forging a compendium for the lore, that should encompass all the goings-on in universe:
docs.google.com

Up, Up and Away!

docs.google.com docs.google.com

You wouldn't happen to be able to take any fair guesses at the backpack components in the diagram I posted earlier would you?
 
Gentleman’s Astronautics said:
Thank you, and you precisely hit the nail on the head for what it is I'm aiming for with this alternate timeline. The moon is quasi-hollow and has aliens living inside, mars has wellsian martians and the canals, Jupiter is a mountainous hell-scape with volcanoes and rivers of lava, Saturn is a vast flat plane of snow and ice with 340 mph, and not much is known of Neptune and Uranus.

As for the timeline itself, I have been forging a compendium for the lore, that should encompass all the goings-on in universe:
docs.google.com

Up, Up and Away!

docs.google.com docs.google.com

You wouldn't happen to be able to take any fair guesses at the backpack components in the diagram I posted earlier would you?
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No idea. But it is lacking several "essentials". The real Apollo back packs had electronics, radio, cooling water (sublimation), oxygen, batteries, and lithium hydroxide canisters to remove CO2. The cooling water circulated through tiny tubes in a garment worn under the outer pressure space suit. Insulaton of the suit works both ways: keeps the lunar temperature extremes out, but also keeps the wearer's body heat generated in.

BTW, when you say "hollow moon", you don't mean largely hollow, do you? For this to work in some realistic fashion, the moon's mass must be largely the same as it is now. Otherwise, earth moon orbital dynamics would not work. You want to stay in the "speculative, alternative realm" and not egregiously violate the laws of physics.
 
The "Real Stuff". Slightly dirty, due to actual use on the moon
 

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TJDougherty01 said:
The real Apollo back packs had electronics, radio, cooling water (sublimation), oxygen, batteries, and lithium hydroxide canisters to remove CO2
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It does have these, as you can see on the diagram, although the CO2 purging would have been done with sodium hydroxide to yield some supplementary oxygen. Picking out the components on the diagram is what I meant.

TJDougherty01 said:
The cooling water circulated through tiny tubes in a garment worn under the outer pressure space suit. Insulaton of the suit works both ways: keeps the lunar temperature extremes out, but also keeps the wearer's body heat generated in.
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Well, owing to the fact that the BIS suit (rebranded as the British Interplanetary Commission in the timeline, with the suits manufactured by Normalair) has an impractical amount of layers to sustain a person in lunar conditions (just 4, lol), I had the idea that the wearer would don a Liquid Cooling garment, similar to the apollo equivalent, but that would reconstitute the lost layers for radiation protection etc. that the suit lacks: 1714583824851.png
TJDougherty01 said:
BTW, when you say "hollow moon", you don't mean largely hollow, do you? For this to work in some realistic fashion, the moon's mass must be largely the same as it is now. Otherwise, earth moon orbital dynamics would not work. You want to stay in the "speculative, alternative realm" and not egregiously violate the laws of physics
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Yes, the moon is still largely solid, it's simply that the selenites live in the large underground lava tubes left behind from the moon's volcanic past. Also, thanks for the suit reference picks, they'll help nicely!
 
Gentleman’s Astronautics said:
View attachment 727615

It does have these, as you can see on the diagram, although the CO2 purging would have been done with sodium hydroxide to yield some supplementary oxygen. Picking out the components on the diagram is what I meant.


Well, owing to the fact that the BIS suit (rebranded as the British Interplanetary Commission in the timeline, with the suits manufactured by Normalair) has an impractical amount of layers to sustain a person in lunar conditions (just 4, lol), I had the idea that the wearer would don a Liquid Cooling garment, similar to the apollo equivalent, but that would reconstitute the lost layers for radiation protection etc. that the suit lacks:View attachment 727617

Yes, the moon is still largely solid, it's simply that the selenites live in the large underground lava tubes left behind from the moon's volcanic past. Also, thanks for the suit reference picks, they'll help nicely!
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The real Apollo lunar backpack has quite a few more components.
Apollo Back Pack.jpg
 

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