Other Apollo Projects: What Should Have Been

That’s a lot of antennas!

Also, the Wayback Machine stalls on asking me for donatations - can’t download the files. Anyone else got the same problem?

There's a very (very :) ) tiny "x" in the upper right corner of the banner. Clicking it continues the download.

Randy
 
Pictures of Apollo lifting body Command Module mockup:
I love that cockpit and the service module.
The Apollo we got was a simple build though. Not sexy, but it worked.

The sunburst pattern solar panels would have spared Lovell a heartbreak.

On blunt bodies
 
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In case you asked yourself what the hell was the GD/Astro Apollo proposal, it is the Design IV in the drawing. Design III is Martin's.
BTW, anyone interested in highly detailed early Apollo proposals drawings ?
Yes , especially the GD Apollo proposals.
 
In case you asked yourself what the hell was the GD/Astro Apollo proposal, it is the Design IV in the drawing. Design III is Martin's.
BTW, anyone interested in highly detailed early Apollo proposals drawings ?
Yes , especially the GD Apollo proposals.

Since you responded to a post that is nearly 14 years old, I assume he'll get right on it.
 
Hey folks, I've discovered something funny and interesting.

From the beginning NASA always planned 10 landings
- 1*G-class: the first one, became Apollo 11
- 4*H-class: 12 13 14 plus the "original Apollo 15" that was swapped
- 5*J-class: should have been 16 17 18 19 20: we all know how that ended.

Now, Wikipedia LM page tell me, the last H-class LM was LM-9.

And thus this mean...

LM-10 = J-1
LM-11 = J-2
LM-12 = J-3
LM-13 = J-4
LM-14 = J-5

Except the last LM was really, LM-15.

According to Google books NASA 1969-70 Hearings, that one was passed to AAP: George Mueller doomed program that ended savaged - and salvaged into Skylab.

Now this begs a whole bunch on questions, some pertinent, some not.

- WTH did NASA ordered LM-15 if the J-missions had enough with LM-14 ?
- Ok, most logicial explanation: it was a redundant / surplus in case of the five J-class LM exploded or burned during ground testing.
- And then it was passed to AAP
- According to the Hearings: it was to be turned into the pre-Skylab ATM
- the one to be build eviscerating a LM into an ATM
- delivered by a Saturn IB to the wet workshop canned in spring 1969 for Skylab

I can't help to think
- "Hey, some bit of Apollo 21 existed after all"
- "Same for those wet workshop 1967-69 plans"
- Also: AAP had some vague lunar landings planned in the 1967-68 era: they vanished early 1968 with SA-516 and SA-517 cancellations

I wonder if George Mueller at AAP had some kind of "Plan A / Plan B" for LM-15

Plan A "Yeah, sure, LM-15 will ride a Saturn IB to Earth orbit, as AAP wet workshop's ATM-1"

Plan B "LM-15 is surplus to Apollo, beyond Apollo 20 and J-5. Now it is AAP tiny foothold into lunar landings... AAP's Apollo 21, kind of."
 
The San Diego Air & Space Museum (SDASM) Archives has just uploaded (looks like SDASM deleted the original Convair/GD LEM photos and reposted them in May 2012 - accordingly, the links & photos below have been corrected) their latest series of photos at their Flickr Commons photostream (link). Among the photos posted are almost 30 photos of the Convair/General Dynamics Lunar Excursion Module proposal in mock-up and model form. Here's a link that should bring up all of them through tags (LINK - Convair/General Dynamics Lunar Excursion Module proposal photos). Aside from the lunar module (LM) photos, there are a bunch of other gems posted in this latest batch, including test photos, drawings, etc., of Saturn I first-stage models equipped with a Rogallo Wing (Link 1, Link 2, Link 3) as a booster recovery system.


Here are a couple examples of the LEM mock-up photos (much larger resolution versions are available at the links/photostream).


Convair Lunar Excursion Module (LEM)
6996880246_3c342aa233.jpg


Convair Lunar Excursion Module (LEM)
6996879946_a91c186c41.jpg
 
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