Category:Apollo space programme

The Apollo missions finally took NASA to the Moon, using technology developed in the overlapping Mercury (single-seater) Gemini (twin-seater) and Apollo (triple-seater) space programmes.

The development of the three-seater capsule was considered vital: not only were more astronauts needed for longer missions to enable shift working, going to the Moon also required the crew to be split, with someone staying in the orbiter, and a minimum of two people on the lunar surface, so that one could help out if the other got into trouble. Three was also considered a good number in long stressful missions, to allow majority voting in a difficult situation.

Apollo 1

The Apollo programme had a bad start with Apollo 1, in which the three astronauts perished in a fire onboard the capsule during a dry run. Normal air is around 80% inert nitrogen gas and 20% oxygen: biologists reasoned that one could lower the spacecraft pressure to one fifth normal, and if the air was pure oxygen, the astronauts would still be getting the same amount of 0₂ per lungful. Unfortunately, the flammability of many materials increases dramatically in a pure oxygen environment, and in the Apollo 1 incident, the capsule was pressurised with pure oxygen at standard pressure.

Further development

Apollo proceeded incrementally, with Apollo 1-6 not involving manned flights, but putting up larger and larger rockets as more of the components and subsystems were built and tested.

With the capsule re-entry now tested, Apollo 7 was the first to carry humans into space, with 7, 8, 9 and 10 practicing docking and undocking, spacewalks, lunar orbits, and finally with Apollo 10, a dry run that took the Lunar Lander to within 9 miles of the lunar surface before turning around and going home.

Apollo 11 was the mission that landed Neil Armstrong on the Moon, 12 and 14 followed (with 13 famously having to be aborted mid-mission).

The last three missions, Apollo 15, 16 and 17 all carried Lunar Rovers, which dramatically increased the amount of ground that the astronauts could safely cover in a given time.

Missions

Apollo 1-6

Unmanned tests

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Apollo 7

October 1968, 11 days

Walter Shirra, Don Eisele, Walter Cunningham

First Manned flight of the Apollo spaceship.

This mission stayed in Earth orbit and tested most of the systems other than those to do with the LEM (which wasn't onboard).

Apollo 8

December 1968, 147 hours

Frank Borman, James Lovell, William Anders

Ten orbits of the Moon, Lunar surface photography, first images of the far side of the Moon.

Still no LEM carried.

Apollo 9

March 1969, 241 hours

James McDivitt, David Scott, Russell Schweickart

Lunar Module testing.

Apollo 9 stayed in Earth orbit, but allowed tests of the LEM extraction, docking, astronaut transfer, further LEM tests, separation, redocking and astronaut return.

Apollo 10

May 1969, 192 hours (8 days)

Thomas Stafford, Eugene Cernan, John Young

Dress rehearsal.

32 lunar orbits. All operations tested apart from an actual Moon landing, with the lunar module twice getting within nine miles of the lunar surface.

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Apollo 11-17

Moon missions (Apollo 13 cancelled in flight)

Apollo 11

July 1969, 195 hours (8 days)

Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin, Michael Collins

Moon Landing

Apollo 12

November 1969, (10 days)

Charles Conrad, Richard Gordon, Alan Bean

ALSEP scientific package deployment, lunar rock collection

Apollo 14

January 1971, 216h 2m

Alan Sherard, Stuart Roosa, Edgar Mitchell

44kg lunar rock collection

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Apollo 15

July 1971, 295h 12m)

David Scott, James Irwin, Alfred Worden

78kg lunar rock collection

Apollo 16

April 1972, 265h 51m)

John Young, Thos Mattingly, Charles Duke

97.5kg lunar rock collection

Apollo 17

November 1969, 12 days, 14h

Eugene Cernan, Ronald Evans, Harrison Schmitt

115kg lunar rock collection

Models and scales

Since the Saturn V is rather large, serious full models start at 1:400-scale, followed by 1:300, "airliner" scale 1:144, and standard model aircraft scale, 1:72. 1:72 is good for modelling individual components like the Lander and CSM, and is a nice scale for dioramas.

For impressive single display models, we have 1:32 scale: used for the larger Revell CSM kit and also for the Dinky Toys Lunar Rover. The occasional 1:18 scale models exist, but are starting to get too bulky to fit on mantlepiece, even for components.

An advantage of the large steps between scales, in addition to the ability to get different models from different makers in the same scale, is that the standard kit sizes encourage an aftermarket in third-party transfers and detailing kits: If you decide to scratchbuild a model, choosing one of the standard scales means that you may well be able to buy transfers for it from off-the shelf from third-party aftermarket accessory websites.