The Moon Landings

[ion]

Like Columbo, taking a puff on his cigar, I have a few nagging questions about the moon landings. I'm sure someone out there can enlighten me. Since Ken's thread is not available for posting, here goes:

Question #1

How was the film used in the Haselblad 500EL cameras able to withstand the extreme temperatures on the moon (+250 in the sun, -378 in the shadows). We know the types of film used was:

   * Ektachrome EF film SO168
      * Ektachrome MS film SO368 35mm film used in the stereo  
      * Panatomic-X recording film - this was specially developed for use on the moon


These films were used in three forms 16mm motion pictures, 70mm stills, and 35mm in the stereo close-up camera. The 70mm still film had a special thin-based and thin emulsion double perforated film that was able to capture 160 color pictures or 200 black and white pictures.

We know that the cameras were modified with special lubricants to withstand the temperature range of +/- 250 F and prevent evaporation due to the the vacuum on the moon.

The cameras did not have any type of cooling system or shielding against cosmic rays, or radiation from solar flares, which happened to be at a peak period during the missions,  or radiation from the VanAllen radiation belts, all of which which would fog film, making the images quite unusable. (see NasaCr188427)

Why were all of the shots superb with not even the slightest fogging or radiation exposures that we would expect to see in the black areas of the film (specks)

We know that no special shielding was used on the camera or film cannisters.

On the moon, radiation from solar flares and cosmic rays ranges from 10 to 100 roentgens/hr.

Since the Moon has no magnetic field, it is subjected to a steady flux of galactic cosmic radiation (GCR) and low energy solar wind particles. The radiation levels are normally low enough (on the order of 1 to 2.5 particles per square cm per second) that people can carry on surface activities without any protection beyond what is offered by the space suits. However, during periods of high solar activity, it sometimes happens that the Sun ejects high energy particles and radiation in the direction of the Moon that can be lethal to anyone on the surface within just a few minutes of exposure.

Solar protons pose a significant risk to inadequately shielded crewmembers. Very large energetic particle events, which can cause acute radiation effects, occur at intervals of 7 to 10 years. Intermediate events, which can limit mission activities, occur several times each year. For nominal flares, build-up to peak radiation intensity occurs within a few hours or less. Monitoring of X-ray precursors may provide 30 minutes to one hour of additional warning.

Regarding Solar Flare, Cosmic and Van Allen Radiation:

Hoyt and his fellow researchers point out that energetic particles will steadily degrade electronics, optics, solar panels and other critical systems by breaking chemical bonds, disrupting crystalline and molecular structures, and by causing localized charge effects.

Higher energy particles in solar events and cosmic rays cause single-event disruptions or damage to electronics. At present, spacecraft systems operating in Earth orbit must be hardened to withstand this radiation environment.

As for humans, radiation particles pose a significant threat, Hoyt said. Zipping through tissue, radiation particles can deposit their energy by ionizing water and proteins, causing cellular damage, modifying DNA, RNA, and proteins in ways that can lead to cancers, immune system disorders, and other maladies, he said.


Question #2

What type of cooling / heating system was used to protect the astronauts from the extreme cold and heat of the vacuum of space on the moon. We know that there was a nylon undergarment that circulated water for cooling or heating but there is little to no information on the mechanism used to produce the cooling or heating as required to stabilize the extreme temperatures, which could cover the rang of +253F to -378F.

Since there is a near perfect vacuum on the moon, conduction and convection can be ruled out as there is no atmosphere to exchange the heat to. The backpacks look to be sealed with no evidence of cooling fins etc. which would be useless anyway. The only mechanisms left are evaporation and radiation, but we see no evidence of any gases emanating from the backpacks that could carry away heat. The internal drawings of the backpacks show a H2O sublimation plate which would somewhat answer the cooling issue, but again we never see any evidence of outgassing. There is also no evidence of radiation e.g. pumping to a higher energy state than the surroundings and allowing it to radiate into space.

The same questions apply to the lunar landing module, which had to survive up to three days in blistering 250F heat. The all aluminum tin can construction of the lunar lander would have posed enormous problems of heat conduction to the interior.

When questioned on this Alan Bean, briefly hesitated like a deer in the headlights then said batteries were used for the cooling (yeah that's it...batteries). This is absurd as anyone who has worked in thermodynamics knows you cannot pack that much power into batteries to provide the tonnage of air conditioning required over three days.

Again with the lunar lander we are faced with the same problem i.e. how was the cooling performed, as normal air conditioning requires an atmosphere to conduct or convect heat away.

Question #3

The gravity of the moon is 1/6 that of earth. The backpacks were 180 lbs earth weight, 30 lbs moon weight. The muscles in the astronauts legs were strong enough to jump maybe up to two feet in earth gravity without a backpack. Lets say an astronaut weighed 180 lbs on earth. He would weigh 30 lbs on the moon plus 30 lbs for the backpack. This is a total of say 60 lbs.

We never see an astronaut jump more than 6 inches (the jumping salute to the flag) yet he should have been able to  easily jump several feet.

Question #4

Upon close examination of the videos there are several places where the astronauts seem to be dangling from something. There are many cases where they are way off balance and should have fallen backwards, but are always magically up righted again by some means defying our visual sensibilities. In one case an astronaut that falls onto his back is mysteriously uprighted, hinging up on his heels as he is brought to an upright position defying the 1/6 gravity of the moon.

Question #5

Why were there no unmanned tests flights of the hardware required to send men to the moon. Logic would presume that unmanned tests of all hardware should have preceeded an actual manned flight.

Yet the lunar lander crashed and burned on testing and the pilots had to eject to save ther lives. Still this was used to supposedly land men on the moon without a single actual test flight to the lunar surface. The lunar lander was tested with a jet engine, not a rocket engine, and failed to be stable, crashed and burned. No tests were performed with the rocket engine supposedly used. Additionally, there have never been any successful testing of rocket powered soft landing vehicles as it poses extremely different problems than rocket takeoff. The amount of shrapnel in the form of rocks etc. kicked up from the lunar surface could have severely damaged the landing vehicle. Recall that the rocket would have produced 10,000 pounds of thrust and produced an eight foot deep crater under the craft. All of the ejected material from the crater would have bombarded the craft, possibly creating great damage. Note that rocket tackeoffs on sandy, rocky surfaces are far different than with controlled steel or refractory surfaces. Attempting a soft landing of a rocket on an undefined surface is extremely risky if not impossible. It may have looked possible for Buck Rogers, but in reality poses many insurmountable problems. Note that none of the photos of the lunar landing vehicle show anything like a crater under the craft, rather there is a surface much like the area surrounding the vehicle.

Question #6

Why has no one returned to the moon in the 40 years since this was last done. Many countries have technology that equals or exceeds that of the late 60's. Yet no one, not even the U.S.A. has ventured back. This is extremely strange as typically, once something is achieved technically it gets easier with the passage of time and as the technology advances. The lunar missions were abruptly halted, being replaced with space shuttle flights that never exceeded 400 miles above earth and more typically were in the range of 50 to 250 miles above earth. Compare this to the lunar missions which travelled in excess of the 240,000 miles earth-moon distance. Consider also that the space station is only 100 miles vertical from the earth. This is not deep space exploration, yet is touted in the media as if we were really exploring space. Considering the farthest space shuttle flights, they were only 1/600 of the distance to the moon, typical flights are 1/4800 the distance to the moon.

Question #7

Why do interviews and press conferences show the astronauts being extremely guarded and careful  about what they say. They rarely look joyful in these interviews, rather they seem to respond to questions by looking at each other in a worried way, to make sure they are all in agreement before answering. Their body language demonstrates a detectable tension and anxiety.

Consider for a moment what a huge embarrassment it would have been for the US if there was a failure that stranded the astronauts on the moon. They would have died a slow horrible death, cooked by the extreme moon temperature. Future people looking at the moon would no longer think of it as an object to inspire love and love songs, but rather a constant reminder of the horrible death of the astronauts. Would the US have taken this chance considering the calculated odds of reaching the moon and returning safely were something like 0.017%. It is one thing to lose astronauts into the void of space as with some of the space shuttle missions, but to have their deaths forever associated with the moon would be a huge black eye to the US.,

I would heavily discount propagandists such as Myth Busters. Their rebuttals are full of holes. I tend not to believe a lot of the moon hoax videos, as they really don't address the fine technical points needed to be discussed.

I'm on the fence on this issue, after countless hours of investigation, still puffing that cigar and asking a few questions.

[Grumpy]

What are possible motives for faking the moon landings?

Cold War Politics?

I think that to go to the moon, you need a level of technology that the US is not willing to admit that they have, much less prove it. 

There is still talk of what the astronaughts saw when they flew around the back side of the moon.  Supposedly there are "structures".

[Peterae]

It gets better than that G theres a rumour there was an Apollo 20 mission to a ship
http://www.cyberspaceorbit.com/walkaboutmoon.htm

but come on they either faked it or didnt LOL, if they faked it how come a mission 20, although i do wonder if upto apollo 14 they were un manned because the new pictures only show foot prints on 14

maybe because of the Cold War they had no choice but to launch 11 without a person because the tech was not perfected until 14, after all 13 was nearly a disaster.

beats me how they could launch a saturn V without anyone noticing though

[Grumpy]

Well, do we have the technology to walk on the moon or not?

Looking at space suits, using air to control temperature sucked so they use liquid body liners.  Now if it is cold outside, you can pump the liquid to the outer region of the suit to cool it since the outside fo the suit is cold.  What about when it is hot outside the suit?  How do you cool yourself off and get rid of the heat?  You can only carry a small amount of air to vent to the outside.  Even soild to gas production means doesn't sound too good.

[Peterae]

Here's what is said about the suit

        * The cooling units could only work in a vacuum. Water from a tank in the backpack flowed out through tiny pores in a metal sublimator plate where it quickly vaporized into space. The loss of the heat of vaporization froze the remaining water, forming a layer of ice on the outside of the plate that also sublimated into space (turning from a solid directly into a gas). A separate water loop flowed through the LCG (Liquid Cooling Garment) worn by the astronaut, carrying his metabolic waste heat through the sublimator plate where it was cooled and returned to the LCG. Twelve pounds [5.4 kg] of feedwater provided some eight hours of cooling; because of its bulk, it was often the limiting consumable on the length of an EVA. Because this system could not work in an atmosphere, the astronauts required large external chillers to keep them comfortable during Earth training.
        * Radiative cooling would have avoided the need to consume water, but it could not operate below body temperature in such a small volume. The radioisotope thermoelectric generators, could use radiative cooling fins to permit indefinite operation because they operated at much higher temperatures.

[Grumpy]

Is there any means to keep him warm when it is -250f on the moon?

[Peterae]

Not sure G a moon night is probably a lot less than on earth so i guess they stay inside at night and rest

[Peterae]

oops well i got that wrong

Average length of lunar day (days)   29.53059

so i doubt they even had to worry about a night when timed correctly

[Grumpy]

There is a lot of talk about going to Mars.  Wemight want to hit the moon first and check things out.  It is a lot closer.

I really thing that if mankind is going to get off this rock, then we have to share some of that covert stuff that we keep so secret.  Public technology is a century behind and doesn't fit the bill.  Mars isn't exactly "next door".  Anything could go wrong and the cost is exorbitant.

Did I ever tell you guys that I  invented warp drive?  Yeah, no shite.  Couldn't get the funding though...(joking)

[BEP]

Did I ever tell you guys that I  invented warp drive?  Yeah, no shite.  Couldn't get the funding though...(joking)

I'm not so sure about that being a joke 

BTW: It isn't a century for most tech. It is between 25 and 40 years on non-computer related stuff, about 15 years on computer stuff, last I heard 

[poynt99]

Nice exposé ION  

Some very pointed questions. If it smells like a skunk...

Or as Judge Judy says..."if it doesn't make sense, then it must not be true".

Anyway, either NASA was far more advanced in 1969 than they wanted to appear and they really did get to the moon and back, or it was all faked.

I suspect we may not know the truth of the matter for a very long time.

.99

[BEP]

ION,

I appreciate your objective approach to this. Such questions would make many think there was a chance of fakery.

I have watched this trend grow on disbelief of the Apollo missions. In every case of face to face conversation about these thoughts the other person didn't experience that time, didn't have the ability or knowledge to prove or disprove to themselves, or may have had political roots in their disbelief.

There have never been any doubts for me. When that first footprint was made I was timing the delay between the actual unencrypted radio transmissions and the live TV broadcast. I don't remember the details but the delay between the two was only a few seconds. That delay only accounted for transmission time between ground control and that huge 27" B/W TV we all shared in the school auditorium.

Our project was to record the time delay of the echos heard in the transmissions from both sides. We used the TV as the source for ground control transmissions and the echo of that transmission keying the astronaut's mic as heard directly from the moon orbit. The receiving antenna array was made for 432mHz moon bounce HAM experiments. We could hear the ship transmissions whenever the moon was above the horizon. We had to track the antenna on the moon manually to keep the signals.

The delay of the signals was exactly as it should have been. At the time, I doubt we could have varied the speed of a radio transmission through space. Why bother? All it took was guts, determination to beat the Soviets and oodles of money, and several lives.

That was the most technical project I had participated in, at that point. It was a big year for me and radio. Got my Novice ticket just before the moon landing. Since then, I have spoken directly with later Apollo and space shuttle missions. The last good HAM to Space HAM conversation I had was with a crewmember of Mir. Quite sometime after that I watch the live slow-scan Amateur TV transmission of the inside of the control cabin until the Mir antenna burned in reentry.

Doubts? Like quite a few, I was there. I participated in it all, in my small way. The signals were from where they should have been, at the expected strengths or the expected attenuation and the expected delays. I mourned the deaths then watched the skies for 13 whenever I had a chance just like the rest of the world when the crew was limping home in that tin can with almost no chance of survival.

The crew of 13 survived for the same reasons other missions were completed. Maybe we should have waited but we didn't. Did we have technology unknown to the public? I am very sure of that.

Why were the astronauts well guarded and sometimes apprehensive? They were loud mouths that knew too many secrets during heights of the cold war.

I have looked at the evidence. I have no doubt we went to the moon.   

[ion]

Hi Wavewatcher

I appreciate your point of view and your right to your beliefs. I also appreciate greatly your very intelligent posts on this forum. I was  22 years of age and an avid electronic experimenter at the time of the first "supposed" moon landings.

I was not caught up in the ra-ra backslapping of the good old US of A mainly because I did not appreciate the death of several friends in the Vietnam debacle..... it left a bad taste in my mouth and I was not much of a USA cheerleader at that time.

I had learned of the corruption and moneymaking of the "military industrial complex" in that war, not to mention the war atrocities and outright lies by the government. Shall we talk about "torture"?.

A government that nearly continually lies to it's citizens soon loses it's credibility to any thinking person. When huge sums of money are to be made by faking or not delivering the goods why would anyone not think this would be an easy path to take?

The delay of the signals was exactly as it should have been. At the time, I doubt we could have varied the speed of a radio transmission through space.

As for the time delayed signals, NASA launched a relay satellite just before the missions to mimic precisely transmissions and make them appear to be coming from the moon.... proper delays and signal strengths and fadeouts.

"There is much trickery in the business world"

It is quite possible however that more advanced technology has already bee discovered than the classic chemical rocketry.

If you think about it, an antigravity device would have to be the most closely guarded secret, one that would be agreed to keep under wraps by all the governments because it would allow the elite parasites to lose control of the human worker bee farm if it's secret were revealed into the public domain.

With understanding of antigravity possibly comes a source of free and unlimited energy....this also would have serious implications for loss of control and dominance of the human herd.

Science fiction has predicted many modern inventions and we have actually gone far beyond the predictions of science fiction (cellphones, computers flatscreen TV's, etc) in many areas except for two: antigravity craft and a high energy source. One should ask why we have we seemingly hit a brick wall in these areas?

So perhaps the moon landings were a psy-op to keep us in a Buck Rogers chemical rocketry mindset for the next few decades while far more exotic military NWO adventures are clandestinely executed.

There are a ton of other questions I did not include but would be happy to raise if anyone is interested.

Thank you again for your input.

[Grumpy]

The advanced tech had been developed and even leaked to the USSR by this time.

Hard to justify going in a chemical rocket when you can hop in the sportster for a quick jaunt.

We have probably been to the moon and other places, though probably not the way we are told.

Even if the pictures that we all see are fake and were created here, we may have gone and couldn't get good pictures.  Thinking that no one will believe it without pictures, we make a few.  This way the answer lies between the lines and everything is right and wrong depending on perspective.

No one doubts the we do go into space, and we did orbit the moon and earth.

Some may recall that there were a handful of companies that existed around the time of the moon landing and a couple of decades before the had names that sounded as if they did force field research. 

[BEP]

I'll respect your opinion as I wish for my own but this....

As for the time delayed signals, NASA launched a relay satellite just before the missions to mimic precisely transmissions and make them appear to be coming from the moon.... proper delays and signal strengths and fadeouts.

I am well known for hot air. Here's a little more...

When I was monitoring those signals I wasn't incredibly well versed in the magic of radio, nor did I have the best test equipment, even for the time. My timing device was a mechanical pocket watch. Even as kids we knew we needed an average so a few of us timed and then we averaged. The worst we could have been off was calculated less than 100k miles(memory isn't real good now). Even figuring the worst that means this faker satellite had to be half way between us and the moon.

Now for the hot air:
Since that time my radio career grew a bit. Much of my time(actually out of uniform) was as a SIGINT operative. Google it. I have awards and diplomas to prove it should someone show up demanding proof. One of the awards is for 'Unspecified' Special Accomplishment in Wave Propagation Analysis.

You guessed it. The Soviets tried the trick you mentioned many times. It doesn't work. Quite frankly, I would have caught the same thing when I was a kid.
Now, if you want to throw in things like time travel, warped space, gravity control it might have been possible. Human control of those is just more BS for the compost pile.

When I had keys to the vault there were many interesting toys. I used a lot of them daily. The majority aren't on the public market yet. Many will never be seen. I've only been able to account for a few showing up since then.

Can they do what you suggest now? Sure, but not in '69.

I have read some pretty well though out scientific format papers that show the theory and the math to prove it was possible in '69. The fact is, when you have the radio in one hand and you are pointing the antenna with the other, there is no doubt as long as you understand how these things work.

I am always curious how one may consider OU possible and not a manned shot to the moon. Maybe their minds are more open but too much?

You won't see me in this thread again as the last time it all came to ASCII blows and private insults because the line was crossed. The folks that died to protect our right to argue and died to break the limits that earned so much knowledge were being slammed. Since I also suffered those times AND saw the reality AND lost good friends AND received the INSULTS just for returning alive - I get agitated when apparently unscarred fully complete bodies speak (discontinue the thought...)

So let's agree to disagree.

Until then, I'll continue checking on the latest 'proof' there was no moon landing. Sometimes I just need a good chuckle 

Anyway, if I'm not here, I won't be part of it. 

[MileHigh]

There is no doubt that man landed on the moon.  I remember the whole thing as a kid.  The physics are all simple and doable, and it's neat that the Apollo command module and lunar module had less computing power than a modern cellphone and yet they did it.

It's simply impossible to hide such an allegedly huge conspiracy nor does it make any sense to contract out tens of thousands of jobs to companies only to launch a rocket into orbit and fake the rest.

If you don't believe that man landed on the moon then why believe in the FDA or any other big government agency that is supposed to exist to support the common good?  You may as well pack it all in.

I have looked at pictures that some people allege are fake and it's clear that they simply can't understand how the shadows are cast relative to the camera angle and lens focal length and the position of the sun .

In can be argued that the "real conspiracy" is with the faked-moon-landing crowd.  They want to sell you books and DVDs.

No doubt that Apollo 8 went around the moon because of Cold War politics.  There is a great documentary about the whole thing.  We beat the Commies and twenty years later the Commies imploded.

I saw Buzz Aldrin deliver a keynote speech once and I like that clip where he punches that moon-conspiracy guy in the face.

Remember the "Face on Mars?"  For 20+ years wankers went off freaking out over a 1976 photo.  When a better image scan was done many years later, there was nothing, just some hills.  In the interim many many books were sold where people obsessively examined the geometry of all of the other landmarks in the area and thought that they were looking at special signs.  Or did they really obsessively examine the geometry of the landmarks in the area?  Perhaps they just manufactured that analysis to fill the pages of their pulp books.

MileHigh

[MileHigh]

EMdevices:

Your link makes me laugh and cry.  I read the first page and looked at the photographs.  Those photographs are all related to the simulator setups for training the astronauts.  Before aircraft simulators used computer graphics for the cockpit displays, they used miniature scenes videoed with moving cameras to generate the cockpit view.  The camera movement was controlled by computers that were linked into the cockpit controls and the modeling of the aircraft in flight.  That was the technology of the day.  The same thing was done for simulating the lunar landing.

So the whole thing is garbage.  Sorry for the strong words, but you are looking at the honest hard work of scientists and engineers doing their part in the moon program, and people are twisting that into nonsense for the "fun" of making that web site.  Perhaps they are deluded and believe it themselves, who knows?  My bet is on some person or persons that are doing it for the mental masturbation they get from it.

The bottom line:  The people that worked on those simulators are the good guys, the heros.  The people that put up that web page are the bad guys.

MileHigh

[BEP]

Great link EM.

I've been laughing for the last 20 minutes.

What a bunch of dipsticks!  

The flaming idiot web author actually thinks there are two astronauts in this picture....

This is were the majority of this cult falls down. They interpret pictures far beyond reality. They do a really bad job at doctoring other evidence. Then attribute flaming lies (most really stupid) to history.

These people are no different than many spending so much time on the web. They just want a big hug or to feel needed or want to see they have some control. I have the perfect solution for them. REALITY  

Yep! a bit of reality will do them some good. I think it is time to fire up the Selective Service   I really wish it could be made far more selective, first.

 
-----------------


I just realized something....

It is very unlikely anyone would spend NASA-like efforts, as depicted by the Apollo scam wannabees, to make weird science experimenters simply waste time and money.

It seems far more plausible that similar lamers, like the Apollo scam wannabees, would get their jollies from hacking, inventing, misrepresenting, and lying about any real facts they may know about experiments that have our interests.

I hope these types don't cross the lines between 'Apollo scam wannabee' and 'weird science experimenter'. Somehow I think many of the same traits are required. I certainly have all the traits   

[Paul-R]

Its important to distinguish between "Not going to the Moon" and "Reality of the photos".

I am sure they went to the moon, but many of the photos are amateurish fakes; very
amateurish fakes. I suspect that a lot of film was ruined, if not most of it.

[ion]

It's a sad thing when one is painted, tarred and feathered with a wide brush and more or less cast into the same lot as the Richard Hoagland face on Mars crowd and other so named "wankers" and "idiots".

I don't believe most...probably 99% of the typical  "conspiracy theories" but one would be wise who examines how that "catch all" phrase was slipped into the public media and the reasons thereof. Ever heard of poisoning the well? No one will drink from it.

When one throws a little stone over the wall and is met with a barrage of emotionalism, what returns can be extremely revealing....it is a vetting or discovery process....testing the grapevine if you will.

The words used and how they are used...phrases....key words.... speak volumes of the individuals that within themselves contain such an emotional charge.

In the mid-60's I worked in Valley Forge at a company that built supplied navigational computer equipment to the NASA Apollo project......therefore....... we must have walked on the moon?

I also have an EE friend from the Aerospace industry that knows and worked with Dr. so and so who came up the key navigational plan and formula for the Apollo space mission......therefore we must have done it?

I'll know better than to be throwing any little stones over the wall on this thread. I asked a few honest questions and learned volumes about a few individuals by the responses, none of which answered any of the questions posed.

To bad there is not a more gentlemanly approach to honest inquiry...we might learn a lot more.

[BEP]

My emotional fog is lifting. No need to go into the trigger.

I found myself on the other side of the fence. That being the so-called 'established, published and well proven' fact side. Unfamiliar territory for me. I thought I was always the one needing more proof of some fact or physical law. When doubting the fed data, the arrows were fired at me.

The moon landings or Einstein's Theory. They are the same. Many, many reasons to agree with either or both. The problems are in the inconsistencies, as little or scarce as they might be.

I had no right to respond as I did.

I shouldn't have responded at all since such topics always seem to lead to my sore spots.

[Grumpy]

(Grumpy wheels in a keg of beer and starts pouring - he does not plan to stop - ever!)

What if it was faked.  Why?

How does it effect us now, 40+ years later? - still stuck on this rock, still stuck on the oil tit, and still suffering.

[MileHigh]

Ion:

Forgive the expression, but you need to take a "chill pill."  What I am going to say may surprise you.

It's nice to be be able to say what you think.  Certainly personal attacks are to be avoided, but attacking ideas and having a spirited debate are things that we have the right to do if we want to do so.  That's what freedom of thought and freedom of speech is all about.  It's healthy to be able to say what you want to say.  By the same token you are not allowed to yell out "Fire!" in a crowded theater.

In your posting you can feel your disappointment in what I said in my postings about this subject.  Fine, you don't like what I said or the way I said it.  But if you go back and read your posting over a few times, what comes across is not particularly positive.  You drop a few few critical keywords in your prose that are the familiar lightning bolts that I think we have all read before on these types of forums.  You may not be aware of it but your posting is actually very oppressive and stifling.  It's an attempt to censor speech and mold it in a way that you feel it should be molded, especially when the ideas are ones that you are not comfortable with.

What if you turn the tables, and you say that every "crazy" idea should not be stated unless you can back it up with references and logical explanations?  Then you start to feel the censorship from the "other side" and may be tempted to cry foul.

So your posting is talking more about yourself and less about me than you think.  Please think about that.

Sometimes I make reference to the "pulp press" and I have done so in this thread.  I find it interesting how that angle is almost never discussed on forums like this.  The notion that there are people that take advantage of the free market and sell stuff that is of questionable veracity and value just because they can.  It's not illegal, but it's not particularly nice.  And sometimes quite honestly it's an insult to others, the vast majority of whom are not even aware that it exists.

I think there was a book that came out in 1980 called "The Soul of the Machine" or something like that.  It's a book about the Motorola team that developed the 68000 microprocessor.  There is an intangible heart and soul that goes into developing technology, the sweat and late nights and the stress and all the work that people do to make something happen and do something good.  Look at any mature computer operating system, it represents tens of millions of man-hours of work.  Windows may "suck" but there is probably a billion dollars worth of labour that has been invested in creating it.

Anyway, sorry but I have to brush off what you said and just be me, warts and all.  I am not a bad guy, just expressing what I think and feel.  It's sometimes too much work to write politically correct prose all the time.  I hope that you understand that.

MileHigh

[MileHigh]

Ion:

Let me answer one of your questions:

Question #3

The gravity of the moon is 1/6 that of earth. The backpacks were 180 lbs earth weight, 30 lbs moon weight. The muscles in the astronauts legs were strong enough to jump maybe up to two feet in earth gravity without a backpack. Lets say an astronaut weighed 180 lbs on earth. He would weigh 30 lbs on the moon plus 30 lbs for the backpack. This is a total of say 60 lbs.

We never see an astronaut jump more than 6 inches (the jumping salute to the flag) yet he should have been able to  easily jump several feet.

That's 30 pounds of moon weight when you put the backpack on a scale on the surface of the moon.  Let's assume that an astronaut weighs 170 pounds.  So the total "earth weight" is (170 + 180) = 350 pounds.  What you are missing is that's still 350 pounds of mass on the moon.  When the astronaut goes to jump, he is trying to accelerate most of his mass and the mass of the backpack.  He will feel the same resistance in his legs when trying to accelerate that mass (not weight) on the moon or on the earth.  Hence he can only jump up about six inches.

MileHigh

[BEP]

"Question #4

Upon close examination of the videos there are several places where the astronauts seem to be dangling from something. There are many cases where they are way off balance and should have fallen backwards, but are always magically up righted again by some means defying our visual sensibilities. In one case an astronaut that falls onto his back is mysteriously uprighted, hinging up on his heels as he is brought to an upright position defying the 1/6 gravity of the moon."

I'll be glad to take this on as I answered the first part when gaining interest during a chat about 10 years ago. In the clips used as reference for every mention of this problem, that I have read, The shiny short streak seemingly attached to the top center on the 'backpack' is a whip antenna. Usually, this question is posed by someone of a very recent generation. Whip antennas have been slowly disappearing for many years now.

As for the strange recovery from an overbalance situation.... again, mass not weight. To recover from the same situation on this planet you shift your weight to change your center of gravity, change your stance, etc. All your mass is there with you. In a low gravity environment the hard part would be to avoid shifting too much of your mass too fast. If your swung your arms forward to avoid falling backward like you would on Earth, you would wind up on your face. Very little movement of your mass would be needed to make large balance adjustments.

The part of your question about when an astronaut falls on his back is beyond me. I have seen some video from the web showing this. I discounted it because it was so clearly edited, even beyond possible NASA fakes.

As you watch the clips of the Astronauts moving around the moon surface watch how reserved their movements are. They spent a lot of time training for zero and low G, using different methods. The clips tell me all the training was needed. Without it they may not have survived the trip - or wound up crawling back to the LEM.

(On the bobbing up and down speed..... I saw the whole thing live. The speed was natural then)

Here is the only part MI is not quite correct: "Hence he can only jump up about six inches."

If you have read some of the books authored by the astronauts you'll see references to worries about 'the boys' going overboard and winding up in short-hop flight. They were trained to make very reserved movements. Some of the footage will show they had some trouble following instruction, initially. After all, they were mostly hot-head test pilots.

The danger was once you got the mass going, it took just as much energy to stop it.