I've been reading the article above at the Astronautix site.

It appears that there were a couple of plans to use a small open lunar module weighing only a couple of tons to land on the Moon.

Would this have been only a one-man LM?

What arrangements would have been made to get the astronaut(s) to the LM from the Gemini spacecraft? Would it have been a tethered spacewalk, with the astronaut strapping himself in, and then untethering from the Gemini?

Was the LM a one-stage or two-stage object? Any thoughts on the limits on experiments to be carried down or rocks to be carried up?

Any other technical problems people can see?

So, ah, no problems, then? :wink:

The 1968 movie "Countdown" centered around a very modified one-man Gemini lander going to the Moon. The plan was for it to land close to a previously launched shelter and the astronaut would stay there for a year until a Apollo mission would pick him up.
I want to rant about how that would be a bad idea, but it's just a movie.

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It's just a movie, but during the we-must-beat-the-soviets panic era, such proposals were seriously made, but luckily rejected.

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Lunar Surface Rendevous it was called... one of the less rational approaches to getting to the moon...


I do seem to remember that there was a semi-serious proposal to tweak the Gemini hardware to allow a Lunar mission to be atchieved before Apollo was ready. I never heard anything about a lightweight lander however

This would have been done using the Agena engine , in the manner of Gemini 10/11 and since the gemini vehicle had proven it could standd upto a 14 day mission - it seemed logical ... however Apollo as a better option in the long run

"There is no way on God's Green Earth that we would ever, ever do anything like that." -FtEttM, ep. 5, "Spider"

8) Love that line.

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"Earth diameter is 7,900 miles, and Moon diameter is 2,160 miles. It takes on average 90 minutes to complete one Earth orbit, so one Moon orbit should take roughly 25 minutes." - Sam "NasaScam" Colby

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DataCable^2008 A+

Oddly enough, surface rendezvous is a centerpiece of Robert Zubrin's "Mars Direct" proposal.

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But contrary to the moon scheme in the Sixties ("Bring him up and then we'll going to find out how we get him back"), with Mars Direct, a crew will only go on the trip when everything is already prepared and fine on Mars for the flight back.

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"Flying in space is risky business, but just staying on this planet is risky business too." - John Young, astronaut

http://www.astronautix.com/articles/bygemoon.htm

This was the source of my musings. Unfortunately, the diagrams aren't clear precisely what a Gemini LM would look like.

Yeah, that's priceless. While he's beating them over the head with that line, they're all blinking and sort of recoiling in time with the "ever EVER", almost like my cat does when she mistakingly sniffs at an orange peel.

That's first among my three favorite episodes of FtEttM, particularly for effective use of period music and lots of quotables.

"[Interrupts] John. John? Astronauts are smart. They'll figure it out."

"Bob, how much do these windows weigh?" "I dunno, couple ounces?" "Bob." "The real ones?" =D>

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- Moose's one-line review.

"your going to regret that one. You are now a colonoscope...
- Chrissy, corrupting PraedSt's wish.

"I hear Bolivia is really nice this time of year."

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"Transport of the mails, transport of the human voice, transport of flickering pictures - in this century, as in others, our highest accomplishments still have the single aim of bringing men together." St. Exupery

But landing in an exact spot is a difficult (and energy expensive) thing to do. I presume such plans count on being able to travel long distances, maybe in rovers, to reach cached resources.

Don't know which exactness is needed, but I think we are pretty good at landing where we want to land. When was the last landing that was waaay off the target? And this time the landing craft would be manned, has the biggest computer and most important, there surely would be radio beacons at the landing site.
And why would it be energy expensive? When you come in on the right trajectory and tweak your course early, there shouldn't be extra penalties in terms of fuel.

Harald

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"Flying in space is risky business, but just staying on this planet is risky business too." - John Young, astronaut

????????
Both rovers hit almost dead center of their predicted landing ellipses. A manned landing within walking distance of the shelter shoudn't be difficult!

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Yeah, lotsa deadpan banter on par with SG-1. The exchange I feel an almost overwhelming urge to quote any time discussion of the LM's appearance crops up:

"She's a beautiful machine, Tom!"
"You really think that thing's beautiful?"
"God no, it looks like a toaster oven with legs, but I'm not gonna tell him that."

(feeling the topic slowly slipping away...)

__________________
"Earth diameter is 7,900 miles, and Moon diameter is 2,160 miles. It takes on average 90 minutes to complete one Earth orbit, so one Moon orbit should take roughly 25 minutes." - Sam "NasaScam" Colby

Bearer of the highly coveted "I found Venus in nine Apollo photos" sweatsocks.

DataCable^2008 A+

I don't think a manned mission will use the Rover landing method, so it probably isn't directly comparable.

Also, the ellipses were many kilometers across.

They will have to have a solution in case they come down tens of kilometers from the target.

The EELV approach is about as bad as Lunar Gemini.

No--worse.