Talk:Apollo 10

 			  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.23.60.63 (talk) 16:22, 13 September 2013 (UTC) 

Damn NASA and their screwball units of measure.

....within nine miles of the lunar surface. Except for that final stretch, the mission went exactly ... ????

Thanks, anonymous contributor, for helping me in my editing of this page by explaining where that inconsistent 14,450 meters, in one of four mentions of this distance, came from: a conversion of 9 statute miles. The other three gave it as 8.4 nautical miles, improperly changed from 2 significant digits to 5 significant digits in converting it to 15,557 meters.

Why in the world does NASA use those weird, out-of-place nautical miles in these measurements? Nobody else in all of the aerospace industry ever uses nautical miles to measure vertical distances. The worst of it is that when the NASA public affairs office gets their fingers on these numbers, they often get converted to statute miles. Unfortunately, neither the engineering sectors of NASA nor the public affairs office of NASA are particularly good at always identifying which miles they use, and we often don't really know if the original numbers have been tampered with or not. That is one damn good reason not to use miles of any sort for these numbers.

Note, of course, that 8.4 nautical miles is "within 9 miles", the next whole number up if you are talking nautical miles, but it is not "within 9 miles" if you are talking statute miles— it is about 9 2/3 statute miles. Gene Nygaard 12:07, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

You're using the wrong tense and forgetting that this all happened 41 years ago. NASA doesn't use nautical miles any more. In those days, orbits were traditionally given in nautical miles dating back to the 1950's (why, I don't know.) Shorter-term measurements were given in English feet, more understandable to the (predominantly American) public. Sometime in the early 1970's, before Apollo 17, they switched to metric units. JustinTime55 (talk) 18:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

The last topic probably explains what I just saw, namely that Snoopy's closest approach given as 15.4 or 15.6 km is wrong. Just recently I was perusing some NASA reports and I saw the precise number in the 40,000's of feet, so I know that was too big. Maybe we got the number from Mark Wade(?), who quotes a number in that range but gives Chariots for Apollo as his source. When I go there and actually read the Apollo 10 chapter, I find the number was given as 14,447 meters (metres?), which is only 14.4 km. I used this to fix the error in the Lunar Module article and plan to find the Apollo 10 number I saw and fix it here.

You also have to bear in mind that NASA often quoted "nominal" numbers for these mission parameters, which actually varied from specific mission to mission. The powered-descent initiation point would be quoted as "9 nautical miles" or "50,000 feet". You have to dig up the NASA technical reports for specific missions (some are available on line) to get accurate mission numbers. JustinTime55 (talk) 18:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I found the Apollo 10 mission report ([1]). We're forgetting one significant fact: the surface of the moon is very irregular. On page 6-20 there's a figure which shows the closest approach clearly: they measured 47.400 ft (14,447 meters) with their landing radar as the minimum distance to the ground, so Chariots for Apollo is correct. Pericynthion (aka perilune) is quoted as above the Moon's mean radius, but they were over a sea or crater 10,086 ft. below mean radius. I'm going ahead with this update. JustinTime55 (talk) 19:03, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Peanuts!

I recall at least one full-color one of Snoopy dancing while Charlie Brown, in a spacesuit, cheers, "We're back!"can anyone find scans?), and at least one regular strip related to the mission, where Charlie Brown consoles Snoopy about how the spacecraft named after him was left in lunar orbit. (Source: "All We Did Was Fly to the Moon," reference data below. Specifically described images found in it, but I don't have a scanner.)

This article

... needs a pro re-write and perhaps more info. It should be a dress rehearsal for the later Apollo articles! 68Kustom (talk) 08:52, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

What is the source of the statement that Apollo 10 is going to Oklahoma in 2010? I have not heard anything of this, and how can you be so sure? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 160.111.254.11 (talk) 18:03, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Anecdote about Apollo 10

I remember reading about how some in NASA were worried that Apollo 10 would actually try to land on the moon so they specifically put less fuel in the LM so they would not attempt to do so. I know it was probably just to save money on the launch, as the extra fuel in the LM would require more fuel in the Saturn IV and thus more money. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.33.138.221 (talk) 02:33, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

I have heard different stories on why Apollo 10 didn't land on the moon. However in Michael Collins auto-bio "Carrying the Fire" he specifically mentions that the LEM for Apollo 10 (LM-4) was basically over weight for a lunar mission. Also for Apollo 10 a lot wasn't understood in regards to lunar orbit. So it was felt safer to do a dry run with Apollo 10 first and have a another lunar orbit mission.--Brovane (talk) 02:24, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

Despite public speculation, Apollo 10 was never intended to land. So Collins is the source of some editors saying "it was too heavy"? If he said that, he was just giving a simplified, not technically accurate explanation. Saying it was "overweight" implies that dead ballast weight was added; this was not the case. The dry weight was even less than the Apollo 11 LM-5 (because no scientific instruments were carried). But according to Cernan (who actually flew the mission), the amount of ascent fuel (and thus the total weight) was less, therefore if they had landed, they couldn't have gotten back into orbit. But there was no "saving money" involved. JustinTime55 (talk) 17:15, 12 November 2012 (UTC)

A couple of problematic sentences

• "Due to the use of their names only as callsigns, the Peanuts characters Charlie Brown and Snoopy became semi-official mascots for the mission." That word "only" just introduces confusion; does it mean the names were used for no other purpose than call signs, or that if they were used for any other purpose, that would disqualify them from being "semi-official" mascots, or ??? (Also note there is no such word as "callsign", it's "call sign".)
• In the Crew section: "The Apollo 10 crew was the most experienced crew of the entire Apollo program, sharing five previous Gemini flights between themselves." Two things wrong with this:

1. The concept of an "experienced astronaut" is not well defined in the real-world literature; if one thinks "flight experience" means just experiencing launch and re-entry, then yes, five previous man-missions was the record for Apollo. However, length of time in space could be considered important, too. Since Borman and Lovell flew together on the fourteen-day Gemini 7 mission, and Lovell also accrued almost another 4 days on Gemini 12, that means the Apollo 8 crew had about 32 man-days of experience (even with rookie Anders); and Gemini 3, 6A, 9A and 10 were not nearly long enough to make up for this. Yes, the fact they all flew on five previous missions is worth noting, but making judgements like this and calling them "most experienced" flirts with original research.
2. This paragraph is out of place here, interrupting the flow of the crew tables. It is better placed in the Crew notes section below. JustinTime55 (talk) 20:31, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Lunar Ascent Stage derelict

User:Calixte recently added the Apollo 10 article to the Category:Derelict satellites in heliocentric orbit, with the edit comment "added Apollo 10 Lunar Ascent stage to derelict heliocentic orbit".

I don't believe that is quite right, for several reasons.

• The way categories work, this is now claiming that Apollo 10 is a Derelict satellites in heliocentric orbit; this is clearly incorrect.
• I believe the correct way to do it is have the statement, and the citation, in some appropriate section of the Apollo 10 article (as it is now), and then create a redir to that specific sourced section, while then adding only that redir article to Category:Derelict satellites in heliocentric orbit. I'll plan to do this.

 Done, on this second point, I've created a redirect (Apollo 10 Lunar Ascent Stage), and properly categorized it. I've removed the erroneous cat for Apollo 10 from the A10 article. N2e (talk) 01:19, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

• I have read the NASA source that briefly mentions that the LAS went into heliocentric orbit. Since it is not intuitive to our readers why a launch from the Lunar surface to Low Lunar orbit, in order to get the LAS and the manned capsule in position to dock with the Command Module in that same orbit, would provide sufficient delta-v to put the LAS in heliocentric orbit, I think it would be useful to have more info on the why and how NASA did this maneuver with this particular LAS. Anyone have a source for such? Cheers. N2e (talk) 01:06, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Space turds = notable?

There's been quite a few stories about the escaped turds floating about during the Apollo 10 mission, is it notable enough to mention, I think it is.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2306405/Give-napkin-quick-Theres-turd-floating-air-Transcript-reveals-toilet-tribulations-Apollo-astronauts.html