Spacelog Apollo 8

Roger. Houston, this is Apollo 8.

Roger, Apollo 8. We don't have anything for you; we are just standing by. You're looking good.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Gemini 8—correction: Apollo 8.

Roger. Gemini 8, Houston. We would like to bring you up to date on the COMM situation while we've got some quiet time here. We'll be LOS Tananarive in another 2 minutes; we'll be picking you up over Carnarvon at 2 hours 25 minutes and 22 seconds. LOS Carnarvon will be 02:31:55; then we've got ARIA number 1 coming in about 02:37:30; and after that, we will have a hand-off to Mercury to Hawaii to Goldstone, and we should have continuous COMM. Over.

Very good. That's very good. Thank you.

Roger.

Thought you were Gemini 7, not 8.

Apollo 8, Houston. Over.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo.

Roger. Loud and clear. We'd like to take your tape recorder for 2 minutes, please.

Can he have it, Bill?

Go ahead.

Thank you.

By the way, we read out the voice tape, and quality of the voice tape is good—from the DSE.

Good.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston.

Alright, Apollo 8. You are GO for TLI. Over.

Apollo 8, Houston. Over.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Roger. We will have LOS in about 30 seconds, and we'll pick you up over ARIA 1 at 02:37:30.

Houston, this is Apollo 8. How do you read?

Apollo 8, Houston. Over.

Houston, Apollo 8. I hear you garbled but fairly clear.

Apollo 8, Houston. Over.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Good; you're loud and clear through the Mercury, and you're looking good dawn here. Everything looks good.

Roger. Understand. Our O₂ flow is a little bit higher than I thought, but Bill says that it's just about what he expected.

Roger. Understand.

Your He flow looks good down here.

Apollo 8, Houston. You're looking good.

Roger.

Apollo 8, coming up on 20 seconds to ignition. Mark it, and you're looking very good.

Roger.

IGNITION.

Roger. IGNITION.

Apollo 8, Houston. You're looking good.

Apollo 8, Houston. Trajectory and guidance look good. Over.

Roger. Apollo 8, looks good here.

Apollo 8, Houston. We're predicting cut-off, 02:55:58, and it looks exactly nominal here.

Roger.

Apollo 8, Houston. That predicted cut-off, 02:55:52, 52, and that's exactly as it should be.

02:55:52.

Apollo 8, Houston. You are looking good here, right down the center line.

Roger. Apollo 8.

Apollo 8, Houston. You are looking good, right down the old center line.

Roger. Apollo 8.

Okay—We got SECO right on the money.

Roger. Understand; SECO.

Apollo 8, Houston. Looks like a good cut-off. Everything is looking real good down here.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Your cut-off looked very good down here. We have a whole room full of people that say you look good.

Roger. Thank you. The only situation we have here in the O₂ flow is high, O₂ flow is a bit high.

Roger. Understand; O₂ flow high.

We'll get to first status report here shortly.

Roger.

Apollo 8, Houston. Your booster configured normally, and we're not concerned with the O₂ high flow. We think it's normal.

Okay.

Houston, Apollo 8.

Go ahead, Apollo 8.

Roger. The DELTA-TIG looked like it was right on. Burn time appeared to us to be about 2 seconds longer, 517. VGX was reading 95485 when we got it. The attitude was nominal. V_I was reading 35452 at cut-off, H-dot 04552, and H is 01791. DELTA-V_C on the EMS was minus 20.6.

Roger. We copy that, Jim, and I've got some times here for you.

Roger. Go ahead.

Booster begins maneuver to SEP attitude at 03:10:55. Takes 5 minutes, so it arrives at 03:15:55, and SEP time, 03:20:55. Your SEP attitude, the gimbal angles on the PAD remain good.

Roger. I have those times. The SEP time will be 03:20:55.

Right.

Houston, Apollo 8. Over.

Apollo 8, Houston. Go ahead.

Roger. Going to start charging battery B.

Okay. Battery B.

And would you keep a special eye on the purge tank and cryo O₂ tank 1 DELTA-V for us since our flowmeter is pegged out, we got no warning on O₂ high flow.

Roger, Bill. We'll do that for you.

Okay. Maneuvers started to separation attitude.

Roger, Apollo 8.

Houston, Apollo 8. How do you read?

Yes, reading you loud and clear, Frank. Understand you've started the maneuver to SEP attitude.

Roger.

Are you reading us alright?

Loud and clear.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Okay. Coming up on 3 hours and 15 minutes as per flight plan; we have you GO.

Roger. GO.

You got any reading on that O₂ flow?

Stand by one.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead.

We're reading about the same as we were before on that oxygen flow. The reason it's that high is due to the cabin gas changeover. According to Apollo 7, if your data repeats theirs, you can expect it to be high for another few hours.

Roger. Thank you.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead.

You can expect that the S-IVB will be 10 degrees off in pitch at SEP attitude; however, that is GO. There is no problem involved.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston.

Roger. We have you about 30 seconds prior to separation, and everything's looking good.

Roger.

What a view!

Looks pretty good, huh?

We've SEP'd Houston. We got the IVB, right?

Roger. Apollo 8.

Houston, do you read Apollo 8?

Go ahead, Apollo 8.

Apollo 8, Houston. Over.

Apollo 8, this is Houston. Over.

This is Apollo 8 on VHF and S-band. How do you read?

Hear loud and clear, Bill. How me?

Read you loud and clear. We have SEP and looking good.

Houston, Apollo 8. How do you read?

Read you loud and clear, Frank. How us?

Roger. Loud and clear. We are taking pictures of the S-IVB; the postseparation sequence is completed, and we seem to have a high gain.

Okay; fine.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Roger. Is Bill reedy for his VHF test? We can configure any time he is.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Roger. We would like to ask whether you did a VERB 66 ENTER to transfer the state vector from CSM to LM slot. We didn't copy that down here.

We did not.

Okay.

Do you want us to do that now?

At your convenience.

Roger.

We see the earth now, almost as a disk.

Good show. Get a picture of it.

We are.

Tell Conrad he lost his record.

We have a beautiful view of Florida now. We can see the Cape, just the point.

Roger.

And at the same time, we can see Africa. West Africa is beautiful. I can also see Gibraltar at the same time I'm looking at Florida.

Sounds good. Get a picture of it. What window are you looking out?

The center window.

Roger.

Are your windows clear so far?

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston.

How about your VHF check? We would like to get that done before you get too much further away.

Okay.

We are listening on VHF alfa Simplex.

Apollo 8, Houston. Say again.

We are listening for VHF alfa Simplex.

Okay, good. Thank you. VHF alfa Simplex, and we will get configured for it; and in between times, give us a clue as to what it looks like from way up there.

Roger. Well, Mike, I can see the entire earth now out of the center window. I can see Florida, Cuba, Central America, the whole northern half of Central America, in fact, all the way down through Argentina and down through Chile.

They picked a good day for it.

Stand by. We are going through the separation maneuver checklist here.

Roger. Standing by.

Houston, this is Apollo 8. We've lost sight of the S-IVB here. The separation maneuver may be delayed slightly, or else we will go ahead and make it without having her in sight.

Houston, Apollo 8.

Apollo 8, Houston. Go ahead.

When does the S-IVB do their blowdown maneuver?

Stand by one.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go on.

Your blowdown will be 1 hour from now, a little more that 1 hour from now.

Roger. We have the S-IVB in sight again now. We have done the separation maneuver.

Good show. Thank you.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston.

we would like to take control of the DSE for a while, Bill.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

Apollo 8, Houston. We would like to get an approximate GET of your SEP maneuver to use for our ephemeris tracking data.

Roger. It was 3 hours 40 minutes zero seconds.

Good, 03:40 and a foot and a half—feet per second. Right?

Roger. About that —

Okay.

— We have the—Mike, we have the exact callout here for you and a burn status report.

Alright.

Alright, DELTA-V_X minus 00011, DELTA-V_Y plus 0002, DELTA-V_Z minus 0002, roll 0, pitch 180, yaw 0. Over.

Roger, Apollo 8.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Roger. At your convenience, would you please go P00 and ACCEPT? We're going to update to your W matrix. And also when you get a chance, we would like to know about the SLA panels. Did they all depart? And do you have any comments about the SLA?

They all departed, and they worked fine.

Okay. Thank you.

We are in P00 and ACCEPT.

Thank you.

Houston, Apollo 8. Will you give us the information when you want us to stop the venting and so on?

Apollo 8. Houston.

Go ahead, Houston.

Roger. What is the venting information are you inquiring about: the O₂ flow high out through the waste tank or waste compartment, or are you talking about your evaporator?

Evaporator. We are configuring now to stop boiling.

Okay.

We concur in that.

Apollo 8, Houston. You can go back to BLOCK. We have gotten in the load to the W matrix update.

Roger.

Houston, Apollo 8. The back pressure valve is closed, and the water flow is OFF.

Back pressure valve closed, and water flow OFF. Thank you.

Houston, Apollo 8 here.

Apollo 8, Houston. Go ahead.

Roger. It looks like I might have to do a couple more small maneuvers to stay away from the front of this S-IVB, the way we are ending up now. Do you want me to do these with our P47 if we have to do them?

Standby one, Frank.

That's affirmative, Frank, on this P47.

Okay. And give me the time again when it starts to dump, please.

Roger. We're working on an exact GET of that, Frank.

Roger.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead.

I'd like to give you some idea about your trajectory. It looks like a midcourse correction number 1, projected out to TLI plus 6 hours, would be only 7 feet per second. So, of course, any further maneuvers you do would add to that, which is probably good.

I just want to stay from away from in front of this thing.