Spacelog Apollo 8

Roger. You might be interested to know the center window is pretty well fogged up, but the other four seem to be in pretty good shape.

Glad to hear you've got four out of five, and your big dump will be coming up in 2 minutes or so.

Roger. We're standing by.

The S-IVB has started dump.

Houston, Apollo 8.

Go ahead, Apollo 8.

Roger. Mike, did you say star 14 was good till about 05:30 or something?

Yes. Stand by while I give you that time again. Star number 14 should be good for about another 8 minutes, Jim—7 minutes.

Okay. Now be advised, the optics calibration is very difficult to do because of all the other little stars floating here. I'm going to …, bypass it and do it at the end of this.

Roger, Apollo 8. Understand.

You should have the LOX dump now, Apollo 8.

Houston, this is 8. I'm looking through the scanning telescope and that LOX dump and just blanked out completely the entire scanning telescope.

Understand.

It's a fantastic sight, Bill. Looks like the S-IVB, a small attitude excursion while it's dumping.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Roger. I've got a flight plan update for Bill if he's ready to copy.

Stand by.

Stand by.

Ready to copy.

Okay. We are about 05:10 GET where we will record the BLOCK data TLI plus four and TLI plus 11. The TLI plus four PAD that we gave you before is perfectly all right. We will not require that one, and we will have the TLI plus 11 hour PAD for you shortly, then at 05:45 or 6 hours on that high-gain antenna checkout. Roger. Standing by.

We are on OMNI D, and we heard—we lost you after—TM plus four was okay.

Okay. The TLI plus 4 hour PAD is okay. We will have the TLI plus 11 hour PAD for you shortly, and at 05:50, for your high-gain antenna checkout, we would like you to leave that switch in WIDE BEAM with reference to our conversation the other day; leave it in WIDE.

Roger. Don't want to zap your receivers.

No, it has to do with some loss of tracking data, so it is better to leave it WIDE.

Houston, Apollo 8. Are you recording what we are getting out of 23?

Stand by one, Jim; I'll check.

That is affirmative, Jim; we are copying your P23.

Pretty big numbers there.

Well, we think that is because you bypassed the trunnion check.

Houston, we are getting some really big numbers in DELTA-R and DELTA-V.

Roger. Understand, Jim.

Do you want us to proceed with this, or should we just leave them alone?

Apollo 8, say again.

Do you want us to accept these, or should we leave them alone?

Stand by.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston.

Roger. We do not wish you to accept those marks. This is due to the fact that in bypassing the trunnion bias check, you still have big numbers left in those registers, so you go ahead when—after you do the trunnion bias check. Those numbers will become small later, but do not accept them right now.

Understand, Houston.

We have a TLI plus 11 hour update for you when you are ready to copy.

Stand by.

Roger. Ready to copy TLI plus 11.

Roger, Bill. TLI plus 11, and this assumes no midcourse correction number 1: it's an SPS/G&N; 63330 minus 163 plus 129. Are you with me so far?

Roger.

Okay. 013:56:47.59 minus 00489 plus 00000 plus 47250 177 144 000, not applicable, plus 00197 47253 554 47050 12 1278 256 023, up 265, left 18. Are you with me so far?

Yes, I'm with you so far, Bill; go ahead.

Plus 1197, minus 16500 12681 35608 0506, correction 050:46:53 north set 068 097 356, zero ullage. Note one: fast return, P37, DELTA-V 7900 Indian Ocean; two, high-speed procedure not required; three, PAD assumes no MCC 1. Over.

That's all correct, Bill.

Roger.

Houston, Apollo 8.

Go ahead, Apollo 8.

Roger, Mike. I'd like to give some comments on P23 data. The auto maneuver was quite accurate. Looks like we got some substellar point in the maneuver; auto optics put Canopus straight where it should be; minimum impulse control worked as advertised. At the altitudes at which I started to do the sightings, they have a definite hazy band line. The filter gives the earth a glow, sort of an orangey glow. It's very indefinite of where to put the star, but there does seem to be a solid line where you might expect the horizon to be that appears through the haze where we expect the atmosphere to be. I followed the procedure which we had done up at MIT, about two lines atop the haze layer a definite line for these sightings. In regards to the optics calibration, it was very difficult to find a star in the landmark line of sight in the venting of the S-IVB.

Roger, Apollo 8. We copied that, and we'd like for you to do that trunnion check, that calibration, prior to your next set of sightings.

Roger. Will do. Canopus just disappeared from view, and maybe when we get a little time here, I'll try to get a calibration the first time.

Roger. Understand.

And, Houston, we've rewound the tape; you can dump it at your convenience.

Roger, Bill. Thank you. Are you still picking up anything on the VHF?

Are you playing anything?

Affirmative.

No, I'm not picking anything up.

Roger. Thank you.

What's our altitude now?

Well, you're about 22 000 miles.

Okay.

Give or take a thousand feet.

I'll go ahead and turn VHF-A off and high gain.

Roger, Bill. Thank you.

It was some pretty nice music while it lasted.

Yes, I bet so.

Apollo 8, Houston,

Go ahead, Houston.

We're going to have to wait until we get the high-gain antenna locked on again to dump the tape.

Okay. And you are about ready for us to go to the PTC attitude?

Stand by one.

Okay.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead.

We'd like to hold off on the PTC and get some more P23 information. We'll have some more details of that for you shortly.

Alright.

Mike, what I'm doing now, I'm going over to the star Sirius …

Apollo 8, Houston. You faded out completely, Jim. I heard Frank, but it faded when you began talking. Say again.

Roger. I have switched to Sirius, the second star in the first set, to see if I can't get an optics calibration on it, at least.

Roger. That's fine. We'll have some more good words for you shortly.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead.

Jim, on your P23, we'd like to go ahead and do the calibration and then use star number 15 and take three sets, followed by star number 16, two sets. Over.

Roger, Houston. That's what we're trying to do. I'm trying to get 15 for an optics CAL. It's been very difficult with the bright earth to find a star that we can get into the sextant. I'm trying to use the auto optics in P23 to get the star. We have that now; we're trying to maneuver the spacecraft to bring the trunnion to zero so we can get the landmark line of sight.

Roger. Understand. And I also have your PTC attitude, which is different than you have. I'll give that to you whenever you get a free moment.

Ready to copy.

Alright. PTC attitude will be pitch 242; yaw is 020. Over.