Spacelog Apollo 8

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Okay. We've got a telescope alignment if you'd like to give it a try. Your sextant star is still good, but if you had problems with that, folks have worked out that if you look through the telescope at 10:35, we have a shaft and trunnion that should point you at the center of the earth, if you would like to give that one a try.

Okay.

Okay. At 10:35, the shaft angle 006.2, trunnion 18.9. Over.

Roger. 10:35: shaft 006.2, trunnion 18.9.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead.

Okay. We'd like to get a fan—a cryo fan cycle in here before the burn. About 1 minute on each should be fine.

Roger. I've already given 2 minutes on H₂ 1 and 2 and O₂ 1, and I've just started O₂ 2.

Roger. Thank you.

Apollo 8, Houston. We'd like to dump your tape prior to the burn.

Roger. It's only been running here about 15 minutes.

Okay, Apollo 8. That's—that's correct. You're on high bit rate, and we're afraid you may run out before the burn, so we'd like to dump it, and give it back to you with a full load before the burn.

Roger. And give us a comment on the voice quality.

Wilco.

Houston, Apollo 8.

Go ahead.

Roger. We plan to stop charging battery B about another 5 minutes. You concur?

That's affirmative.

Okay. You might just remind us.

Apollo 8.

This is 8. Go ahead.

Go ahead, Houston. You were cut out.

Okay, Apollo 8. All your systems are GO, and we were about to tell you you can go ahead and terminate the battery charge, and you beat us to the punch.

I read your mind, and it's showing 37 volts right now.

Apollo 8, Houston. If you'll go high bit rate, we'll give you a tape recorder back to your command.

Apollo 8, Houston. If you'll put your high bit rate on, we'll give you a tape recorder back.

Houston, did you give us a tape back? Over.

Affirmative, Apollo 8.

Apollo 8's COMMAND RESET to get tape motion, we're now in NORMAL.

Roger.

Apollo 8, stand by for a mark at 1 minute.

Roger. Apollo 8 standing by.

Ten seconds.

Five seconds.

Roger. Battery Bravo.

Houston, Apollo 8. Do you want us to maneuver to any particular attitude for a water dump, or do you want us to go to PTC attitude?

Okay. Let's go PTC.

And give us the angles, please.

Okay, Apollo 8. Let's do the same angles we had before: that's pitch 242 and yaw 20 on the PTC attitude.

Houston, we're preparing to dump our waste water now.

Houston, Apollo 8.

Go ahead, 8.

We noticed on our system test battery vent pressure that when we opened the battery vent valve, we get an immediate drop-off to pressure which nulls out at about two-tenths of 2—to three-tenths of a volt. And we think this is zero at the battery manifold. Do you concur?

Okay. Stand by. … stand by one, and let's check it out.

Apollo 8, I cut you out there. What did you say on the last one?

It looks like probably that zero psi corresponds to about three-tenths of a volt on the test meter. We've had it happen a couple of times, where the pressure would drop rapidly to this setting, as if it were zero. Over.

Roger. We'll look at our data here and let you know what we see. Are you going ahead with the water dump now?

Roger. We'd—we're pausing here on the water dump, though, just to verify that the battery vent—the line is clear as indicated by a battery vent pressure of zero.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston.

Okay. Number one on the list of things is that the flight plan shows CDR should hit the sack. Number two, kind of a summary of your burn. All your SPS and systems look GO. The trajectory shows that you have a CPA with a mode of 69.67 miles and the time of pericynthion is 69 plus 10. You do have a capture on a good free return. It's a little bit early to completely evaluate the trajectory for corridor control. You'll have no update to the TLI plus 11 block data. After looking through the CAL curves, it looks like the battery-vent pressure is actually zero at 0.2 to 0.3 volts, so that—we agree with you there, and you can go ahead with the water dump. We still have the COMM check to do whenever we get ourselves in a good high gain look angle and whenever it's convenient for you. Over.

Thank you very much. That was a very fine resume you sent in. We're right now in the process of trying to dump out the water and the UCDA's and so on and so on. So we'll get with you on the high gain as soon as we can.

Okay. Good burn.

Houston, what do you want to dump the waste tank down to?

Apollo 8, I would like you to dump the waste tank to 25 percent.

Hey, we're dumping now, Houston.

Okay. Thank you.

Apollo 8, Houston.

Go ahead, Houston. Apollo 8.

Roger. Do you folks have your WATER QUANTITY switch in the POTABLE or the WASTE WATER TANK position now?

We're in the WASTE TANK position now, and we're dumping UCDA's first, Houston.

Okay. We weren't watching any waste quantity decrease, and it looked like the nozzle temps indicated that something was going on, and we were trying to dope out what was going on.

Well, there's a lot of stuff going out I'll tell you. How do nozzle temps look?

Oh, about 81.

Okay, Houston. We're going to dump the waste tank on down to about 25 percent.

Okay. Thank you.

Houston, Apollo 8. Do you copy?

Affirmative, Apollo 8.

Okay. Tell Zeke Thomas to wake up and keep an eye on the waste tank servicing.

It'll take a minute to think of something appropriate.

You're slowing down.

How are the nozzle temperatures looking, Houston?

Man, you're looking pretty small down there now, Houston.

We're carrying a big stick, though.