Page 44 - Apollo Moonships

42 On bOard apOllO mOOnships
APOLLO 10 CREW COMPARTMENT SIMULATOR
Astronaut John Young, Command Module pilot of Apollo 10, trained in a simulator of the capsule before the flight. At least 15 simulators trained the crews of Apollo missions to provide them with a close experience of spaceflight without living on Earth. Due to the requirements of realism, these simulators were almost identical to the real vessels. The astronauts spent 80% of their training time practicing on these machines.
THE CREW COMPARTMENT
This cabin—which covered 366 cubic feet but was only usable by
the crew—held all the controls, displays, and navigation equipment required to fly the Apollo mothership and monitor its systems. It also accommodated—packed into bays—the supplies and provisions to sustain the crew for up to 14 days. The cabin was completely sealed and maintained ideal pressurization and temperature conditions—4.9 pounds per square inch and 75 °F, respectively—to provide a comfortable environment. These conditions allowed the crew to move around without wearing their spacesuits, except during critical phases of the mission. The crew compartment, protected by a heat shield of 1⁄2 inch thickness, had two access hatches: the large side hatch, used for getting in and out of the CM, and the forward hatch, situated at the nose of the vessel and used to transfer to and from the docked Lunar Excursion Module (LEM). Aligned at the center of the cabin, facing the tip of the CM, were the astronaut seats. The spacecraft commander was seated on the left-hand couch to operate the flight controls placed on the left side of the main display panel. The CM pilot, who was in charge of guidance and navigation systems but also flew the spacecraft at times, occupied the center seat. The crewman on the right hand-couch was the LEM pilot, whose main task was the management of spacecraft systems (propulsion, electrical power, communications, among others).
CABIN ARRANGEMENT
The cabin of CM housed the navigation and guidance systems, the main display panel, the crew seats, the Waste Management System, the docking tunnel,
and many equipment and supply lockers. The most visible component was the main display console, which measured 7 feet wide and 3 feet tall, and it was flanked by sets of smaller control panels situated on its left and right sides. In the center of the cabin were the crew seats, which could be folded in various positions and were built of steel tubing. The cabin had five windows: two 13-inch square observational windows placed to the side of left and right seats, and two 8-by-13-inch rendezvous windows used to aid in docking maneuvers. The cabin also contained six equipment bays endowed with several cupboards, which housed food, water, and spacesuits, as well
as oxygen tanks, carbon dioxide (CO2) absorbers, environmental control instruments, and tool sets.
FRONT VIEW
UPPER EQUIPMENT BAY
1 Emergency oxygen and repressurization system
2 Stowage locker
3 Stowage locker
4 Crew access hatch
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