Кто, кроме Ирана, способен отправить беспилотник с хорошей оптикой для разоблачения лунной аферы?

“The damned thing looks like a cross between a crazy Bull Terrier and a Peacock!”, my Boss said. After weeks of in-plant secrecy, we had finally unveiled our robotic entry in the moon rover sweepstakes. To everyone’s amazement and delight, Jack Miller was directing its peregrinations around the back forty of our El Monte campus, using a hand-held radio control link device. With its ridiculous TV camera “head” wagging from side to side on its long tubular swiveling “neck” scanning the local scenery, the six legged beast really did look outré – like a malformed hound out of Star Wars.

At that time, I was Chief Engineer, reporting to Dr. Fred Eimer, recently recruited from JPL by Jack Froehlich and who, in turn, had reached back there to recruit Jack Miller and Al Morrison for my Design Group. They quickly had proven themselves to be two absolutely top-notch designers. I organized a proposal team, with the sterling duo in the conceptual design lead. The design we came up with was a walking, rather than a rolling or hopping, vehicle. We believed a walker stood a better chance of navigating an unknown surface than the other options. Its body was triangular in shape, longer in the forward moving direction than wide, and about 6 inches thick. Its flat sides were parallel to the ground, with the underside standing about a foot off the ground. The swivel – mounted TV camera that looked like a Cyclops was mounted on the forward – moving point of the triangle. The aft sets of legs emanated from the other two points of the triangle, thus providing a broad stable base to preclude tipping. More than covering the creature’s upper back was a square solar array which provided drive motor, communications, and TV camera power. This array was hinged near the base of the TV camera supporting “neck”, and could be raised up to a 45 degree angle to track the sun as it moved through its lunar day. At its larger angle extensions, it gave the beast the appearance of a peacock in heat! The antenna that communicated with the Surveyor was attached to the top end of the array. Adding to the fowl appearance was a forward thrusting claw at the end of a second tubular bendable “neck”, meant to pick up lunar samples, but actually looking more like a peacock pecking at the ground.

cyberneticzoo.com » Blog Archive » 1961 – Moonwalker Lunar Rover – Space General Corp. (American)

a history of cybernetic animals and early robots // cyberneticzoo.com

 

 

Alas, by the end of the competition, the SURVEYOR’s final design weight had grown so heavy that the intended launch vehicle did not have the lifting power to accomplish the mission. Weight had to be dropped and, to our everlasting grief, the moon rover portion of the program was summarily deleted

 

Space General designers have built an insect-like vehicle with six legs, two arms, a triangular body, a solar-cell panel, and an antenna. The left arm, ending in a claw, piks up objects to examine. The right one holds a TV camera to do the looking – and to see where the vehicle is walking. This lightweight 135-pound rover will fold to compact 40-by-40-by-12-inch size for rocketing to the moon, where it's expected to operate for at least two months. cyberneticzoo.com » Blog Archive » 1961 – Moonwalker Lunar Rover – Space General Corp. (American)