Europe's Moon Shot

[rickshaw]

I agree that von Braun could be a key player.

What if Operation Paperclip had gone awry: someone finds out that von Braun and others are in the US with papers falsified by Operation Paperclip, and either the American public or Soviet diplomatic pressure forces the US to return the scientists to (West) Germany.
Von Braun starts advocating space travel; he sees that Germany is in no position to pay for his plans, so he involves other nations, and starts selling this as a pan-European project, in the same vein as the early efforts that led to the EU.

Alternatively, von Braun surrenders to the British, fleeing North-West rather than South-West.  He flees to Denmark and the Danes hand him over to the British.  The British, realising who he is and deeply disturbed by the V2 attacks, immediately puts him and as many of his team who can be found to work on their own ballistic missile.  In real life, they assembled and fired IIRC 5 a4 missiles after the war which they had captured.  They used German personnel to do so.

The only problem would be finance.  The UK was cash strapped post-war.   What it might do though, is stop the UK wasting money on so many projects that came to nought and give them drive and direction, which was sadly lacking for the most part.

They'd have to find a suitable launching position though. While Woomera was good for missile proving, it was a bad choice for satellite launching.  The UK likewise.  British Guiana or one of the Caribbean Islands perhaps.  On or near to the equator and relatively close to the UK - one of the major problems with using Woomera was its sheer distance from the UK.  The Caribbean OTOH is much closer and a direct flight is possible.

[Geoff]

Hmmm Vulcan converted to carry a lifting body?

[Weaver]

The scenario I was thinking of had the US space program, von Braun included, pretty much as per real life, with Europe choosing to do all the stuff (space station, spaceplane) that the Americans passed on during the 1960s in the quest to beat the Soviets and make Kennedy's promise come true at any price. Europe essentially decides that it's "firsts" are going to be the first space station and the first spaceplane, rather than the first supersonic airliner.

I agree that a straight-forward capsule system would HAVE to be developed first, for three reasons:

1. as a quicker, low-risk backup to the spaceplane,
2. as an emegency escape system from the space station (for which the spaceplane is over-specified),
3. as a return vehicle for the moonshot (for which the spaceplane is over-large)

One advantage to the moon shot of establishing the space station first is the ability to launch the lunar crew module unmanned (I'm just going to change my launch schedule...), which saves the lunar launch from having to carry an escape system. This a BIG deal: the Apollo escape tower weighed over 4 tonnes! This also simplifes the design of the Lunar crew module, since the re-entry capsule no longer has to be on the top of it in launch configuration, with a hatch in it's heatshield to allow access. (You can have hatches in heatshields, but it's a big simplification not to have to!)

[frank2056]

Von Braun also looked at using the atmosphere as a brake, by skipping a spaceplane-like vehicle off the atmosphere until it had burned off enough energy to do a re-entry.

Von Braun may have had the idea at some point, but Eugen Sänger had a detail design (and did some work on prototype engines) for an antipodal bomber that would skip off the atmosphere -the Silbervogel.

[Hobbes]

I just ordered 'Vertical Empires'. I saw on Amazon that there's a second, revised edition of this book coming out, so chose that one. Once I confirmed the order I noticed the line "Dispatch estimate for these items: 30 Jan 2012"  I knew I was placing a preorder, but didn't realize that I'd have to wait this long. Oh well, it can join my preorder for the P.1216 book and Tony Buttler's latest (placed 3 months ago, still not ready for dispatch).

[Hobbes]

They'd have to find a suitable launching position though. While Woomera was good for missile proving, it was a bad choice for satellite launching.  The UK likewise.  British Guiana or one of the Caribbean Islands perhaps.  On or near to the equator and relatively close to the UK - one of the major problems with using Woomera was its sheer distance from the UK.  The Caribbean OTOH is much closer and a direct flight is possible.

For a purely British effort, the Caribbean is a good spot. Looking at the map, Grenada is closest to the equator, Barbados offers more launch options (from Grenada, launches in certain directions would overfly other islands, something you want to avoid. British Guyana would be even better (closer to the equator).

For a European program, the existing spaceport at Kourou is the best spot I can think of.

[Weaver]

A potential problem with the Carribean islands is space: how much of Barbados are you willing and able to plaster with concrete and big, ugly stuctures and then put a serious security fence around it?

I think a major French contribution to the effort would be the French Guyana launch site: it's pretty much as damn near perfect as Florida.

[Mossie]

Ascension Island?  Might conflict with US space & military interests, but Britian could always say 'It's our bloody island'.  You've got ex-colonies in east & west africa that might be possible, although around the time of any moon-shot these would be independent.  Some kind of commercial agreement could be made on their use, especially with the UK's influence through the Commonwealth.

[PR19_Kit]

Gan?

It's surrounded by miles and miles of water and to the south east, where you'd probably want to be launching, there's nowt till you reach Oz.

[Hobbes]

Gan is tiny, only 2 km^2, barely large enough to support an air base, let alone a spaceport.

A space port is more than a launch pad: you need an assembly building, which is connected to the launch pad but far enough away to not be damaged by takeoffs: the VAB on Cape Canaveral is 5 km from the launch pads it serves. Now that's an extreme; this article on the new Soyuz launch pad at Kourou shows that buildings can be put a lot closer.

Still: you need habitation and office space for a lot of people, again away from the launch pad. You'd have to put parts of the infrastructure on other islands.

Ascension seems a better candidate, but on the maps it looks like there's very little flat terrain on the island.

(fun fact: at Kourou, the fire service is part of the Paris fire department...)

[The Rat]

(fun fact: at Kourou, the fire service is part of the Paris fire department...)

Who do you have to sleep with to get that assignment? 

[The Rat]

Gan?

It's surrounded by miles and miles of water and to the south east, where you'd probably want to be launching, there's nowt till you reach Oz.

It would take more power to launch to the southeast. Gan is 0° 41' 2" South, so the most efficient route would actually take it slightly northeast. But since it's a lot closer to the Equator than Florida the boost given by the Earth's rotation would be greater, you could get away with using more power.

[Hobbes]

Lunar Landing Vehicle: 20 tonnes (Apollo LM: 15 tonnes). Has a proper airlock so one of 3 crew can remain inside while 2 go EVA. Upper stage is ascent vehcle for return to lunar orbit.

...
RM burns Trans-Earth motor to leave lunar orbit. LOM is left in lunar orbit for potential re-use by next mission (it would need re-stocking, but all the science hardware and structure wouldn't need to be launched again.

I really like your idea. It nicely illustrates that it's possible to do a Moon mission with smaller launchers, but also the tradeoffs you have to make. Building 12 launchers for one mission isn't going to be cheap exactly.

I'd want to add a rover. Preferably one that's a bit larger than the Apollo rover, and built so that it can be remotely operated: once the manned mission is over, the rover can be useful as an unmanned platform. Add some scientific instruments, and maybe have it collect rock samples that can be picked up on the next manned mission.

Leaving stuff in lunar orbit is an iffy proposition: the Lunar gravity field is so uneven that you need constant course adjustments to avoid crashing.

What was your idea behind the LOM? The combination of CM+RM+LOM seems overkill to me, but maybe I'm overlooking something?

[The Rat]

I'd want to add a rover. Preferably one that's a bit larger than the Apollo rover, and built so that it can be remotely operated: once the manned mission is over, the rover can be useful as an unmanned platform. Add some scientific instruments, and maybe have it collect rock samples that can be picked up on the next manned mission.

That is sheer genius! 

[dragon]

Ascension Island?  Might conflict with US space & military interests, but Britian could always say 'It's our bloody island'.  You've got ex-colonies in east & west africa that might be possible, although around the time of any moon-shot these would be independent.  Some kind of commercial agreement could be made on their use, especially with the UK's influence through the Commonwealth.

...and it even has the perfect name, according to the Marketing and PR folks.