The Popov/Bulatov "analysis" of Apollo 11's velocity vs time

[JayUtah]

Now what were we talking about again?

The latest in a long string of "experts" no one has ever heard of, who advance claims based on the most inept caricatures of science, all saying that for one reason or another the Saturn V couldn't possibly have done what vast numbers of people physically saw it do.

[Luke Pemberton]

Now what were we talking about again?

What forum is this? Apollo what?

[Chew]

Even if you think an idiot couldn't screw it up, check it anyway!

Ain't that the truth. My favorite example is a self-described amateur astronomer in Australia who said he filmed "Planet X" in the southeast. He was actually filming Jupiter off towards the north. Out of all the things to screw up, how does one screw up which direction you're looking? Especially by 135°?

I'm on a Facebook group and it took five of us amateur astronomers two hours to teach someone, who thought the Earth's axis had shifted by 90°, how to locate north.

[smartcooky]

Even if you think an idiot couldn't screw it up, check it anyway!

Ain't that the truth. My favorite example is a self-described amateur astronomer in Australia who said he filmed "Planet X" in the southeast. He was actually filming Jupiter off towards the north. Out of all the things to screw up, how does one screw up which direction you're looking? Especially by 135°?

Would 117° count

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varig_Flight_254

"While First Officer Zille was making an external inspection of the aircraft, Captain Garcez consulted the flight plan for the magnetic heading to Belém, the flight plan read 0270. Garcez interpreted this as 270 degrees, but the intended meaning was 027.0 degrees (Varig's flight plan notation did not explicitly specify the position for the decimal point, which was implicitly located to the left of the rightmost digit). That confusion was the primary cause for the disaster, along with other minor errors. The captain therefore set the left-side Horizontal Situation Indicator (HSI) to 270 degrees, i.e. a due west course. This heading was inconsistent with flying from Marabá to Belém."

The aircraft ended up crashing in the Amazon jungle, hundreds of miles away in the opposite direction from its destination.

[raven]

"This heading was inconsistent with flying from Marabá to Belém."
Perhaps I am a horrible person, but this ling cracks me up. It's obvious to the point of sounding dryly sardonic.

[nomuse]

I actually got the following when I was processing reconnaissance reports during a Army Reserves field exercise.

"The stream is fordable with difficulty. Average water depth is three feet, but there is a large sinkhole just to the left of the roadway that is fifteen feet in depth.

"The depth in the middle of the stream was measured by a soldier standing in the water, holding a yardstick. The depth of the sinkhole was measured by a soldier standing on top of the sunken command vehicle (11.5" bridge clearance), holding a yardstick."

[Peter B]

Even if you think an idiot couldn't screw it up, check it anyway!

Ain't that the truth. My favorite example is a self-described amateur astronomer in Australia who said he filmed "Planet X" in the southeast. He was actually filming Jupiter off towards the north. Out of all the things to screw up, how does one screw up which direction you're looking? Especially by 135°?

I'm on a Facebook group and it took five of us amateur astronomers two hours to teach someone, who thought the Earth's axis had shifted by 90°, how to locate north.

Somewhere on Cosmoquest, IIRC, there's a thread discussing a UFO group's report on a UFO sighting near Crawford, Texas.

Among other things, the report included quotes from witnesses who were interviewed. One of the interviewees was apparently unable to describe how far above the horizon the object was that he saw - because he didn't understand the concept of 'angle above the horizon'.

I was so intrigued at the idea that this witness was nevertheless one of the (again IIRC) eight best witnesses interviewed for the report that I felt moved to post a comment, to the effect of: how reliable can this report be when one of their star witnesses didn't understand what it meant to visualise how high above the horizon something was in the sky?

Apparently there are quite a lot of people Out There who seem quite incapable of positioning themselves in the world.

[Glom]

Just for fun, I'm still thinking of ways that one could build a rocket that would have the readily verifiable characteristics of the Saturn V, yet still be unable to make it to the claimed cutoff velocity for the S-IC stage.

The fatal flaw that makes it impossible, of course, are the readily observed shock clouds forming just as the stack approaches Mach 1. But let's say NASA has some fiendish way to fake those too. Besides, the average person doesn't understand supersonic fluid flow, therefore all that science is bogus and can be ignored.

"Readily verifiable" includes the external dimensions of the entire rocket, the height of the launch tower, and the liftoff acceleration. We can include the known physical properties of kerosene and liquid oxygen, and we can assume Newton's laws of motion and Tsiolkovsky's rocket equation are correct. It would not include any mass, thrust or engine I_sp figures as those are obvious NASA propaganda. Dummy upper stages (e.g., containing extra propellants for sub-performing first stage engines) would be permitted as it's assumed the eyewitnesses could not verify proper operation of the S-II and S-IVB stages.

We can assume that NASA would not secretly sabotage their rocket to lower its performance, as the whole point is to fake a better-performing rocket than the one they were able to build.

Have at it...

Yeah put like, someone at some point must have said, "You know what, this just isn't worth it. Let's just do a real moonlanding."

Even if you think an idiot couldn't screw it up, check it anyway!

Ain't that the truth. My favorite example is a self-described amateur astronomer in Australia who said he filmed "Planet X" in the southeast. He was actually filming Jupiter off towards the north. Out of all the things to screw up, how does one screw up which direction you're looking? Especially by 135°?

Would 117° count

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varig_Flight_254

"While First Officer Zille was making an external inspection of the aircraft, Captain Garcez consulted the flight plan for the magnetic heading to Belém, the flight plan read 0270. Garcez interpreted this as 270 degrees, but the intended meaning was 027.0 degrees (Varig's flight plan notation did not explicitly specify the position for the decimal point, which was implicitly located to the left of the rightmost digit). That confusion was the primary cause for the disaster, along with other minor errors. The captain therefore set the left-side Horizontal Situation Indicator (HSI) to 270 degrees, i.e. a due west course. This heading was inconsistent with flying from Marabá to Belém."

The aircraft ended up crashing in the Amazon jungle, hundreds of miles away in the opposite direction from its destination.

To be brutal, that's still bad airmanship. Gross errors checks are essential. At some point, he should have though, "Does a due westerly course make sense for the sector we're doing?"

[ka9q]

Reminds me (again) of the exchange among the Apollo 11 astronauts on the far side of the moon preparing for their trans-earth injection burn:

C: I'm graphically reminded of it at this moment. Yes, I see a horizon. It looks like we are going forward.
Armstrong: Shades of Gemini.
C: It is most important that we be going forward.
C: There's only one really bad mistake you can make there.
Aldrin: Shades of Gemini retrofire. Are you sure we're...No, let's see. The motors point this way and the gases escape that way; therefore imparting a thrust that-a-way.

[raven]

"If starts pointing toward space, you are having a bad problem and you will not go to space today." in the words of the description of the Up Goer Five's description.

[cjameshuff]

The exhaust plume is - even though quite bright - not transparent to sunlight.

Most liquid-fuel plumes are transparent to sunlight, counterintuitively so even for incandescent ones.  Do we have any specific data on the Saturn V?

Don't forget that distinctively sooty turbopump exhaust layer, thick enough to partially obscure the actual rocket exhaust. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/F-1_Engine_Test_Firing.jpg

Also, in the right conditions a transparent plume can still cast a shadow on a distant surface due to refraction of the light. The light may get through the plume just fine, but not end up in the shadowed area.

[Allan F]

That sooty exhaust only lived for a few meters, before it was ignited and burned in the atmospheric air.

[ka9q]

Whether plumes are translucent, transparent or invisible is beside the point.

The real problem with the analysis is that the (silent) 8mm film is in obvious slow motion compared with every other record of the event (and there are many). The Saturn V really did punch through the clouds much more slowly than NASA claimed it was going at the 108-sec point for a very simple reason: This isn't the 108-sec point; it's actually around 62 sec. And it appears even slower on the film because the film is in slow motion.

Nothing else is needed to completely demolish it.

[Echnaton]

Also, in the right conditions a transparent plume can still cast a shadow on a distant surface due to refraction of the light. The light may get through the plume just fine, but not end up in the shadowed area.

This can be demonstrated by shining a flash light through a candle flame.  The shadow of the wick will be apparent and the flame will cast a slight diffuse shadow.  One will see the swirling refraction shadow of the hot rising gases well above the flame area too. 

A church I attended burned candles in the sconces.  The spot lights focused on the pulpit would also strike the nearby candles, which would cast shadows that were often more interesting than the sermon.

[JayUtah]

Don't forget that distinctively sooty turbopump exhaust layer, thick enough to partially obscure the actual rocket exhaust.

Exactly the motive for my question.  The default guess for liquid-fuel exhausts is that it will be transparent.  But the F-1 is unique for its annular turbine exhaust.  But again, intuition is notoriously wrong on these questions.  In later years, knowing the optical characteristics of rocket plumes would become enormously important in military applications.

And yes, transparent doesn't mean like glass.  You can get the Schlieren effect if you're lucky.