KSP - The Failed Soviet Moon Mission 

Enjoy! :-) Collaboration Station drops next Saturday at 5pm GMT

Here's a challenge. Get a Kerbal in low kerbin orbit. But only use 'Ant' engines. Good luck.

"dammit, our rocket isn't good to reach the moon, how should we fix it?" "well we do have some extra 50 engines" "this is going to work.

Probably one of the most kerbal spacecraft is the israeli Shavit launcher, not because of it's design, but because of what it did. Because of the earth's spin, it's more efficient to launch rockets going west to east, because that gives you a ~500m/s boost, so almost all spacecraft launch like that. Almost. You see, Israel can't do that. Back when the launcher was developed in the 80s, the countries to the east of Israel were very hostile (Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia...), and a big concern was that most spacecraft failures happen at launch. The mission directors did not want their then classified advanced space technology falling into enemy hands, so they did the only thing they could. *Launch the spacecraft the wrong way.* Instead of it launching over enemy territory, it launched over the Mediterranean, going east to west. That meant that not only could they not use earths kick, they had to fight against it. The launcher includes over 1000m/s more Dv than would be required if they were flying west to east, but they did it anyway, and the launcher still launches like that today. *Going the wrong way*

SpaceX is building a rocket with 42 engines, hope it doesn't meet the same fate

Well, it's important to consider that the Soviets didn't throw engines on just because. They were forced to use a large amount of small engines because programs that would have produced large engines to rival the F-1 used in the Saturn V were cancelled. These small engines, by the way, are the most efficient chemical rocket engines ever produced, and a quantity were bought by the US following the fall of the Iron Curtain.

soviet union was playing KSP IRL back in the 50s-70s

In Soviet Russia, you do not land on mun, mun lands on YOU.

A most informative episode Mr Lowne! I havent done a lot or reading up on the Soviet vessels, so it was interesting to see a successful version of the mission. Nice one buddy! ... One week till Colaboration Station drops 😀

"In Soviet Russia, you do not go into space. Space goes into you" - Boris

One of the other reasons Block A had so many engines, was the fact that if 1 or 2 failed, you still had a bunch left. With the Saturn V, it would be a bigger failure. It actually happened at the Apollo 13 launch, one engine failed but they could make it into orbit. Sadly the rest of the trip didn't go as planned as well.

соме, кегвал сомгадез! тодау, ше эо то зрасе!

this is the possibly the most entertaining ksp video I've seen to date. thanks Matt =)

As I watched this, I suddenly realized that the footage of the lander at around 9:00 was from the movie Apollo 18. I swear, that is probably the only movie to ever feature this lander.

Actually the N1 rocket with an LOK craft on it used an extraction like maneuver similar to that of the Apollo missions, the LOK craft would be stored in an adapter from block V to the LOK service module, fairing, and escape tower, and the LOK capsule did indeed have solar panels along with fuel cells that would activate whenever the LK lander was not docked to it, and finally, the LOK craft broke into 3 pieces before re-entry, being the service module, capsule, and docking module, the capsule was the only part of the rocket to make it back to earth in one piece, and there were specialized hatches between the service module and docking module (the 2 pressurized parts of the LOK craft) to make this detachment possible, and the N1 was only partially intended to go to the moon, it was designed to go to mars or venus (and recent studies show that if an N1 rocket was assembled today with a lower chance of failure, that it would have enough Delta V to enter orbit around Mars (not venus, as the soviets forgot to calculate the gravity of the sun pulling them in past venus) land and return, anyways, hope this helps!

I'm hearing quite low frequenzy base around 12:30 and 13:00, is that ambient noise or music in the background? two bottles on my desk that were touching each other went nuts vibrating, ARE YOU TRYING TO SUBLIMINALLY MANIUPULATE US TO SUBSCRIBE?!

Sweet! I've always wanted to see this. Had to wait 37 years, but finally saw a Soviet flag planted on the moon by a Russian.

That footage of the Soviet (LK) lander at 9:00 is from the movie Apollo 18, which is a really cheesy movie about secret military moon missions and rock-aliens on the moon, however it has a Russian moon landing and it's really cool to see the LK lander, given some fair justice.

The 13th episode was by far my favorite of the collab station series. The way the music slowly starts up is hilarious.

Love these kinds of videos. I loved the Ekranoplan one when you made it and it's great to see you continuing this! More!

"What, you expected loot crate?"

Ah the classic Russian motto of "What the use of brute for isn't working? Add more Force! Boom! Problem solved!

Wow I'm really impressed by this video. Please do more of this series! Really interesting stuff.

"The most Kerbal rocket... ever made." Yup, I LOLed.

Were there so many spherical shapes in the design because a sphere is excellent at holding pressure and being under stress?

the crew modual and the lunar modual would not dock!!! they got very close and then the kosmonaunt would do an EVA!

I enjoy learning about space stuff, but I'm too lazy to read so this is great! Thumbs up, Matt!

History with Matt. Great Job mate!

FYI: The NK-33 on the N-1 Soviet moon rocket never successfuly launch to orbit, at least until some 40 years later on April 2013, when it launched the Antares rocket from US that modified by Aerojet one of the cold war space race rival of the Kuznetsov, the designer of the NK-33. A bit ironic indeed

Как, в видео про космический симулятор в котором рассказывается неудачная история Советской Лунной программы, собрало столько диванных политиков в комментариях?! Забавно, наверное я единственный русскоговорящий зритель этого канала ( ° ʖ °)

This is your best video matt!!!! Although all of your videoes are really good this and the apollo mission is the best

I found this very creative how you used stock parts. Over all I thought this recreation was very cute. Great job

Hello comrade, I was sent here by our glorious leader Stalin, i’m supposed to tell you that you’re rockets looks good and our supreme leader APPROVES YOU, be proud!!!!!!!!!

Rocket is too powerful for the payload we want to send? More engines should fix that!

I love the fact that you actually played the reversed part of the russians in the horror film: Apollo 18.

Nice one Matt! Original have to say, and your commented videos are cooooool :)

-Launch a submarine to Laythe OCEAN (obviously) -Launch a Brahmos missile from it. and thats it. If you read this, Thank you

If I remember correctly Apollo 13 had an engine failure on stage one, so even the "simple" design had issues.

I love the historical (kind of) series thing though there was just 2 videos. please do more that would be great!

"What, you expected Lootcrate?" You got me Matt :D

These people sucked at asparagus staging

>tfw you know Elon Musk is designing a rocket with 42 engines.

What an interesting craft! Nice history lesson to go along with it too.

Apollo 18 was great thanks for reminding me of it

Dear Matt, you mention here that you think 30 engines in the first stage alone is ludicrous. If that seems ludicrous, I'd like to hear your opinion on the SpaceX ITS motor count of 42 Raptor motors?

Actually both because of logistic (the rocket was not made near the launchpad unlike Saturn V and its VAB) and to keep it secret, the rocket was literally deconstructed and rebuild on the launch site, most engine were not tested prior to launch and never all of them were tested at once because of lack of big enough infrastructure, it would had reveal the issue of plumbing vibration if it was done. The rocket was literally tested on a trial and error basis and the firsts were literally expected to fail. Also the onboard software that controlled the engines was one of the biggest flow of the rocket and the thing that caused the most amount of problems, after the all 4 failed launch basically all known issue were fixed and the next rocket would have probably work without problems (or catastrophic failures at least). Just after the fourth attempt, the first man was already on the Moon by the USA. The thing is that this is the issue here, not only the Russians never publicly entered in the moon race, but also, the SPACE race was over after the USA landed on the Moon while they literally failed at every first anything before that, URSS was winning, if the USA were not bitchy and did not say that the race was not over until they stop loosing, the space race would have continue, not only to the moon, but also to others planets. The URSS was ready to launch a mission to the Moon, which is why two others rockets were ready to continue the tests, but since the USA claimed that they win the space race by actually not loosing for the first time, and since a successful launch of the N1 would have mean to continue toward manned moon mission, the URSS probably realised that it was not worth it to spend more money trying to race an unfair adversary who self proclaim himself winner of the space race, while the rest of the solar system is still, 47 years latter, virgin from direct human presence and actually the Soviets were the first to land on the moon, unmanned but still the first, same for Venus and Mars, because you can be sure that if the Soviets were the first on the Moon, USA would have never accept that they won and simply push the finish line to another objective until they could do it first. So yeah, in this video you were trashing the N1 as a total failure that was almost stupid and impossible to made properly work while it was not the case at all, the two next would have probably been really successful and failure was expected, not just as the state of rocket science of those old days but literally as a lot of unknown were still awaiting to be found which is not representative of the final expected rocket reliability. Anyway nice video.

love your videos

Very well done!

Should I buy CS:GO or this? Or not buy the switch and buy both?

Matt,what is the music played at 14:00 ? I need to know so badly!

Congratulations, Comrade! Not a bad recreation of the Soviet N1 rocket and the LK lander.

"I apologize for that...but I also, don't." Love it. Great vid.

I NEED THIS MUSIC AT THE BEGINING WHAT IS IT

i apollo-gise for that oh you funny!

Great video, congrats.

These historical vids are awesome

apollo soyuz?

Why did you Apollogize at 11:29 ? It was a soviet mission!

It's weird watching him dock without using the lowne lazy method

Hi Matt! Great video, thanks for this recreation of ambitious but unsuccessful program. Special thanks for accurate staging, a lot of youtube videos doesn't bother to do it. I just notice one tiny inaccuracy. The LOK actually was supposed to drop the living compartment together with lunar module on the moon orbit. Otherwise the spacecraft didn't have enough fuel for moon escape burn due to N1 underperformance. And AFAIK docking node of LOK was one-off and didn't have a undocking mechanism anyway.

You should play KSP on Xbox 1! (It's brutal) like this so he can see this.

This mission is to the Mun not the moon, the title is Clickbait #mattlownesux

You keep saying it’s hard to mimic a sphere, but you did pretty well in the Minmus hotel video!

Good job for 100 thousand subs😊😊

FIRST

Thanks for the video

Has anyone noticed how Kerbal Space Center and Kennedy Space Center have the same initials?

I suppose I sort of recreated the mission on accident. With the mods I have I had to build a big rocket which looked like an Apollo or Soyuz styled vehicle. I know this video is a bit old but it's still good and inspiring.

That small screening of two astronauts seeing an ok lander is from Apollo 18 a horror movie with extreme realism with a website repeating 16 hours of the movie

when you recreate soviet things that failed irl and made them work in ksp the series turns to "making fun of the soviets"

Ey good video comrade! The motherland will be proud of you!

Another big factor in its failure is the launch computer suddenly and inexplicably shutting down all engines.

I didn't even know there WAS a Soviet Moon Mission programme ! Nice video Matt, thanks :)

You know it’s a good rocket when you can’t say if the rocket works but are fairly certain of the escape system

such a great voice!

Matt is the best youtuber

Love when apollo 18 played in the corner

thank you comrade

This is crazy, the soviets used the same mun lander style as me, using last stage to low it down near the surface then use the main landing engines. Thats awesome

The most Kerbal rocket, in my opinion, is most of SpaceX's rockets. "More thrust, you say? More engines, we reply!"

I LOVE THIS VID I WATCHED IT FIVE TIMES😀😀😀

"Rather than planning things economically." *Stares in Soviet.*

The song at the beginning is either "Dance of the Knights" or "Montagues And Capulets" by Prokofiev.

I like the flags plaque text! xD

very interesting video

You sound like such a nice chap, I'd have a beer with you

There's mods floating about with quite excellent soyuz and salyut flyable models, I tried them recently, fun stuff!

Title: "Soviet Moon Mission" RU-vid: HERE HAVE AN APOLLO SPACE PROGRAM ARTICLE

Very Interesting, From the things I've read, they only launched the N1 a few times, which was a smaller portion of the total "planned test launches" but they got so far behind (All USA lunar missions completed successfully) that they decided to cancel because their moon missions were abbreviated versions of what we've already done, and even if they were 100% successful, it would be judged too little, and too late. But, the N1 rocket used state of the art engines, in use in the Atlas today, as I understand it.

You have done us well.

The coincidence to this video is I just accidentally killed Jeb, Bill and Bob on my Soviet themed sandbox save during a Mun mission that went awry. This video appeared in my suggestions not long after.

Hello scene from Apollo 18 the space horror movie.

You should make a shirt that says “we have more fuel than we need”

this is why you don't fire your big engines expert

No Lootcrate shenanigans in this video, I guess.

I was once 10 meters away from the mun surface, and I was doing a flyby.

The reason why the N1 has so many engines was because 1st of all, at the time, the soviets didn't have the industrial capacity compared to the U.S.A. The U.S. Could afford to make huge rocket engines. Second of all, the sole designer of the N1, Sergi Korolev, had a very strong grudge against the only man who could produce large engines, Valentin Glushko. In the 30s, Glushko had blamed Korolev for a mistake Glushko had made. As a result, Korolev spent many years in a Siberian labor camp, giving him lifelong heart conditions untill his death, around the time when the N1 first launched. Third of all, Glushko wanted to use hyperbgolic fuel, which was more efficient than other fuels, but was extremely poisonous. Hyperbolic fuel could dissolve flesh, and if breathed in, fill the lungs with fluid. As the N1 was a manned rocket, Korolev strongly disagreed with Glushko. Therefor, Glushko did not produce large engines for Korolev. The only other man who could produce engines for Korolev was a jet engine designer, who had the very efficient experimental NK-15 engine. The problem was that the NK-15 was very small, so Korolev had to use 30 of them. However, It was also extremely difficult to provide fuel for the NK-15. The main reason why the N1 failed was because the NK-15 engines kept failing and shutting down.The NK-15 later developed into the NK-33 and NK-43, which today powers the K-1 rocket, Antares, and the Soyuz-2-1v rockets.

There's a great docudrama miniseries on Netflix about this, Space Race. Produced by the BBC in 2005, goes through the post WW2 era of US and Soviet space programs. I also recommend Cosmodrome (Netflix), as it goes through the history of Soviet rocket engine development.

a bigger problem with the n1 was that the engines could only be fired once, so they couldn't test them before launch. Also, I believe that the N1's computer contributed to a couple of the failures. Rocket stages with many engines can be reliable. Just look at the Falcon 9. Neither of its two RUDs were caused by the engines. I addition, on one of its early missions (CRS-1 I think), a falcon 9 had an engine failure but didn't crash or explode.

Very good video. Interestingly the Soviet docking system intended for their Lunar shot was only capable of being used once. The act of docking would smash the mechanism so severely it was simply impossible to pull off a second one. Your video really is very good, and I've no doubt you know way more on this than I do, but I always thought the fairings around the cargo bay holding the lander was to stay in place until lunar orbit had been achieved? I'm wrong in this I guess..?