Little Joe-II 50th Anniversary of Mission A-003, the one that spun and broke up

Tuesday, May 19th, is the 50th Aniversary of the fourth Little Joe-II flight, mission A-003. There is a Facebook post by Launch Magazine, with a number of comments:

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=789798691134293&id=625890014191829

Below are three photos from that post:







For those interested in more info, photos, and data, here is a link to the main page of the Little Joe-II data on my website:
https://georgesrockets.com/GRP/Scale/DATA/LJoeMain.htm

A-003 was.... technnically a failure because the rocket went out of control and broke up without reaching the planned abort parameters..... but in a REAL in flight emergency and break-up. it acted perfectly and was an incredible success. AFAIK, the fast roll was never accounted for in design, so it surprised me that the spinning did not cause the recovery system to get tangled up and fail. The rocket took off using a cluster of three Algol motors, and was supposed to ignite three more after those burned out (never had the chance)

Here is what Tom Beach wrote about A-003:

-003: The objective of this mission was a high-altitude (about 20 miles) abort, but a control system failure prevented this. At launch, fin 4 locked over to maximum deflection. The other fins and the RCS system tried to compensate, but were unsuccessful, and the roll rate of the vehicle increased until centrifugal forces resulted in disintegration of the Little Joe II at 12,400 feet. The LES sensed the failure and initiated an emergency abort, successfully pulling the BP-22 capsule away for a safe recovery, a consolation prize for the Apollo engineers. Upon impact in the desert, the unignited upper stage Algol motors were observed to ignite violently, throwing burning and unburned propellant within a radius of several hundred feet. Nice prang.

Click to expand...

[video=youtube;AqeJzItldSQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqeJzItldSQ[/video]

First of two pages of photos: https://georgesrockets.com/GRP/Scale/DATA/JoePhotos/JoePhotos.html

The following are all from A-003:







Drawing at 1/100 scale:


The fifth and final Little Joe-II mission was A-004, January 20, 1966. So, about 8 months away from the 50th anniversary of that flight.

- George Gassaway

The video is cool. Very interesting to see the booster break up and the escape system actually work in an unplanned accident.

I had a flying model of a Little Joe II when I was a kid in the 70's. I didn't really know what it was meant to be a model of --- was told it was some kind of "moon rocket." It had a 3-motor cluster and almost never worked right, but it produced a lot of cool crashes.

Anyone have any 2' Sono tube laying around?

Apollo'ish capsule, toy box?

john

Surprised at the relative lack of interest in this thread compared to some other things.

ThirstyBarbarian said:

The video is cool. Very interesting to see the booster break up and the escape system actually work in an unplanned accident.

I had a flying model of a Little Joe II when I was a kid in the 70's. I didn't really know what it was meant to be a model of --- was told it was some kind of "moon rocket." It had a 3-motor cluster and almost never worked right, but it produced a lot of cool crashes.

Click to expand...

Sounds like the Centuri 1/45 Little Joe-II, which had a 3-engine cluster mount. It was a great kit, 3.6" diameter. Too bad the original injection molds for the plastic Apollo parts cracked, otherwise Estes might have re-issued the kit.

I have one, though it's very beat-up, plus an unbuilt one in the box. I flew mine mostly on a single D12, it was a light rocket so a D12-3 flew it very nicely. flew it once on an FSI E60, even better, but landed in a tall pine tree , requiring "chainsaw recovery". Only dared to do clusters much later but by then I knew good ways to do that, like Flashbulb ignition.

Pics below from 1989 when it had a new cluster arrangement and an A3-4T was in the base of the CM to do a simulated "abort" (Mercury switch activated, rear ejection system for the chute). I'm on the left when I weighed about twice what I do now, Wayne Hendricks on right.

Wayne loved the Little Joe-II (I had always liked it... the Centuri 1/100 was my 5th model rocket). When we formed a team, he had already made Little Joes that were nice for sport but not detailed. I looked into how to make one with more detail, which led to getting in contact with Tom Beach, and a multi-year odyssey of data development and drawings (plus some good scale models, two long before the data was completed).

The video is very interesting. You can see the tabs at the bottom of the fins deflecting.

I had one of the Centauri models in the late 60's early 70's - the one with the corrugated body wrap. I seem to remember that the escape tower was a real challange for me at the time.

Thanks George.

Greg

I drive by a Little Joe II at every launch at JSC.

I got a Centuri 1:45 Little Joe II in 1979. Still have most of the parts, maybe someday I'll rebuild it.

Definitely one of my favorites, been known to build one or two myself.....

View attachment LBJ-II parts.JPG

Neat story George. I had a LJ II when I was a kid. A guy I launched with, my mentor, shoved some sort of big engine in it. We lit it off and all we got back was the booster. The capsule drifted for miles....

My first "big" motor I ever used. I think it was 1976....

Thanks for the memories George!

Mike