A circuit board from the Saturn V rocket, reverse-engineered and explained

http://www.righto.com/2020/04/a-circuit-board-from-saturn-v-rocket.html

by mcrute • 6 years ago

187 14 6 years ago

tectonic• 6 years ago

This reminds me of this short piece about debugging a live Saturn V (http://www.zamiang.com/post/debugging-a-live-saturn-v), and also a detailed video about the Saturn V's Launch Vehicle Digital Computer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mMK6iSZsAs) — it had 112 KB of dual-redundant hand-woven magnetic core memory.

(Links borrowed from my weekly newsletter about the space industry called Orbital Index https://orbitalindex.com — check it out if you like this kind of nerdery.)

grecy• 6 years ago

it had 112 KB of dual-redundant hand-woven magnetic core memory.

Purely out of curiosity, do we know the amount of memory a modern orbital rocket like the Falcon 9 has?

TheDesolate02• 6 years ago

640K

kbaker• 6 years ago

You might find this question interesting:

https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/9243/what-computer...

The Falcon 9 has 3 dual core x86 processors running an instance of Linux on each core. The flight software is written in C/C++ and runs in the x86 environment.

Diederich• 6 years ago

This reminds me of this short piece about debugging a live Saturn V

Fantastic link, thank you for sharing.

cpascal• 6 years ago

My new favorite YouTuber, CuriousMarc, has a whole series of videos about restoring the Apollo Guidance Computer (AGC).

His AGC Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KSahAoOLdU&list=PL-_93BVApb...

His channel is full of fascinating retro-computing and EE videos.

kens3• 6 years ago

Just to keep everything straight, the AGC that we restored is a totally different computer from the LVDC/LVDA that this board is from. The AGCs were on the Command Module and the Lunar Module that went to the Moon's surface, while the LVDC was onboard the Saturn V rocket.

The AGC was one of the very first computers to use integrated circuits, while the LVDC used hybrid modules. The LVDC used triple-redundant circuits with voting while the AGC was not redundant. The LVDC was a 26-bit serial computer, while the AGC was a 15-bit computer. The LVDC was built by IBM, while the AGC was built by MIT and Raytheon.

It's interesting that the two computers were different in so many ways.

TheDesolate02• 6 years ago

the audio is often so bad tho, I can't understand what they are saying half the time.

PostOnce• 6 years ago

This guy's blog is ridiculous(ly good). Browse the rest of it, you'll be glad you did. I'm glad I did.

http://www.righto.com/2014/10/how-z80s-registers-are-impleme...

http://www.righto.com/2020/03/inside-titan-missile-guidance-...

http://www.righto.com/2016/10/simulating-xerox-alto-with-con...

kens3• 6 years ago

Thanks! I'm glad you're enjoying the blog. I'm here if you have any questions.

djmips• 6 years ago

Do you plan on revisiting your analysis of power bricks with regard to current models. I know it's not as exciting as Apollo era computers but I found it intriguing.

A circuit board from the Saturn V rocket, reverse-engineered and explained

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