Whilst staying at my relis in Recklinghausen over the summer I found this great German book from the Sixties called Planeten und Raumfarht ( Planets and Space Travel). Amongst the many brilliant pictures typical of the era, I found this cool black and white drawing of our old friend the MOON PROSPECTOR (Scheufer). Seeing it named in German is one of the very few times I've ever seen any of the SWORD vehicles in non- English. Except for Japanese SWORD, like the recent Moon Ranger discovered, the only other instance was also a Moon Prospector, in Spanish/Argentinian on the CHIBI version. there must be more non - English terms for SWORD vehicles, particularly those based on real NASA concepts.
the Surveyor and Ranger are way off the final designs, but the Prospector is almost identical to the Spacex one - even down to the fluted central cone which doesnt appear on the Sword version.
ReplyDelete