On Apr 24, 6:44 am, "Greg D. Moore \(Strider\)"
wrote:
History says that Apollo 8 was launched to the Moon despite the risk, w/o an
LM since the LM wasn't ready.

That statement implies a spec that the LM could be used as
a "lifeboat", we got lucky the Apollo 13 SM malfunctioned when
it did. If it happened when the LM was on the moon...

What exactly wasn't ready? I suspect it was more than simply being
overweight (since it was overweight as late as Apollo 10).

The LM was the most complicated 2 stage manned
rocket ever built. I'd imagine the assembly instructions
and checklist would run to nearly 1,000,000 items.
(anyone know?).
The engineers could not sign-off a unit 90% complete,
unless that was pre-designed.

Thinking about it, was ANY thought given to launching it, even if it was
only dead weight to be used as a lifeboat (ala Apollo 13). I.e. could they
have accomplished Apollo 8 even more safely than they did?

Not realistically, after all, Apollo 8 proved to be 100% safe.
I think the Constellation Earth-Moon-Earth ferry-boat should
have redundancy.

IIRC the Apollo 13 was a freak accident caused by a
check-list malfunction, (had the wrong switch).

Greg Moore
Ask me about lily, an RPI based CMC.

Regards
Ken