"OM" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:38:45 +0100, Jochem Huhmann
wrote:

But all were due to a flaw in the first stage which could have been
caught with full testing. They did never (to my knowlegde) a full
vibration test, a fuel flow test or (god forbid) a test with all engines
running for the full duration of the first stage burn.

...Correct. About the only static testing they did was individual
engines, and possibly 2-3 engines in cluster. The issue was secrecy,
in that either a static test of the full 30+ engine cluster and/or a
single-stage launch test could/would have been detected by US spy sats
- which is what happened anyway when they rolled the full stack out to
the launch site either the first or second time, there's some debate
about which pad checkout was caught and labled as "TT-5".

That and I don't think the Soviet Union was ever fully invested in the moon
race. It wasn't important enough for them to focus all of their efforts on
that single space program. They had several different programs going on
internally, so their efforts were always divided. Even their space station
work in the 70's suffered from this. Duplication of effort was rampant in
their space program and I'm not sure it ever completely ended.

Jeff
--
"Take heart amid the deepening gloom
that your dog is finally getting enough cheese" - Deteriorata - National
Lampoon