Completed ascent stage

The US Lunar Module has always been to me the ultimate spacecraft. Landing on the Moon was the ultimate space mission of the twentiest century and the current interest in the Constellation project shows that the exploration of the Solar system and the Moon is still very much alive. Many models have been created of the Lunar Module and I actually built several of these in the past. However some of them were designed at the early stage of the Apollo project like the Revell one and needed many modifications to make them accurate and the scale was no more than 1/48 making it a medium model to display details.

In July 2006, John Ortmann exhibited a digital model of LM-5 in the space-modelers yahoo group. The realism of this model was stunning. Most of the rivets on the ascent stage mid section plates were visible for instance and the color of the model was the most accurate representation of LM-5 I had ever seen. I realized that it was probably possible to build a real model as accurate but at a scale larger than the usual 1/48. Furthermore the availability of all photographs taken during the Apollo missions scanned at high resolution in the Apollo Archive web site was an invaluable source of information for reference of the Lunar Module.

I then decided to build a 1/24 Lunar Module to be able to show as many details as possible as well as as the inside cockpit. I choose to depict the historic LM-5 used for the Apollo 11 first lunar landing.

The 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing approaching I was able to complete the ascent stage and show it in a manner compatible with an exhibition. This model is aimed for display at the Cite de l'Espace in Toulouse - France for the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing.

I would like like to thank a few individuals such as Karl Dodenhoff, Jim Key, Paul Fjeld and John Ortmann plus the band of space-modelers around the world on the Space-Modelers Yahoo group who provided me with invaluable sources of materials for this project.

Finally I would like to dedicate this project to John Ortmann jr. As indicated above it was his work who decided me in building this model. I was in frequent e-mail contact with him during those last two and half years, always available to answer questions and provide help. Unfortunatly he passed away in June 2009 just a couple of weeks before I completed the ascent stage. May a bit of his spirit be in this model.