[russell]

Apollo was way bigger than the LHC, $200B (today's dollars) vs $7B. The engineering of the LHC is impressive, but a lot of it is scaling such as bigger semiconducting magnets. With Apollo everything was unknown, huge rockets, space suits, life support, space rendezvous, cameras, pens, even Tang.

[glenra]

> With Apollo everything was unknown, huge rockets, space suits, life support, space rendezvous, cameras, pens, even Tang.

Tang wasn't invented for the space program, it was merely a commercial food product they happened to find a use for. The Space Pen was inspired by the needs of the space program and was used in it, but wasn't a prerequisite for it.

http://www.misconceptionjunction.com/index.php/2011/01/tang-...

http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.asp

[russell]

Tang was a joke.

I believe the color video camera for was specially made by RCA, but the workhorse still camera was an off-the-shelf Hasselblad.

I had thought that the Space Pen was an existing commercial product. Apparently I was only half right. Thanks for the link.