Apollo guidance computer12/21/2023 : 129 The use of a single type of IC (the dual NOR3) throughout the AGC avoided problems that plagued another early IC computer design, the Minuteman II guidance computer, which used a mix of diode–transistor logic and diode logic gates. They were connected via wire wrap, and the wiring was then embedded in cast epoxy plastic. : 27, 266 The ICs, from Fairchild Semiconductor, were implemented using resistor–transistor logic (RTL) in a flat-pack. While the Block I version used 4,100 ICs, each containing a single three-input NOR gate, the later Block II version (used in the crewed flights) used about 2,800 ICs, mostly dual three-input NOR gates and smaller numbers of expanders and sense amplifiers. ![]() The Apollo flight computer was the first computer to use silicon IC chips. The flight hardware was fabricated by Raytheon, whose Herb Thaler was also on the architectural team.įollowing the use of integrated circuit (IC) chips in the Interplanetary Monitoring Platform (IMP) in 1963, IC technology was later adopted for the AGC. Laning Jr., Albert Hopkins, Richard Battin, Ramon Alonso, and Hugh Blair-Smith. The AGC was designed at the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory under Charles Stark Draper, with hardware design led by Eldon C. The AGC in the lunar module ran its Apollo PGNCS (primary guidance, navigation and control system), with the acronym pronounced as pings.įlatpack silicon integrated circuits in the Apollo guidance computer The AGC in the command module was the center of its guidance, navigation and control (GNC) system. Each Moon flight carried two AGCs, one each in the command module and the Apollo Lunar Module, with the exception of Apollo 8 which did not need a lunar module for its lunar orbit mission.
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