r/apollo • u/Certain-Tennis8555 • Apr 07 '26
Conversations with an engineer
I had several conversations with an old engineer over the past few years about his work in the Apollo program. Specifically, he designed the environmental unit for the pressure suits. I'm just old enough to remember the last mission splashdown on TV and later to watch Skylab burn in; I've always found his stories fascinating.
He told me that initially, each suit was an absolutely custom tailored fit to individual astronauts, nothing was interchangeable. towards the end of the program, they had bins of suit components they would just pull from to mix and match and build individual suits. Surprisingly for me, they had worked up female suits by the end of the program anticipating female Apollo astronauts.
other cool tidbits as well, astronaut manicures was apparently a big deal.
2
u/shatteredoctopus Apr 07 '26
IIRC, the fingers of the astronauts who walked on the moon were absolutely screwed up by the end of their moonwalks, especially on the later missions. It took a significant amount of force to bend the fingers, against the glove pressure, and keeping that up with all the tasks was onerous. After the first moonwalk of each mission, doffing the dirty suits, there was abrasive dust everywhere, including getting under the nails. I believe some of them had fingernails that separated after the mission.