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22 July 

TRIP REPORT 

SUBJECT: AF/Contractor MOL Program Rescheduling Meeting 

From July 15 to July 18 I attended the meetings of the 

Systems Office and the associate contractors, held at the 

McDonnell-Douglas Astronautics Company, Huntington Beach. 

Principals in attendance were: 

Colonel Ledford, SO 

Colonel Dietrich, SO 

Colonel Gandy, SO 

Colonel Knolle, SO 

Colonel Paige, SO 

Mr. Johnson, McDAC (HB) 

Dr. Malkin, GE 

Mr. Pepping, McDAC (StL) 

Mr. Sewell, EKC 

Mr. Blasingame, ACED 

Mr. Tennant, Aerospace 

The purpose of the meetings, as stated by General Bleymaier, 

was to assess the schedule impact of the FY 69 budget reduction 

from the previously planned $600M to an anticipated $515M, and 

to reach agreement among the principals as to the technical content of the adjusted schedule. 

Mr. Tennant, Aerospace Corp., followed General Bleymaier's 

remarks with a presentation of significant test and hardware 

guidance which the contractors were told was to be included in 

the schedule adjustment considerations (Patch 1). As he presented 

this guidance, there was a considerable amount of demurral on the 

part of the contractors. They pointed out that each had received 

General Bleymaier's message which identified their individual 

FY 69 planning bogeys, a FY 70 planning estimate of $600M, and 

the suggestion that a six month slip might be necessary. Their 

positions were based on this guidance and, therefore, the conditions described by Mr. Tennant's presentation invalidated most 

of what they had done in preparation for the meeting. They asked 

for, and were given, time to caucus with their support people. 

The meeting reconvened in the afternoon and eventually focused 

on three items: 

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o LMQTV Acoustic and Vibration Testing 

o Contamination 

o Ground Alignment 

GE took a very strong position arguing against the Aerospace 

recommendation that the testing be eliminated. Dr. Malkin 

stated that if the testing were eliminated, then the GE contract should be changed with respect to performance incentives. 

The optics contamination subject was eventually resolved as 

not being a problem, and the Ground Alignment subject was deferred. 

The contractors positions at the end of the first day can 

be summarized as follows: 

McDAC (HB) 

Can conform to the schedule/costs/ground rules as 

stated in General Bleymaier's wire. FV-3 would slip to March 

'72. Critical to McDAC are the Dynamic Test Modal Survey and 

LM/MM static tests which must move to July r70 and LM/MM mate 

which must start in March '70. 

EKC 

Two month slip at end FY 69; six month slip of 

FV-3. The FY 69/70 schedule adjusted from 24 to 28 months. 

COA engineering assembly will proceed on the current baseline 

schedule. 

GE 

The LM hardware flow imposes an impossible schedule 

on GE; to accomplish the schedule and hardware exchange discussed requires an addition of $20 million to the FY 69 bogey. 

(At one point in the meeting, Dr. Malkin mentioned that the 

berylium gimbal may have to be redesigned. This subject was 

never again mentioned in open session.) 

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McDAC (St. Louis) 

Two month slip at end FY 69. No further problems. 

T-IIIM (All) 

Requires $8 million among Martin, ACED, AGC and 

UTC to stay on schedule. Otherwise, 6 month slip of FV-3. 

On Tuesday morning, the contractors and Air Force met 

separately. Colonel Ledford, chairman of the meeting, remarked 

to the AF people that the previous day's session went about as 

he had expected, and that when we reconvened the contractors 

would be given very specific and "hard" instructions, i.e., the 

financial bogeys as stated in General Bleymaier's message; 2 

months schedule slip thru end FY 69, a total of 4 months baseline schedule slip of FV-3 (moving FV-3 from August to December 

1971). 

The contractors were unanimous in their dissatisfaction 

with the new instructions. The rest of the afternoon was spent 

trying to agree on the critical schedule hard points, and in 

trying to resolve the problem(s) these imposed on the individual 

contractors. The critical hard points were: 

o the Static Test Structure (STS) and STS MM assembly 

o. the Dynamic Test Structure (DTS) and DTS MM assembly 

o Bays 2 and 8 shipping dates and check-out sequence 

o GE MM alignment 

The meeting reconvened at 0930 on Wednesday, the contractors 

having been in joint session to iron out schedule problems. 

EKC indicated that they would have only minor FY 69 problems, 

and could hold the FV-3 slip to approximately 16 weeks. 

GE pointed out that the EKC adjusted schedule was forcing 

hardware exchange dates back so that GE rather than slipping work 

out of FY 69, was having to do more. There seemed to be some 

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p.„ 

justification to their argument that the schedule was not consistent with the GE FY 69 fund bogey and the SAFSL/SPDR requirements. 

McDAC (HB) noted that there was a very definite schedule 

vs funds conflict, and that the impacts on the SAFSL and SPDR 

must be assessed against funds available and schedule requirements. 

By the end of the day it was finally decided that on Thursday separate committees would meet to try to resolve the following general problem areas: 

MM Test Equipment 

IVS Loads & Ross Barrel Interface 

EDCTU Substitute 

Bays 1, 2 and 8 hardware and shipping dates 

CITE 

Mission Simulator 

Exchange Hardware 

This was the last session I attended. In my view, almost 

no progress toward arriving at a realistic and acceptable schedule 

had been made. I have the feeling that any agreement reached on 

a slip of less than 6 months will really be a reflection of the 

contractors' anticipation that schedule relief will come with the 

next rescheduling exercise (which they feel is a certainty). There 

seemed to be a concensus among many who had attended previous rescheduling meetings that this meeting was proving to be the most 

difficult. 

Atch: 

a/s 

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