Talk:Lunar Roving Vehicle

old talk

Who invented the lunar rover?

LRV Deployment procedure diagram is referenced in the text however the diagram is not included in the entry. The detail of the text is excellent and informative.

Did the astronauts take critical components from the rovers back with them or deactive them before they left? i.e. If a future mission were to land near the Apollo sites would it be possible they'd still work and someone could just "hop on" and drive them again?

The Rover was developed by Boeing with help from Delco and GM (the automobile mfg.) If the batteries were replaced, it is possible they would still continue to work. 67.142.130.32 05:32, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

I am interested into more details about how the luna rovers where stowed in the lander. The rovers seem so large compared to the available storage space. Are there any photographs of the folded up rovers etc. 82.5.241.137 15:42, 23 June 2007 (UTC) Peter Howell

Ferenc Pavlics "invented" the lunar rover: 1969-1972 Santa Barbara, California, Engineering Manager, Lunar Roving Vehicle Programs at AC Electronics. Responsibilities included the design, development and testing of the Mobility System for the Apollo Lunar Roving Vechicle used succesfully on the Apollo 15, 16 and 17 lunar exploration missions. The program included the design, development and testing of the space qualified equipment as well as a complete Training Vehicle used in the 1 g environments on earth.

According to the Science Channel's "Moon Machines", General Motors' Defense Research and Development Center was largely responsible for the unique "fold-up" design of the rover while Boeing was responsible for its construction. The unique design was developed after NASA's original efforts to take a vehicle to the moon had been largely abandoned. The original vehicle, equipped with an environmental capsule for multi-week trips, had reached a weight of 8,000 US lbs. The addition of 8,000 lbs of weight would have necessitated an unmanned trip to the moon to pre-position the vehicle for later astronaut use. NASA administrators considered this option too costly. In response, GM employees developed the fold-up design that fit in an unused LEM instrument compartment. See "additional information" for a link to photos of the lunar rover unfolding on the moon.

http://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/missions/apollo/apollo_15/surface_opp/

67.82.89.250 (talk) 10:32, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Expansion / Other Rovers

Can someone add a bit about other versions of the LR considered? Also, are rovers concepts being worked on yet for Constellation? CFLeon 04:26, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. There were and are a heap of different proposed designs. Hell, there's a whole competition over it. Where's the general article for that? -- PaulxSA (talk) 03:13, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

The general article is at Rover (space exploration). (sdsds - talk) 03:26, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Saw that, it doesn't add anything other than unmanned rovers. What I'm talking about is the various manned rovers proposed for Apollo (that weren't flown because they lost bidding, or were too heavy/dangerous), and the many manned lunar rovers proposed since then. (For example, from Apollo: Grumman Aircraft's "MOLAB", TRW's "Mooncopter", I'm sure there were more.) -- PaulxSA (talk) 14:24, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Bit of googling found this at astronautix, there were more designs than you can shake a stick at, yet nothing here (not even a reference to how competitive the competition for the Apollo rover was.) -- PaulxSA (talk) 14:32, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Proposed move (2007)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

I propose moving this article to Lunar rover (Apollo), and then making the article with this name a disambiguation page. There needs to also be coverage of the missions shown on {{Lunar Rovers}}. (sdsds - talk) 14:28, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Current status

Where is the buggy now and what is it's presnt state? TomGreen 22:21, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

It would be good for the article to cover this better. It currently reads, "Four lunar rovers were built, one each for Apollo missions 15, 16, and 17, and one that was used for spare parts after the cancellation of further Apollo missions. There were other LRV models built: a static model to assist with human factors design, an engineering model to design and integrate the subsystems, two 1/6 gravity models for testing the deployment mechanism, a 1-gravity trainer to give the astronauts instruction in the operation of the rover and allow them to practice driving it, a mass model to test the effect of the rover on the Apollo Lunar Module (LM) structure, balance and handling, a vibration test unit to study the LRV's durability and handling of launch stresses, and a qualification test unit to study integration of all LRV subsystems."

The three used for the Apollo missions are still on the surface of the Moon. (This is already mentioned later in the article.) It would be neat to include information about the fate of the test models, if a reliable source for that information could be found. (sdsds - talk) 22:26, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Any concensus on this?

One anonymous user seems to feel it neccessary to specify the land rover picture is "supposedly" on the moon. Am I wrong in assuming this view probably doesn't reflect the general consensus here, or am I way off base? - Vianello (talk) 01:44, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Your understanding is correct: use of the word "supposedly" is not appropriate in that caption. (sdsds - talk) 02:38, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

There are many credible people claiming that the moon landing is a hoax (see the article "Apollo Moon Landing Hoax"). How do we KNOW for certain that it wasn't set up at a movie studio sound stage? We don't. that's why it's "supposedly" taken on the moon. If we state it as a fact, then we do a disservice to the readers of Wikipedia on not being unbiased. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.125.217.40 (talk) 02:48, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

The only credible people (in terms of education etc) are those two Russian scientists. BUT neither belong to Russia's space program (they are the ones in a position to talk, and they back the landings). One has a bizarre theory that the Saturn V was really a disguised Saturn 1B, but uses gobbledygook to explain it. The other one claims the Saturn V velocity at staging was only half the quoted figure, but apparently doesn't correct his figures for altitude or atmospheric density, and his estimate is supposedly taken from extrapolating from a film. What neither explain is how the chemical signature of the Apollo moon rocks match that of the Russian sample returns. Kaysing isn't really credible. For one he was a technical writer rather than an engineer or physicist. But perhaps even more importantly, he left Rocketdyne in 1964. Of course there would have been a lot of doubts as to whether Kennedy's deadline was achievable at the time, as there were so many things that needed to be tested. I don't doubt that someone who left the Manhattan Project in late 1942 would have doubted that they'd be able to have a working atomic bomb by the end of 1945 too. The other hoaxers are either self styled people (Rene), conspiratorialists, fantasists, or one or two photographers who don't seem to realise that the reason why you can see objects in shadows on earth is more to do light reflected from surrounding surfaces than scattered by the atmosphere. They also neglect the fact that film emulsions have been used to take photographs of atmospheric A-Bomb and H-Bomb tests which emitted far more intense radiation than you'd get on the moon. As a final word. The insane logic is that today's technology can't land on the moon, so it couldn't happen in the 1960's. It isn't a question of superior computing power, but of rocket LIFTING POWER. Look at it this way. Would you say the early 17th century had better technology than today because you can't drive your car across the Atlantic, but the Mayflower managed it? No Government since 1972 has been willing to fund a manned lunar flight, and that is why we can't do it tomorrow. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.39.162.130 (talk) 13:36, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

You are correct, and those views are well covered at Apollo Moon Landing hoax conspiracy theories. It doesn't make sense to rehash here a discussion of those views, but you might want to also look at the article on the Lunar Laser Ranging Experiment, which allows scientists on Earth (lots of them, not just a conspiratorial few) to use retroreflectors placed on the Moon's surface to exactly determine the distance to the Moon. Retroreflectors don't exist naturally on the Moon's surface; something placed them there! (sdsds - talk) 03:33, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

The Lunar Laser Ranging Experiment doesn't prove anything. 1) If the moon landing was faked, couldn't the LLRE have been faked too? 2) if LLRE is real, it could've been placed there by a robot or just dropped on the moon without man actually landing there. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.125.217.40 (talk) 06:36, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

There are many credulous people, not credible, who believe the moon landing was faked. This discussion here is pretty silly. I mean how do you really know that you're in front of a computer, looking at the talk page of a wikipeadia article. You could be dreaming, or worse, you could have been kidnapped, placed in an isolation chamber, and have electrodes in your brain inducing your wikipeadia experience as mere halucination. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.31.44.230 (talk) 22:07, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

The problem is, we DON'T state anything as fact. It's just a picture of the lunar rover. The picture's caption said nothing about where it is, or what it's doing. Why bother adding that it's a picture on the moon for the pure purpose of then immediately disputing that claim? It would be like adding to a caption of a photo of John F. Kennedy, "Supposedly assassinated by a lone gunman." Yes, it's true, and yes, it's supposed, but what purpose does it serve to say that? It's not really fair, appropriate, productive, or necessary to assert a fact just purely to cast aspersions on it when that's not even the topic of the page. I probably sound way more hostile than I intend to when I say this, but it really seems like this attempt to make the picture "objective" is just an attempt to smuggle in a POV comment. It corrects a subjectivity problem that didn't exist before the 'correction' was made. - Vianello (talk) 09:55, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

On a side note, let's keep on-topic. This isn't meant to be a debate over whether anyone ever did anything on any celestial body besides Earth. This is PURELY a discussion about whether or not to include a comment that at least two users so far have stated they find dubious (not in its truth, but in its constructiveness and intent). - Vianello (talk) 09:58, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Okay, and just outright accusing it of being on a sound stage has all the exact same problems. It's just more honest about the angle. Which is a small improvement, I guess? - Vianello (talk) 06:23, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

The point is that a caption to a photo is not the forum to bring up the controversy. CFLeon (talk) 21:14, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

One does not mention the controversy if OJ Simpson was guilty in every picture of him; or whether Jesus really lived or not, let alone if he was the Son of God, in every picture of him. CFLeon (talk) 00:00, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Stars in lunar photos

Pardon my ignorance--but why are no stars visible in any of the photos/videos on this page? I'd imagine the negligible atmosphere on the moon should allow a clearer view of celestial bodies than on Earth. What's up with that? -VM

It was daytime!

That sounds condescending, but it is the actual answer. Because there is no atmosphere, the sky is dark, so it's very deceptive. But the sun is above the horizon, so the ground and everything else is lit up like your backyard in full sunlight (In fact, without atmosphere, the sunlight is slightly brighter, and isn't dimmed when low in the sky.) Cameras have to be "stopped" down to avoid over-exposure. Even your eye would be fully light-adapted, you wouldn't see the stars unless you stood in a shadow for awhile (The next clear night, shine a torch into your face for a few minutes, then look up. See how long you have to wait before your eyes adjust. And torches are nowhere near as bright as reflected sunlight.) If you go hunting around for shuttle/space-station missions, you see the same effect. That make sense? -- PaulxSA (talk) 03:10, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Reuse?

If there are still Lunar Rovers on the moon - why were they not reused - the team would only have to take replacement batteries and reuse? has any pictures ever been published showing an old Lunar landing site? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.175.44.215 (talk) 09:43, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Each Apollo landing was at a different site, up to hundreds of miles apart, and the rovers were not able to be driven unmanned from Earth. CFLeon (talk) 21:14, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Rover design

I recall reading MANY (30ish) years ago that Boeing based the rover on the chassis of a lightweight mechanical harvester designed for use on wet sloping ground. Can anybody confirm this? 203.7.140.3 (talk) 01:53, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Some of the new rovers (NASA)

ATHLETE http://www-robotics.jpl.nasa.gov/systems/system.cfm?System=11

Small Pressurized Rover (SPR) http://blogs.nasa.gov/cm/blog/NASA%20EDGE%20BLOG.blog/posts/post_1224905068621.html

Chariot http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/constellation/main/lunar_truck.html

Eduardo San Juan - controversial and unsupported by references

I've been watching the recent changes and reverts around Eduardo San Juan, and have been doing a bit of digging around. While it looks like there was an Eduardo San Juan associated in some way with NASA and the LRV, the evidence doesn't support him having the central role that's been posited in some of the entries. Whereas Bekker and Pavlic are easy to find in a lot of referencable material on the LRV (pre and post apollo work on vehicle development), San Juan is somewhat of a void. Except for eg this [legend debunk] site ...

I'm reworking some of the historical section, and in this I'm planning to remove any mention of San Juan. If you have references which can be cited to show that Eduardo San Juan was indeed a central figue in the development of the LRV, please add them here so we don't erroneously write him out of history. Lissajous (talk) 11:56, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok - I know I didn't leave much time for anyone, but before a war starts I've removed the San Juan references until someone comes up with verification. FWIW, here's the block removed:

Eduardo San Juan, a filipino from Mapua Institute in Manila is considered the primary designer of the Lunar Rover.[citation needed] He was also the designer for the Articulated Wheel System. Prior to the Apollo Program he worked on the Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM).

Lissajous (talk) 13:52, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

There's some pretty useful stuff [here] on actual contributions from San Juan. It might be useful in a section on alternative ideas for LRVs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lissajous (talk • contribs) 15:23, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

So basically this article is confirming that the claim by Filipinos of Eduardo San Juan being the inventor of the Lunar Rover used in the three Apollo Missions is a myth, isn't it? 121.216.168.145 (talk) 08:46, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

We're not confirming any such thing; we're simply ignoring the claim, per our Fringe theories guideline. JustinTime55 (talk) 14:45, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

There should be little controversy surrounding Eduardo San Juan. He worked for Hayes Corporation and wrote the Conceptual Design Document. As such it would be appropriate to say "He Authored the the Conceptual Design Document. (Link: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19650014414.pdf) Xamalek (talk) 22:51, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

NASA Marshall Space Center received 47 Conceptual Designs for the LRV in 1964. The design from Hayes International by Eduardo San Juan was for the MOLAB and SHELAB, which incorporates the LRV, but it was not the final technical design of the LRV. Again, this story should really be put to rest and under the category of Filipino Urban Legends. Bootkinero (Bootkinero) 08:10, 27 May 2021 (UTC)

Power converter

Looking at Lyons' claims for a 22.4 mi (36.0 km) trip (p.78), I wonder if he didn't confuse mi & km, & turn 57km into 57mi... Anybody able to confirm & correct it? TREKphiler ^{any time you're ready, Uhura} 10:21, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Proposed move (2010)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved to Lunar rover (Apollo). Arbitrarily0 ^(talk) 04:48, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Lunar Rover Vehicle → Lunar Roving Vehicle — This is the specific, proper, recognized name for the vehicle. Lunar Rover Vehicle is a less formal name used mainly in outside sources (not NASA). I will move if no objection comes forth. Tyrol5 [Talk] 19:49, 22 September 2010 (UTC)

• Comment the WP:COMMONNAME is lunar rover. Which suggests lunar rover (NASA) or lunar rover (Apollo). 76.66.200.95 (talk) 04:25, 23 September 2010 (UTC)
  • lunar rover (Apollo) would make more sense; it's more specific and that's the whole purpose of this proposed move. lunar rover (NASA) is too general, NASA's always liable to make other rovers, but this one will always be specific to Apollo. Tyrol5 [Talk] 23:30, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Mass of Rover

The article states 'The Lunar Roving Vehicle had a mass of 463 lbs (210 kg)[5]', reference 5 states that this mass would be lower (77 lbs or 35kg) on the moon. This is incorrect - the mass of the Rover is the same wherever it is but its weight varies. The reference should be removed.

Butterfish41 (talk) 14:02, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Wheels can't support rover mass in 1G?

I was a preteen during the missions on which the rovers were used, and I distinctly recall hearing that the wheels could not support the rover's unloaded mass (let alone with two adult men in EVA suits aboard) in standard Earth gravity without deforming. Is that true? Could anyone confirm, please? It would be an interesting nugget to add to the page, if it could be supported. 204.86.42.50 (talk) 14:48, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Not sure, but it would be the weight it couldn't support.

Just briefly mass is a property all material things have. It's the amount of "stuff" making up an object.

Gravity is a field pulling downward. When an object with mass is under the influence of gravity, this creates a downward force, called weight. I can understand the confusion, sometimes when physics teachers are trying to get you out of the habit of referring to "mass" as "weight", it goes a bit too far and you end up afraid to use "weight" even when it's appropriate.

The amount of stuff / mass of the rover is the same anywhere in the Universe, the downward force on the wheels depends on the strength of gravity where it is.

This is important even in orbit where things appear weightless. They're not actually weightless, they're just in free-fall, but that's another issue for now. The point is, for astronauts handling, say, a 1-ton satellite, although it has no weight, it still has mass. And therefore inertia. So pushing and pulling it still takes a lot of strength and energy! Astronauts can get worn out quickly doing "heavy" work, even when it's weightless!

It's a shame I can't answer your point about the wheels not being strong enough, since it's really interesting! I suppose you could check the unladen weight vs laden, see if the difference is anything like 6X. And again, it's not just the downward pull of weight that matters, the forces of driving the rover around will apply in all sorts of directions, causing all sorts of stresses. Sorry about not knowing more! 188.29.164.140 (talk) 19:22, 6 August 2014 (UTC)

All you advance is true, but the original question was about supporting mass in standard Earth gravity, which *is* weight: weight = mg, (@ Earth's surface), or G(m1)(m2)/r∧2 (generally). --Badger151 (talk) 21:41, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

Requested move 2011

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 15:13, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

---

Lunar rover (Apollo) → Lunar Roving Vehicle — Lunar Roving Vehicle is the official name. Lunar rover (Apollo) is too similar to lunar rover. --Jokessongs (talk) 17:50, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

• Cautious support Lunar Roving Vehicle or Lunar roving vehicle (per WP:MOSCAP) since it is also the official name. As far as WP:COMMONNAME I am not too sure. Doing a preliminary Google search, Lunar Roving Vehicle appears to be mostly connected to the Apollo lunar rover while Lunar rover is sometimes associated with other rovers such as Lunokhod. The ghits for both terms appear in similar numbers. But I haven't checked in depth. Dr.K. ^{λogosπraxis} 01:18, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose "lunar rover" apollo gives 300kghits, while "lunar roving vehicle" only gives 100kghits. 65.93.15.80 (talk) 05:28, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
• Support. Lunar rover might be the best title, but since that's now taken by another more generic article (since September), the legitimate alternative name Lunar Roving Vehicle (a redirect since 2004) should be preferred to a constructed title using parentheses. Station1 (talk) 17:11, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
• Support per Station1. --GW… 22:38, 1 February 2011 (UTC)
• Support per wp:precise, use natural disambiguators. An Apollo Program "Lunar Roving Vehicle" is a specific model of lunar rover. ^walk victor falk ^talk 14:17, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Too confusing

Note that I didn't add the maintenance tag. I am merely copying the edit summary of the anonymous user who did so that it doesn't get lost in the edit history. —howcheng {chat} 05:48, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

There are too many acronyms in this article here, and too much minutae, making it difficult to follow. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.128.252.111 (talk • contribs) 03:48, 19 May 2013‎ (UTC)

Why doesn't the article mention where it was created?

The Moon Buggy was created in the Philippines. Curious why it's not mentioned in the article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Presidentbalut (talk • contribs) 12:49, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Probably because no reliable sources happen to mention this. Do you have one? What do you mean by "created"? Was perhaps some part made there? The article does say it was made by a company in Alabama, USA. JustinTime55 (talk) 21:37, 6 August 2014 (UTC)

This issue has been dealt with in the Eduardo San Juan thread, see above. JustinTime55 (talk) 16:04, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

LEM center of gravity

The LEM is finely balanced on a single rocket motor, the addition of 210kg on one side would be catastrophic to the LEM control, so the article needs to address how the counterbalancing was done by NASA before the flight. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.243.219.175 (talk) 21:35, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Georg von Tiesenhausen

Here and here it is said that Georg von Tiesenhausen was a primary designer of the LRV -- is there any reliable reference? Should he be mentioned in the article? Sincerely, 93.224.109.104 (talk) 13:21, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

That's the first I've heard of that. The name I've always heard as the developer is Ferenc Pavlics, who apparently still has the remote control scale model for his design that he built and then drove into von Braun's office to show him how it worked.Almostfm (talk) 06:29, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

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Requested move 29 December 2018

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Not moved. See general agreement below to stay with the present title style. Kudos to editors for your input, and Happy New Year! (nac by page mover) Paine Ellsworth, ed.  ^put'r there  06:01, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

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Lunar Roving Vehicle → Lunar roving vehicle – A clear majority of both contemporary and better modern (book) sources use lowercase for the lunar roving vehicle. Per WP:NCCAPS and MOS:CAPS, then we should do the same. Dicklyon (talk) 03:11, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Evidence

n-grams show most uses were lowercase during the time of the Apollo program. The gradual increase in capitalized usage is due mostly to titles, headings, and citations to titles that have it in title case. E.g. in a book search of 21st century books, I find 10 that use it lowercase in sentences, and only 8 5 uppercase (see #Discussion below), even though Google find lots of uppercase titles and citations (which are influencing the n-grams count). Dicklyon (talk) 03:19, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

• Your n-gram and this n-gram both show a clear and trending majority for upper casing. The rover, driven on the Moon by astronauts on Apollo 15, Apollo 16, and Apollo 17, has a name. Lunar Roving Vehicle. Not the most creative name, or one that rolls off the tongue (or into a crater), but so historically significant that lower-casing the long-term stable title just doesn't fly. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:25, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Adding "the" in front doesn't help your case. There are still many title-case citations to "The Development of Wheels for the Lunar Roving Vehicle: A Survey" and to "Mobility Performance of the Lunar Roving Vehicle: Terrestrial Studies" and "Field Tests of the Navigation System Equipment Used on the Lunar Roving Vehicle" and so on. Also lots of places where it's capped just for acronym definition, including for more specific entities such as "the Lunar Roving Vehicle Simulator (LRVS)". These all contribute to the n-gram counts, but do not support treatment as a proper name. Dicklyon (talk) 04:48, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

• 'the' clarifies the common name. And yes, adding 'the' to n-grams is supposed to help narrow the search for the common name, and in this case it, along with the n-gram you provided, upholds the full upper-case name. The examples you give above are quite interesting, and taken as a unit, do support upper-casing. Randy Kryn (talk) 04:57, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  But as I showed you, what it narrows to still includes many title-cased citations. It doesn't do much to narrow to a sentence context (sometimes a little). And finding title-cased uses certainly does not contribute evidence of sources treating it as a proper name (you're not thinking that it shows that "Mobility Performance" is a proper name are you? or "Wheels" or "Terrestrial Studies"?). Please go back and read WP:NCCAPS. Dicklyon (talk) 05:15, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

• Here is NASA's take on it: Upper casing. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:40, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Yet in other docs, such as this one, NASA clearly distinguishes between the "Lunar Roving Vehicle Project" and the "lunar roving vehicle". Dicklyon (talk) 04:01, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

• And here is one of many NASA youtube videos, all of which upper-case the common name. Look at that off-road baby kick up the Moon dust! Randy Kryn (talk) 03:45, 29 December 2018 (UTC)
• Space.com, a major authority on all things space, upper-cases the Lunar Roving Vehicle. Randy Kryn (talk) 04:08, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Shall we have a race to see who can cherry-pick more authoritative sources then? Dicklyon (talk) 05:14, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Nah, I'm good. Some interesting material at Lunar rover which is a separate but related topic (there are lunar rovers and then named lunar rovers, which includes our Moon buggy here). Randy Kryn (talk) 05:20, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Bad evidence

• Not all the evidence links seem to show that the Apollo vehicle is the one being described in the lower case instead of the general class of vehicles. Indeed, some of those evidence links used to show the lower case form seem to be describing future vehicles, which is clearly not Apollo vehicles. Thus any lower case evidence that is not clearly Apollo vehicles are not acceptable. Thus any pure usage stats of caps v nocaps is not reliable evidence without specific evidence it is about Apollo. Therefor Google NGRAMS is not acceptable nor reliable since the general vehicle class can also use this terminology. -- 67.70.34.69 (talk) 05:42, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

  Can you provide a link to an example of what you mean? So far nobody has been able to show an example of "lunar roving vehicle" meaning anything other than the Apollo lunar rovers. Dicklyon (talk) 05:45, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

  This is a NASA document about a (former) future (cancelled) non-Apollo rover (Apollo follow-on) [1]

  This is about future rovers, and the class of manned rovers in general [2]

  This uses the term as a general class of vehicles for vehicles before NASA started Apollo (admittedly, as a section title) [3]

  This treats the term as a general vehicle classification [4]

  This predates Project Apollo, and is about an unmanned vehicle [5]

  This is about a robotic vehicle, using the term as a general class; and is also Pre-Apollo [6]

  There are many such uses -- 67.70.34.69 (talk) 21:59, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

  Thanks for looking. I agree you have found a few generic uses of the term. But none of this makes the n-grams evidence "bad"; that evidence is from the Google Books corpus, and only one of your links is within that corpus, and that one mentions "in the design of a lunar roving vehicle" in the context of a NASA-sponsored research program during the Apollo era, so it would be odd to claim that it means anything other than the same thing as all the other mentions of lunar roving vehicle in the context of NASA and Apollo, even if they wanted it to be interpreted broadly. Some of the others are stretches, too, like the section title used for historical roots in a paper about the LRV history. And the fact that NASA used the term before the design converged, and afterward for adaptations, is not evidence that they considered the reference to the Apollo design to be a proper name. And the one you said "predates Project Apollo" is NASA sponsored in Dec. 1961, and the "also Pre-Apollo" one is Oct. 1961, by which time there was already a guy in charge of developing an LRV, according to another one of them (Kennedy's goals having been announced earlier that year). Anyway, it's great to see what's out there; not much. Dicklyon (talk) 01:15, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

  So Dicklyon, what you're saying is that there is no evidence anywhere of any other use for this term than the one discussed on this page NASA's Lunar Roving Vehicle? That seems to show, evidentially, that it eventually became a proper noun, and proof that the long-term stable title is accurate. Randy Kryn (talk) 04:07, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

  That's the opposite of what I'm saying. I'm saying that NASA used it generically, before, during, and after the Apollo program, to refer to the LRV they were developing and that they sent to the moon with later Apollo missions. When they adopted it as the "name" of their vehicle and adopted the acronym LRV, they still mostly used lowercase, since it's clearly not a proper name, though of course it's often capped where the acronym is being defined. My point is just that there's no important distinction between referring to the Apollo LRV in particular and referring to other things called lunar roving vehicles, since those other things were almost always part of the same lineage. The "generic" interpretation is not introducing any ambiguity as some claim. Nobody else made a line of lunar rovers that are called LRVs. Dicklyon (talk) 04:14, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

  Yes, NASA developed it first and lower-cased it solely because no other lunar rovers were in existence. When other nations began creating and using lunar rovers NASA started, more and more, to differentiate their rover by using it as a proper name, which the other nations then tacitly agreed to by not using that exact combination of words to name their rovers, even though, lower-cased, it would be lumped in with the other rovers (some of which are also named and upper-cased). Randy Kryn (talk) 13:49, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

  Randy, you can't have it both ways. Below you supported the undocumented conjecture that "the generic term is for all lunar rovers, not just the Apollo one". Now you're saying that since the evidence shows that's not true, that's a good reason to treat it as a proper name. The truth is not so black-and-white, but implication on whether it's a proper name is still nil. Dicklyon (talk) 04:22, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

  It is a NASA term used solely for this vehicle, and thus a proper name compared to the generic terms which combine 'lunar rover' in some form and are used for all of the rovers which came later. To cherry pick the words 'lunar' and 'roving' and 'vehicle', which are general descriptors of all the later rovers sent to the Moon, then say that first and "real" Lunar Roving Vehicle should now be lower cased as well, is changing the meaning of the term to mix it with all of the other rovers which followed this one. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:43, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

  Randy Kryn, your last two posts above make statements to motives and actions [of NASA and others] without citing authorities and therefore, appear to be speculation and not fact. Similarly, there appears to be a linguistic arguement being made without reference to authorities and [apparently] contrary to what is written at proper name. A singular (ie monoreferential) or discrete set of referents does not, ipso facto make a noun phrase referring to it [them] a proper name. The use of the term "generic" can be misleading (by which I mean unclear). "Common name" is often used to distinguish from a proper name, though it can have other connotations and appellative is specific. A common name refers to a class or group, even if the class or group has a specific number, a small number or only one member. Specificity can be achieve by using the definite article or other modifiers (eg attributive nouns) - eg "the Ford car parked outside" is very specific. Proper noun touches on all of this. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 00:06, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

  In your example, "Lunar Roving Vehicle" = "Ford". The n-grams show it as the proper name (even though it's not super capitalized at 90% - the oppose editors know that and so, by opposing, are calling this a common sense exception), NASA now is using it as the upper-cased proper name, now and going forward into the Apollo missions rolling 50th anniversaries. When they get to the 50th of the missions that used the rovers they will be honored as separate Lunar Roving Vehicles, and not as a lunar roving vehicle. Different points of view exist here, and editors asking for the common sense exception seem to have kept this as a no consensus decision. The stable long term title - the same long term title that NASA and common name have stabilized it at - should be kept here as well. Randy Kryn (talk) 00:27, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

  Randy, you ask for a "common sense exception" on practically every discussion of MOS:CAPS. How is that common sense? Dicklyon (talk) 04:06, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

  WP:COMMONSENSE appears in the wording of the guideline template used at the top of every guideline. It means to treat every rule with common sense, and that occasional exceptions to those rules may apply. The editors 'strongly opposed' and 'opposed' below know that the wording isn't capitalized in 90% of sources, yet we also know that the 90% bar is too high when choosing to upper-case such a prominent name which is upper-cased in the majority of ngrams and other criteria (search engines, etc.). This particular case is perfect for a common sense approach, as the majority-upper cased name is now capitalized by NASA as it goes forward into the Apollo 50th anniversaries and beyond. Just today another lunar rover landed on the Moon. At the time many of the lower-cased Lunar Roving Vehicle examples were published, it was the only one (but now it must be clearly and non-confusingly differentiated from the many other lunar rovers). Randy Kryn (talk) 13:36, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

  As for "long-term stable title is accurate", I never said that over-capitalization makes a title not "accurate"; this is a WP style thing, and there's WP:NODEADLINE on improvements. Dicklyon (talk) 04:29, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

Survey

• Strong Oppose, per common name, search engine results (page after page of upper-casing), NASA's use of the upper casing as it celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landings, and the n-grams that show the common name took over in the mid-1970s while the lower-cased name dropped like a stone. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:28, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  See #Discussion; the n-gram evidence cannot be taken as convincing of anything until it is looked into. Dicklyon (talk) 03:51, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

• Strong oppose - this article covers specific, named, vehicles. lunar rover is the article which covers the more general topic. ngram evidence is convincing that the status quo is correct. -- Netoholic @ 04:09, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  See #Discussion; the n-gram evidence cannot be taken as convincing of anything until it is looked into. Dicklyon (talk) 03:51, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

• Extremely strong oppose - Ngram evidence is convincing that the proper name is more common. - BilCat (talk) 04:21, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  See #Discussion; the n-gram evidence cannot be taken as convincing of anything until it is looked into. Dicklyon (talk) 03:51, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose the generic term is for all lunar rovers, not just the Apollo one -- 67.70.34.69 (talk) 05:09, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  I don't believe this term has ever been applied to rovers other than Apollo's. Point one out if so. Dicklyon (talk) 05:11, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Many. See Lunar rover. Randy Kryn (talk) 05:27, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Point out any one if you can. There are no generic uses of lunar roving vehicle there as far as I can find. Dicklyon (talk) 05:49, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  They are all lunar rovers, from various nations. The are all vehicles. It's just that the Lunar Roving Vehicle came first and took a descriptive name which at the time some could lower-case but now must be differentiated to identify it when the words stand alone without descriptors - one reason for the ngram trend favoring upper-casing. NASA and the large number of other sources using upper-casing now is a common sense decision for an iconic piece of hardware. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:38, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  OK, you have twice failed to back up the assertion that "lunar roving vehicle" might ever have been applied to anything other than the Apollo lunar roving vehicle. This is just noise. There is no basis for IP's claim that "the generic term [lunar roving vehicle] is for all lunar rovers, not just the Apollo one". As for your claim that "Ngrams and search engines show what the common name is", that's nonsense; the common name is not in dispute, just whether it should be styled as a proper name, and the way we determine that is to look at sources as described in WP:NCCAPS and MOS:CAPS. The search engine results tend to uprank capitalized uses, and many web sources tend to use styles different from our, capitalizing for emphasis. You need to look closely, as I've been pointing out. Dicklyon (talk) 17:26, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  What do you think lunar rovers are? They're lunar roving vehicles. The lot of them. Randy Kryn (talk) 19:55, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  They could be called that. But in RSs they are not; only the US Apollo ones are called lunar roving vehicles. The term does not need to be capitalized to be unambiguous. NASA seldom capped it during the years of the Apollo program, and most sources still don't (except on the web, where styles differ and too many just copy Wikipedia's over-capitalization). Dicklyon (talk) 20:25, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. The Ngram is convincing. Calidum 06:19, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  See #Discussion; the n-gram evidence cannot be taken as convincing of anything until it is looked into. Dicklyon (talk) 03:51, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose – This is not a generic name, but just a descriptive name that was chosen as the official name of the device. We have a similar case with Space Launch System – not imaginative, but not generic either. — JFG ^talk 08:06, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  The case would be similar if "Space Launch System" was usually lowercase in sources, but it looks to me like it's about 90% capped, so that passes the "almost always" or "consistently" criterion that we use. Nobody is going to challenge the caps there, but we have successfully challenged and lowercased dozens of other NASA acronym-related subsystem over-capitalizations to bring them into alignment with our longstanding style guidelines. Dicklyon (talk) 17:41, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Congratulations? By "lowercased dozens of other NASA" articles do you mean going around lowercasing things without listing them or thinking that maybe the name changes may be contested? I don't follow your editing history. Not stalking you to find out what you're talking about. But maybe you should tell everyone what you're doing. Randy Kryn (talk) 19:55, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  I'm not talking just about article moves; sometimes titles are involved, and more often not. But yes I have moved hundreds of articles without discussion when the moves appeared to be uncontroversial. Only a few very (about a percent) of my undiscussed moves get a comment or any pushback leading to discussion, because they are usually obviously aligned with guidelines. Dicklyon (talk) 20:21, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support as follows:
  • The evidence at this point consists of two n-grams (Dicklyon and Randy Kryn) and a closer review of recent sources (this century) by Dicklyon. MOS:CAPS states: "only words and phrases that are consistently capitalized in a substantial majority of independent, reliable sources are capitalized in Wikipedia." (my underline for emphasis).
    • The n-grams are inconclusive. The older end of the data set does not support capitalisation. The recent end of the data set suggests that the requirement of a "substantial majority" may be met for the capitalised form. But, as noted by the proposer, n-grams do not distinguish headings etc that can bias raw n-gram data toward capitalisation.
    • A review of usage in prose in recent texts (this century) fails to confirm that capitalisation is used in a "substantial majority" of sources. Rather, if anything, the converse is true.
    • According to the advice of MOS:CAPS, and on this evidence, the article should be moved/decapped.
  • WP:CONSENSUS is not a vote or head-count.
  • An appeal to NASA's "authority" is a logical fallacy. It also falls to specialized-style fallacy.
  • Capitalisation appears to be used here to distinguish this vehicle from other lunar roving vehicles. This is not supported per MOS:SIGNIFCAPS
  • Onomastics does not support this as being a proper name noun phrase:
    • Proper names are not descriptive - this is.
    • A single referent or (discrete set) does not make a name (appelative or "common" name) a proper name.
    • Proper names generally are not modified by articles or other determiners. "The" may be part of a weak proper name but it is generally inseparable from the noun phrase (except where the noun phrase is being used attributively). The article has occurrences where the definite article is not consistently attached in cases which cannot be reconciled by its use attributively. This does not support it being a proper name.
    • In the case of "Apollo lunar roving vehicles", "Apollo" is acting as an attrbutive noun, to describe the "lunar roving vehicle". While not used as a proper name, Apollo is capitalised because it is derived from a proper name. Capitalising part of a noun phrase (particularly an attributive noun such as Apollo) does not confer capitalisation on the whole phase or imply that the appelative to which the attribution applies is a proper name. (Just heading this one off at the pass)
    • A proper name cannot be pluralised or, if in the plural form, singularised (ie the Pleiades but not a Pleiade). Per the point immediately above, "Apollo lunar roving vehicles" is pluralised quite naturally and does not support it being a proper name. The anagram (LRV) is pluralised in the article.Cinderella157 (talk) 22:34, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 08:18, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Per Land Rover. You say "A proper name cannot be pluralized". Some people drive a Land Rover. Others drive a Lunar Roving Vehicle. Land Rover is now the company's name but it wasn't for a long time. It was a product of the Rover Company. And yet it is also descriptive, both then and now. As are thousands of other proper nouns which can be pluralized. The upper case Lunar Roving Vehicle identifies it among the many other lunar rovers. The trend of the ngrams favors capping Lunar Roving Vehicle, as you point out. A search engine survey shows the same thing. Ngrams and search engines show what the common name is, and this common name is capitalized. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:28, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Trademarks (such as Land Rover) are conventionally capitalized (both in WP per MOS:TM and outside in general); that doesn't make them proper names. I don't think this would apply to lunar roving vehicle. Dicklyon (talk) 17:26, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Which lunar roving vehicle? There are a lot of them, from many countries. Randy Kryn (talk) 19:47, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

This again? Show me even one outside the US Apollo program that has been referred to as a lunar roving vehicle. Dicklyon (talk) 19:53, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Here's an article about the Lunokhod program which intermixes lunar, vehicle, and roving to describe the machine. They didn't hit on the exact combination that would mimic the NASA car because...it had already been used. As a proper noun. So could it be that nobody else was going to use that exact combination, even though that's what the lower-case lunar roving vehicle means: it's on the Moon, it's a vehicle, and it roams? NASA's, on the other hand, proper nouns it in one electric car. If they had made it on an assembly-line and sold it at WalMart it would be a popular upper-cased brand name. But they only made four of them, so on Earth they lost out to, of all things, the Land Rover. Randy Kryn (talk) 20:08, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Right, once more you fail to find a single instance of "lunar roving vehicle" referring to anything other than the US Apollo lunar roving vehicle. Dicklyon (talk) 20:21, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Not all words or phrases that are capitalised are proper names. Capitalising proper names in English is an orthographic convention. Per Land Rover, it is an overwhelmingly and universally practiced convention to capitalise brands, registered names and trademarks, regardless of whether they are proper names - and often not. The analogy with Land Rover falls to false analogy fallacy, in that, the generalisation (the crux of the analogy) being made actually falls at the point of critical difference between the two instances - ie, it is comparing apples and oranges. A registered name is conferred by a legal process. There is no evidence presented that "lunar roving vehicle" is a registered name. The analogy to WalMart also fails at the point of making it a registered name. You have stated that I am incorrect on matters of onomastics but offers no authorities. My authority (in the first instance - for reasons of accessibility) is proper noun but see also here). Your statements in rebuttal are inconsistent with onomastics per the authorities I have given. Finally, you have misrepresented my comment wrt the n-gram evidence. My comment wrt the n-grams was very much qualified - including the much-less-than-categorical "may". Misrepresenting statements (ie without appropriate context) might be construed as uncivil. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cinderella157 (talk • contribs) 00:45, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

Re: "An appeal to NASA's "authority" is a logical fallacy. It also falls to specialized-style fallacy." – Another issue with it is that it isn't an independent source. It's the same as arguing that WP "must" move Sony to SONY to match the company's marketing logo stylization. Further, we also know from the two previous RMs on other Apollo vehicles that NASA does not come anywhere near to consistently capitalizing these things, and the majority of their own materials actually go lower-case. The capitalization is mostly found in recent marketing materials for anniversaries, and other things written by PR flacks, not in their technical material.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:22, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

• Support per Cinderella157's detailed reasoning, and Dicklyon's evidence, and the Apollo command and service module RM (same case, basically). Randy Kryn's N-gram is meaningless because it does not and cannot distinguish between use in titles, headings, captions, and other places where title case is employed. Even looking at the "unclear" evidence set below, 3/4 of it favors lower-case, because most publishers, like WP itself, use the same style for captions and table headers as they do for article titles and section headings, so title case in either a caption or a table header has nothing to do with usage in running prose; and a source that capitalizes every unusual term like "moon car" (something they apparently made up) and "rover" is just a source that doesn't know how to use capitalization properly (or, more charitably, is written in something like "field guide" style, in which capitalization and boldface are often used as signifiers of terms that have their own entries elsewhere in the work – WP doesn't do that, but instead uses wikilinks). The majority of sources are going lower-case on this. It's the same reason it's "Constitution-class battleship" (not "Constitution-Class Battleship"); virtually no one capitalizes general classes of vehicles. As there are three LRVs, it's a common-noun phrase, a general class, not the name of a specific vehicle (like the battleship Constitution).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  15:08, 30 December 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose - Proper noun term for this class of vehicle, as opposed to the generic term "lunar rovers", which describes all such rovers. — Huntster (t @ c) 21:53, 2 January 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose – Proper noun phrase, but even more strongly than Huntster above, this isn't a generic class of vehicle, it's a small set of actual vehicles, built for Apollo. Yet again, this is just dogma run wild. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:06, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

Discussion

• Hi Dicklyon, might you please supplement your evidence. You have referred to 18 21st century books and use of the capped (8) and uncapped (10) versions in prose. I accept this evidence in good faith but think others may be more convinced if you were to list the titles of these that you were able to search, with links. Also, some indication of the likely total set of 21st century titles - again with links. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 04:42, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  Yes, I expect I'll get around to that, since people aren't getting the point. I did this search, then inspected each hit to see if I could find a use in a sentence supporting either upper or lower case. Don't have time to collect all this links at this moment; maybe tomorrow. But it should be obvious, with casual inspection, that it is nowhere close to being consistently capitalized in sources. Dicklyon (talk) 04:51, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

• Of course it won't meet the consistency bar (which means 100%, with no exceptions, one of the most oddly worded "guidelines" on Wikipedia). But upper-casing is the most familiar name in English, which another guideline calls for. Randy Kryn (talk) 05:01, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

  I don't think "consistently" has ever been interpreted so strictly, but at least a significant supermajority would be needed by any reasonable interpretation. Dicklyon (talk) 05:05, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

OK, copying links and titles, going through the google book hits in the order I see them (which is dynamic, so you may see different):

Lowercase

1. Lunar and Planetary Rovers: The Wheels of Apollo and the Quest for Mars
2. Terramechanics and Off-Road Vehicle Engineering
3. The Apollo Lunar Samples: Collection Analysis and Results
4. Chariots for Apollo: The NASA History of Manned Lunar Spacecraft to 1969 – this is a good example of one that at first looks like uppercase due to titlecase citations. click the "View all" link to see the other uses, which are lowercase in sentences and in the index.
5. Space Technology and Applications International Forum 2007
6. Automobile Quarterly, 2003 – also, the search showed a capped usage "programs like the Lunar Roving Vehicle", but that's about the program, not the vehicle.
7. Apollo 17: The NASA Mission Reports, Volume 1
8. The Real Space Cowboys
9. Space: The Fragile Frontier
10. The New Book of Popular Science, 2003
11. The New Book of Popular Science: Technology, 2004
12. The New Book of Popular Science: Plant life, animal life, 2004 – This is the second volume of the volume above, with identical index entry, so shouldn't really be counted as another source. And they're both related to the earlier version, so could be discounted further.

Uppercase

1. Moon: Prospective Energy and Material Resources
2. Space Travel
3. Macmillan/McGraw-Hill Math: . Teacher ed., v. 2 – go back to search to see the use in a sentence that's not showing up here.
4. Space Exploration Reference Library, Volume 2
5. United States of America in space

Unclear

1. Fortune, Volume 152 – Search shows capped in a non-sentence figure caption that also caps "Moon Buggy"; can't see a sentence.
2. Virtual LM: a pictorial essay of the engineering and construction of the Apollo lunar module... – probably counts for lowercase since search show it lowercase in a sentence, but the book snippets only find a capped one in a sideways table.
3. Reverse Acronyms, Initialisms & Abbreviations Dictionary – nothing visible
4. Firefly atlas of the universe – They do cap it in a sentence, but also "Moon Car" in the same sentence and "Rover" in the next, so that's no evidence they think it's a proper name.

OK, so I miscounted pretty badly. The 10:5 or better case for lowercase is much stronger than I said on first count. Dicklyon (talk) 05:46, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

20th-century books lean even more toward lowercase, as expected from the m-grams. Dicklyon (talk) 17:32, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

In particular, the 4 or more editors above you said something like "ngram evidence is convincing" for proper name status are just failing to look at and understand the evidence. Hopefully a closer will see that. Dicklyon (talk) 04:24, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

• Request for an administrator closer whenever the close occurs. The ngram evidence is strong, as is common name evidence from search engine results. In any case, there is no consensus to move this stable title, and editors are saying that even if there is a letter-of-the-law argument (90% of sources following casing) the title should remain upper-cased as a common sense exception. Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 05:08, 4 January 2019 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Proper name

To editor Dicklyon: please, let's discuss your revert. As clearly shown in the lead and in the article content, the proper name "Lunar Roving Vehicle" applies only to three specific and specifically described lunar rovers, those used on missions 15,16 and 17. In addition, it is incorrect to precede a proper name with an article, whether definite or indefinite, so "A Lunar Roving Vehicle..." is incorrect. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  ^put'r there  06:11, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

I'm surprised you're willing to jump in and claim that this is a proper name, or that it applies to only those specific vehicles, after that god-awful close and explanation you did. Where do you find evidence that the proper name status, if any, was applied to those three that went to the moon in particular? Dicklyon (talk) 06:20, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

The reason I "jumped in", and the only reason, is to dispel confusion among general readers. To refer to these three vehicles by the proper name is presently the status quo, and until that is officially changed by a RM or a MRV, then it is incorrect to apply the indefinite article "a" as if it is not a proper name. Now I realize that you disagree with its proper-name status; however, I refuse to believe that you are willing to allow confusion of our readers to persist while the proper-name question is "up in the air". Paine Ellsworth, ed.  ^put'r there  06:28, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Not sure what confusion you mean, or how this reduces it. Confusion about why the capital letters? Certainly nobody has argued that the term applies to only the three that went to the moon. That's your own invention, which I find confusing and a bit amazing. Dicklyon (talk) 06:44, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Read the first ref at Lunar_Roving_Vehicle#Locations for the details on 4 flight-ready LRVs and quite a few training and testing variations that were also LRVs. It also notes that "Three LRVs were driven on the Moon"; not "all three" or something like that. Dicklyon (talk) 06:57, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Not here to reargue the debate with you. The status quo is clearly stated in the lead of this article except for the indefinite article "a". I'm trying very hard to AGF your intent; however, that is beginning to get a little difficult. If you don't want to confuse our readers, then please let my changes stand at least until the MRV has been closed. Paine Ellsworth, ed.  ^put'r there  07:29, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

To editors Dicklyon and Randy Kryn: recent edits appear to make the lead clearer for readers, so thank you for your help in this! Paine Ellsworth, ed.  ^put'r there  13:03, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

You're welcome. I hope it's clear now that nobody is trying to "confuse our readers" for the sake of making a point or otherwise. Dicklyon (talk) 17:51, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

Location of fourth flight-ready LRV

The article mentions the present locations of non-flight hardware but not that of the unflown Apollo 18 rover. Grassynoel (talk) 23:41, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

are current coords accurate?

Are the coordinates for the current locations of the LRVs correct? In each case (Apollo 15, 16, and 17), the LRV is located just over 6/10s of a mile from the landing site. Would the astronauts really have parked them that far away? Elsquared (talk) 07:55, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

That's about right. They parked that far away so they had a shot at using the TV camera (which stayed on the LRV) to get television of the LM taking off from the surface. Almostfm (talk) 15:55, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Mass of the Lunar Rover

The article states the 'Curb Weight' of the Lunar Rover as follows:

Curb weight

   460 pounds (210 kg) on Earth
   76 pounds (34 kg) on the Moon

The mass of the object remains the same regardless of location. 210kg on Earth is 210kg on the moon. Weight is the perceived reaction to the local gravitational field. So an object of mass 210kg will display a weight of 460 pounds on the Earth but only 76 pounds on the moon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Joelchummel (talk • contribs) 02:44, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

the Lunar Roving Vehicle and the Lunar Module

Their are insiders that told me that the only Apollo Program which made it to the Moon was this Roving Vehicle carried by the Lunar Module. Their are no human crew along with this. The reasons are the Oxygen etc. Supply *Air for Human Breathing" are so huge that even the Module cannot carry it even when compressed for that length of Time. The Lunar Module serves as a Garage of the Roving Vehicle (maybe recharging, audio/video transfer) from SOLAR rechargeable Module. The Rover Radio Frequency for the Remote Controller over in Houston passes to the Module and then to Earth vice versa, video and audio coverage are also including with this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.53.185.84 (talk) 00:40, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

Payload

What is the correct payload? The ability to carry things won´t be in pounds the way it is on Earth. 2604:3D09:757F:EC30:0:0:0:52A (talk) 07:40, 14 July 2022 (UTC)

You don't know what the hell you are talking about. The fact that the Moon only has one-sixth of Earth's gravity doesn't determine how much mass it can carry. The figures given in the article are presumed correct because they come from a cited NASA source, and are translated into mass (same as Earth weight) and lunar weight. JustinTime55 (talk) 01:05, 15 July 2022 (UTC)

battery supplier

I copied from the german wiki Varta as battery supplier. That was changed to Eagle Picher by @Kittell. Also w/o proper reference. My research: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a17/A17_LunarRover2.pdf Magnesium casing https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/apollo_lrv.html two 36-volt silver-zinc potassium hydroxide non-rechargeable batteries with a capacity of 121 amp-hr. https://www.designnews.com/aerospace/batteries-powered-lunar-module The battery supplier for the LM was Eagle Picher.

titanium. They would take a small number of recharges— 25 times
==> Rover not mentioned

Reference: https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/tech-zukunft/mondautos-rekorde-50-jahre-mondlandung-2019/

several quotes for varta providing the battery for the camera

Result: The Lunar Module had rechargeable batteries by Eagle Picher with a titanium casing. The rover had non-rechargable batteries by Varta with a Magnesium casing. Schrauber5 (talk) 18:30, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Page 96 of the Apollo 15 Press Kit (https://www.nasa.gov/specials/apollo50th/pdf/A15_PressKit.pdf) states: "Eagle-Picher Industries, Inc., Joplin, Missouri builds the LRV batteries, and the United Shoe Machinery Corp., Wakefield, Massachusetts provides the harmonic drive unit." —kirk (user page | talk page) 18:55, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

That's convincing. Thanks Schrauber5 (talk) 20:37, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

A Remote Controlled Battery Operated Rover

yes from our School....a size that can be carried by the Space Shutlle at a small volume and space to bring with.. 103.224.94.24 (talk) 00:56, 10 March 2024 (UTC)