“"J-missions"”
The final three Apollo missions — 15, 16, and 17 — were designated "J-missions" and carried an invention that transformed lunar exploration: the Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV). Built by Boeing with a mobility system from General Motors Defense Research Laboratories, the battery-powered rover was a lightweight, four-wheeled electric vehicle designed to operate in the vacuum and low gravity of the Moon. It folded to fit inside the Lunar Module’s descent stage and deployed by springs onto the surface. Each rover carried two astronauts, scientific equipment, and lunar samples across terrain that would have been unreachable on foot. The first LRV, driven by David Scott and James Irwin on Apollo 15, covered 17.25 miles. John Young and Charles Duke on Apollo 16 traversed 16.5 miles, and Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt on Apollo 17 drove 22.3 miles, reaching a maximum speed of 11.2 miles per hour — an unofficial lunar land-speed record. The LRV was developed in just 17 months and performed flawlessly on all three missions, expanding the scientific harvest of the final Apollo flights and enabling the deep sampling of the Taurus-Littrow valley and the Hadley Rille region. All three rovers remain on the Moon.
The engineering principles pioneered here—The final three Apollo missions — 15, 16, and 17 — were designated "J-missions" —are still embedded in the aircraft you fly today.