The main purpose of the mission was to test the N1/L3 spacecraft's Block Dlunar orbit insertion/descent stage by simulating the lunar orbit insertion burn, the lunar orbit circularization burn and the final lunar descent burn. Over the course of five days, the Block D stage was ignited three times to raise the initial ~190 km × ~300 km × 51.6° orbit to a final 2577 km × 5082 km × 55.87° orbit. The Block D stage was fitted with cameras in the tanks to monitor the fuel and oxidizer behaviour in weightlessness and during acceleration.[1] Kosmos-382 also carried other experiments, including a prototype environmental control subsystem named "Rosa" for producing potable water from atmospheric condensate exhaled by cosmonauts onboard Soviet crewed spacecraft. This system was later used on the Salyut space stations in the 1970s and 1980s.[2]
The following maneuvers were performed:
190 km x 300 km orbit to 303 km x 5038 km orbit (delta-V=982 meters/second;
318 km x 5040 km orbit to 1616 km x 5071 km orbit (deltaV= 285 m/s);
1616 km x 5071 km orbit to 2577 km x 5082 km orbit (deltaV= 1311 m/s).
^"Публикации сотрудников АО "НИИхиммаш"" [Life Support Regeneration Systems for Long Space Flights (Publications by employees of JSC NIIhimmash)]. www.niichimmash.ru.
Payloads are separated by bullets ( · ), launches by pipes ( | ). Crewed flights are indicated in underline. Uncatalogued launch failures are listed in italics. Payloads deployed from other spacecraft are denoted in (brackets).
