[DarrellZero]

This was when NASA’s job was to get things done instead of checking off boxes.

[BipolarBob]

We can outsource that to the Chinese and save a bundle.

[quantim]

Fast forward decades until now and the only thing the gummit can lift is the debt ceiling.

[logi_cal869]

All thanks to a Nazi under Operation Paperclip.

In a word, that history is rather pathetic. Remarkable, but pathetic.

[SuperLuminal]

Pre-DEI, maybe...

However, NASA hasn’t been smart enough to figure out how to scratch its own ass since the late 1990s...

[jeffersondem]

As I recall the engines were made by Chrysler.

[Ezekiel]

Industryweek.com ^ | May 12, 2011

And even more relevant today.

Visiting Marshall

NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center is situated on the U.S. Army’s Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama. Visitors are welcomed at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, Marshall’s official Visitor Center. U.S. Space & Rocket Center visitors can learn more about Marshall’s legacy and ongoing work.

Interactive exhibits and historic artifacts demonstrate our critical role in supporting the breadth of NASA’s exploration and science missions. Visitors will learn how Marshall develops, integrates and manages complex space systems and scientific research projects that continue to yield exciting and innovative scientific discoveries.

Visit Marshall

U.S. Space & Rocket Center

The Saturn V was, and still is, the largest object to leave the surface of the Earth. At 363 feet in height...

(= המשיח)

[PAR35]

It was built without DEI. Designed mainly by white men using slide rules and pencils. In a program run by ex-Nazis.

So of course it worked.

[The Truth Will Make You Free]

Regrettably the knowledge to build a Saturn V was not captured. To do it again would be a lot of starting over.

[BobL]

Any guess as to how much Chinese content there was?

[KarlInOhio]

It’s the heaviest object to leave the surface of the Earth, but the Hindenburg had a lot larger volume. The gas bag was over twice as long as the Saturn V is tall.

[cpdiii]

harness the energies of 400,000 engineers, scientists, technicians and supply chain professionals

They were using slide rules and very crude computers.

When Apollo 13 went wrong these same engineers figured out how to get them home from a failure they never anticipated nor even planned for. Their crippled craft was on a trajectory to take them around the moon and back toward earth. They had to calculate everything using the Lunar Excursion Module for thrust to get them on the correct reentry path. Get it wrong and you burn up in the atmosphere or be forever in orbit and dead. The astronauts had to use star shots to correctly orient their crippled craft for each engine burn. They got it right. They were brilliant and the engineers on the ground were brilliant. That was NASA's finest hour.

[wjcsux]

If I remember correctly, Boeing was the prime contractor for the Saturn V back in their good days.

[Paal Gulli]

"...The five rocket engines of the Saturn V's first stage were the most powerful ever built...requiring 7.7 million pounds of force...

The operative word is "were." The SpaceX Super Heavy makes 16.7 million lbs of thrust, more than twice the Saturn V.

[Freedom4US]

The success was (overall) due to the administrators who had cut their teeth in the military, and no tolerance for nonsense. Guys like James Webb (Frank Borman, of Apollo 8 fame, once quipped he thought the Viet Nam war would have turned out quite different with Webb as SecDef instead of McNamara), George Mueller, George Low, Bob Seamans.

Another guy who doesn’t get the credit deserved was Rocco Petrone. Werhner built a good rocket.

The VAB had 4 bays, the idea was an assembly line operation. They planned over 100 Saturn V launches, (which obviously never happened). Von Braun wanted a Mars attempt for the 1984 1986 launch window.

In a lot of ways, Lunar Orbit Rendezvoux while clearly the “best” way to effect a lunar landing before the decade was out, was kind of a dead end overall. The risks involved as the program continued made politicians skittery, and they started cutting everything back as soon as Apollo 11 returned safely, diverting funds to other programs, canceling Apollo 18 and 19.