Author Topic: When were the production lines for the Saturn IB scrapped?  (Read 11592 times)

Offline brickmack

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Re: When were the production lines for the Saturn IB scrapped?
« Reply #20 on: 07/29/2017 05:13 pm »
J-2S was consider as Space Shuttle main Engines (four in Orbiter) in early 1970s
as Two way R&D program to start Shuttle with J-2S and Replace them with High Pressure Engines later
so Rocketdyne keeps the J-2 production on standby for NASA until they took SSME

J-2S was a very different engine from J-2, nearly a clean-sheet design. The ability to produce J-2Ses does not imply the ability to produce J-2s. "Study of J-2S Impact on Saturn V Launch Operations" indicates that all Saturns after and including AS-515 would have used a J-2S

RS-27A uses a larger thrust chamber than RS-27 that is more efficient in vacuum.  It may be fair to say that it was derived from H-1/RS-27, but it was a new engine that did not use any parts scrounged from the old H-1 engines.

On the subject of parts scrounged from H-1s in RS-27, do you happen to know what the difference is between RS2701A/B? The A's I presume were retrofitted H-1s, were B engines newly-produced ones to the old design, or a later upgrade, or what? RS2701C is the newly produced version for RS-27A

Offline WallE

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Re: When were the production lines for the Saturn IB scrapped?
« Reply #21 on: 07/29/2017 09:45 pm »
There was no unmanned NASA payload in the 70s that required a Saturn-class vehicle, so they just scrapped them. As Jim said, the skill knowledge was not retained after they laid off the workforce, because a lot of it was intuitive and not written down. This is a point often brought up when people ask why it wouldn't be possible to mfg F-1 engines and whatnot today; it relied on a lot of unwritten know-how.

During this time, NASA had only two unmanned LVs in their arsenal, Atlas-Centaur and Delta, which completely sufficed for all of their needs aside from some planetary probes where they had to borrow Titan from the Air Force. After budget cuts, they didn't even have the money to fly the Saturns that had already been built.

Offline WallE

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Re: When were the production lines for the Saturn IB scrapped?
« Reply #22 on: 07/30/2017 02:02 am »
NASA (Langley, later Goddard) also had Scout, which averaged three launches per year during the 1970s and kept flying until 1994.  Titan 3E was a NASA launch vehicle, developed only for the Agency (essentially a Titan 3D with a Centaur upper stage, a unique shroud, and other changes).  It flew seven times.

In either case, Titan was still primarily an Air Force vehicle and not part of NASA's regular fleet. Titan-Centaur was a special LV developed for a couple of planetary missions that required heavy lift capacity unlike Atlas-Centaur which was used for a wide variety of missions. I had heard that LC-41 was still under Air Force control during the Titan-Centaur launches, although it might not have been since the pad had been mothballed since 1969 and then mothballed again until 1989, and all East Coast DoD Titan launches during this time were Titan 3C flights from LC-40.

There was also one NASA use of the Titan 3C, when they launched ATS-6 in 1974, and Cassini was the only NASA use of Titan IV.

Offline Archibald

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Re: When were the production lines for the Saturn IB scrapped?
« Reply #23 on: 07/31/2017 05:53 pm »
Quote
Propellant tanks for S-IB-15 and S-IB-16 were manufactured and stored at Michoud, but were never assembled into stages.  There are photos of these tanks in Lawrie's excellent book.

Now that's interesting. I assumed that Saturn IB production had stopped at -214 just like Saturn V stopped at -515.
I suppose their S-IVBs were never build, but do you know if the H-1 engines were produced  ? 

a quick search brought this (from Google books)

Quote
The procurement of long leadtime components for four additional Saturn IB Launch Vehicles (SA-213 through SA-216) was approved in August 1966. This approval was granted to retain the option to continue uninterrupted production of the Saturn IB Launch Vehicle if the requirement for additional launch vehicles became firm. The procurement of these additional launch vehicles (SA-213 through SA-216) was approved by Mr. Webb, NASA Administrator, on January 18, 1968. follow-on Saturn IB Launch Vehicles. Some long leadtime components such as tanks, structures, etc., have already been fabricated for vehicles 213 through 216. Steps are being taken to reorient the production and support activities to give the most economically sound program feasible that will result in qualified, flightworthy launch vehicles.

Source: NASA hearings, 1968.
« Last Edit: 07/31/2017 06:11 pm by Archibald »
Han shot first and Gwynne Shotwell !

Offline Jim

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Re: When were the production lines for the Saturn IB scrapped?
« Reply #24 on: 07/31/2017 07:55 pm »
Air Force always had control of 41

Tags: Saturn IB J-2 J-2S H-1 RS-27 
 

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