Insane Engineering Of The Saturn F-1 Engine
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- čas přidán 19. 05. 2024
- Not all the details, but enough to understand how this monster got going. Enjoy!
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Fran, Thank you so much. I was a machinist at Rocketdyne 1965 - 1968 and worked almost exclusively on F1 parts. I would see the injector plates come back from testing at Edwards with holes blown in them and melted. I did not understand the miracle our engineers achieved until I viewed your video. I have seen the F1 at the Smithsonian and at Kennedy Space Center and it just gave me chills to think that I did something on every one them that flew. Funny thing was that in 1965 and 1966 my work was just a job then in 1967 it hit me like a thunderbolt how very special our work was. I relish every minute of it - to this day. Thanks again for a great explanation of the majestic F1 engine and how good old American ingenuity made it work so well.
How great for you to have been involved in such historic events. I'm curious...how old were you then and what was your education?
Only American Ingenuity?!
@@ejcorreia2 Hi, I was 20 - 23 and had graduated from Canoga Park High School (right next door to Rocketdyne). I later went on to get a degree in Mechanical Engineering. And, yes I do know how to use a slide rule :)
@@flightfan0595 Well - Canoga Park is in America! I assume that you want to acknowledge that many people, from many different countries around the world also contributed - I heartily agree. Nevertheless, it was mostly American Engineers and Scientists who accomplished the incredible feat of not only launching the Saturn V, but going to the Moon and safely returning. Seriously, we should acknowledge that all of mankind was represented then, as it is represented now with the amazing accomplishments we now take for granted. The Russians routinely send people to the ISS, the Chinese have robots on the far side of the moon, we (the larger we) created, launched, and successfully placed the Webb telescope a million miles from Earth, every week or two SpaceX is launching to orbit and returning the booster almost without fail, and when I see the SpaceX people celebrating their accomplishments I see people of all races, and I assume multiple nationalities cheering their work.
@@chuckhenderson6222 I feel like it is wrong to say that the Saturn V was "only american ingenuity". The head of the development team wasn't even american. The leading personal wasn't american. There are projects were "american ingenuity" can be said. But not when it comes to the Saturn V!
I feel like saying ingenuity of this and that country is stupid after all. Down on earth we can talk about concepts like "countries". But when we are in space, do concepts like that even matter: No! They do not! We are all one curious species. We are all the same! Yet there is an american flag on the moon, not something that all of humanity shares.
I hope you get were I am going with this. I am not after a random discussion on the internet. But I felt like I needed to say what I just said!
I am pleased to see how many follow-up comments I continue to receive. I want to record one more observation: While working at Rocketdyne, early in 1968 I needed to go to an office away from the machine shop, got lost, walked into a large storage area, and there before me were 21 fully assembled F1 engines ready for shipment - I was alone in this room. It was, and is to this day, one of the most magnificent sights I have ever been privileged to behold.
Thank you so much for sharing this!
I was too young when the Saturn V was launched (born 1965) but also as a child I was always fascinated by the sheer size and power, and later on by the complexity and engineering behind every single one of those launches. Probably what started me on the road to become an engineer myself! 👍
Your story gives me goosebumps just to *imagine* that moment of encountering these monstrous F1 engines - let alone what it must've felt like on the spot... 😎🙏
Too bad they couldn’t have kept making them and put the in storage for future moon missions like we want now.
Wow! That all I would have been able to say if I stepped in there.
21?!?! To the tune of how many millions?
I was at Rocketdyne during the SSME program. Many of my (older) fellow engineers were the designers of the F-1. Without question, one of the greatest engineering feats in human history.
Billy! You probably worked with my Dad!!!
Billy,please answer me !!...I heard that it would be difficult to return to the moon using the Saturn 5 F_1 engine combination...Because,there wouldnt be enough qualified mechanics/engineers to complete the work..Today's engineers and workforce in general ,they dont have enough hands on skills to do the job..In other words,there was so much trial and error work on these engines(hands on mechanical and fabricating skills)..These guys didnt make notes or drawings showing all the changes and little detail changes made..NowIm not saying they couldnt produce the engine ,but they needed people from this era who could weld,fabricate,mechanical skills..Today's workforce lack these skills...What say you?
@@lookfor125 I do not know about US. If you send a complete moon mission F1 rocket engine to China, China engineers can replicate it in one or two year. Reverse engineering is very powerful now. They do not need to know why you do things this and this. They can make a 100% millimetre perfect replication. It will work. However, it is not wise to do so. Some guys in Huntsville made a improved rocket engine based on F1 called F1B. They tendered for the SLS project and lost. However, F1B is very similar to SpaceX's Merlin engine. If you want to do F1 again. Divide the process into two part. Reverse engineering shoud be done by Chinese company. The manufacturing should be done in SpaceX.
@@catchnkill Well,I understand the reverse engineering part..I was stating that the workforce doesn’t posses the skills that this generation did..I know,because my father was a part of it..(He recently passed away at 90 years of age)..You wouldn’t believe how many people brought him parts and pieces to fabricate..My main point was the engineers alone are not enough..You need technicians(for lack of a better word) ,too..I probably didn’t word it very well..If we tried to duplicate what we did in the 60’s,without the advantages of the template to follow..It would be almost next to impossible,because today’s workforce doesn’t possess these skills..At least not at the number it would take to do another moon landing
@@lookfor125 surely the skills required could be sourced from those who construct nuke reactors for submarines?
Fran, as a kid who grew up in Canoga Park listening to Rocketdyne green-run F-1 turbopumps (at night, you couldn't see the test directly but they made this pulsating orange glow that reflected off the sandstone of the Santa Susannas, and you could HEAR this weird rumbling whine from 8 or 10 miles away...), thank you, GREAT description! Oh, and for everyone who thinks they were hearing complete F-1s tested at Santa Susanna, no, you weren't - they tried that once or twice with a partial-thrust development chamber very early on and THAT broke windows in Simi Valley! They trucked full-up F-1s out to the ridge at Edwards AFB and tested them there before shipping them to either Huntsville or Michoud... The big engines tested at Santa Su were smaller ones like J-2, Saturn H-1, Thor/Delta MB-3 and RS-27, and Atlas MA-3 /MA-5 in those days. When I was at Rocketdyne in the 80s and 90s we ran single SSME tests there alongside RS-27 and MA-5. But I have always been in love with the F-1 and in my heart of hearts hoped that it might someday come back. I knew some old F-1A R&D guys and they swore there was no reason it couldn't be made a reusable booster engine if the recovery could be managed. Remember - they had F-1A engines certified at 1.8 million lbs (8 meganewtons!) of thrust at sea level in 1973! After Challenger I hoped for F-1A powered liquid flyback boosters. When Dynetics proposed a modernized F-1B for the advanced booster for SLS, I dared to hope again. But it isn't going to happen. Newer designs make more sense, and clustered methane burners at lower thrust levels work better and cleaner for powered recovery schemes on big booster stages. But I thank my lucky stars that I got to go out to Edwards and witness a single F-1 fired on the stand when I was in high school in 1972. The overpressure from the start transient slapped us back a bit - you could SEE the pressure wave rippling out across the patches of sparse sagebrush towards us. Nothing like that hard crackling roar of a big RP-1 burner - our shirts beat a tattoo on our skinny, teenage chests as we stood there, awestruck. They probably had us a wee bit too close, but by then F-1s were very mature and reliable engines. Absolutely unforgettable! Last year, when I went to see that Apollo 11 documentary in an IMAX theater, i looked around at the faces of the audience during the launch sequence because i was disappointed in the sound mix. They just cranked up a lot of rumbling and failed to captured that hard staccato quality. I realized that I was probably the only person in the theater who had ever actually heard an F-1...
As an engineer seeing the transition of Analog to digital solutions, I am so impressed that all the stuff done before the 1970s was even accomplished. I have sophisticated CAD, simulation code and powerful FPGA hardware. They had slide rules, blueprints, and luckily, Apollo had the emerging microelectronic computers. Amazing engineers then and that stuff is the shoulders that we all stand on today.
I’m assuming that computer simulations nowadays could have predicted the combustion instability issues before they even built the first F1. Then come up with the baffles on the injection plate without all the trial and error designs that they had to go through back then.
I live in Huntsville, where most all the engineering took place. We have an air/space museum called the "davidson center" totally dedicated to Apollo. 2019 was of course the anniversary of Apollo 11 - and as such, was a big deal for the Davidson Center. They celebrated by inviting retired Apollo program engineers to hang out in the museum and talk to museum-goers about the stuff they worked on and how they achieved it. I'm not a controls-type engineer, but I spent about two hours talking to an old timer from IBM that was an engineer for the flight control system. At the museum, they have a ring-section of the Saturn V that housed all the electronics, and he pointed out all the various bits and pieces and how they worked. He explained how they analyzed data from flights - which was just crazy. Literally had hundreds of printed pages filled with numbers - to read it would be like reading "The Matrix". So they literally had templates with holes in special places that would hide all non-relevant data to what they were interested in reading. Then make program punch cards for the computer to crunch the numbers. He told me it took several weeks, with every engineer working overtime to find out if the trajectory of the flight was correct. In the same area there is a display of the "memory module" which contains several bricks of memory. Destin of "Smarter Every Day" did an episode on this. The memory was literally hand made, by seamstresses because it involved threading a tiny wire filament around a tiny hoop just so - thousands and thousands of these. When current passes through, according to the right hand rule, it would crate a magnetic field and allow the computer to see if that data location was a 1 or 0. After reading, the magnetism would cause a reversal of the bit, thus flipping the data location from 1 to 0 or vice-versa. So after reading, it again had to pass current back through to flip the bit to make it correct. Can't remember how much memory the whole module had, but was something like 20 kilobytes. Craziness. USA at it's finest, back then.
@@mako88sb Then, SpaceX 3D prints the updated engine parts...
The really sad part is that most humans don't even realize how the space program discoveries launched a revolution in manufacturing, engineering, chemistry, metallurgy, electronics, computing, and the food industry (and so many other fields!).
HACCP is now common in the food industry, yet was developed to prevent astronauts from getting food poisoning... Thanks NASA!
@@mako88sb Yeah, that is why SpaceX has been able to design the most efficient rocket engine in record time. It was not easy back then. It required hard working hours, but they did understand the physics.
Physics is not as important in every engineering job today as it was back then, but the best engineers will always be those who understands the physics. That is the diffence between a Technician and a real Engineer.
@@jedisenpei855 I don't believe space X has the most efficient tickets ever. They are basically just a rehashed SSME - Lox kerosene. The falcons are fine engines, but nothing revolutionary.
My dad was part of that. He worked at Rocketdyne from 1959 to 1968 at the California and Missouri locations. I'll never forget how loud the testing was.
That's so cool you're the first person I've seen in videos related to this subject mention the Missouri location. How long were you there?
@@NOOOOOOO0OOOOO from 59' to 68'
Fran, Even after 50 years I still find the Apollo program absolutely awe inspiring. It still blows my mind what they were able to achieve with 60's technology and all the more so for the fact that humans haven't gone back. Nothing else captures my imagination as to what Apollo did. Thank you for your videos and sharing your enthusiasm and insight.
The F-1 was actually 50s Tech
Would been better if they used nuclear engines
Where did that knowledge go to? Where did they go to work after the Apollo program ended?
I was a helicopter pilot in Vietnam when we landed on the moon and had a great interest in the program and had known about the Saturn F-1 and the design problems and was thrilled when it worked. You have done a great service to remind us that the developers of this rocket are the shoulders on which we now stand! The very best of luck to you!
Welcome Home! Hero
My late uncle was involved in the design of the first stage. He left us a memorial book called the Roll of Honor from the Boeing Corporation which he was included in for his contributions to the program. Albert J Vervake was his name.
Your uncle was a real hero.....
Wow!!!
Hats off to your uncle....to be involved in such an important project in human history 👏.you must be so proud & rightfully so
could you check your book and see if my fathers name is in it (FLOYD BOLT ) . he worked at redstone in huntsville ,alabama and his office was in the hick building . he was an engineer for boeing and worked on the F-1 engin . thankyou wayne bolt .
Tried to find a copy of the book - no luck. If you would be so kind, please look up William Mower in the book for me. Thanks!
Watching the Saturn V lift off never gets old. Engineered in a time when the slide rule was king.
Still use mine, too quick and if you know how, it is easy to figure out where the decimal point goes .
Alien: "You flew a spacecraft off your planet to your satellite and back USING ONLY TWO DECIMAL PLACES?!?!?"
@@ValentineMichaelSmit and computation power that could conceivably have been written with pen and paper.
Men thought totally differently in that era. Today we couldn't launch because of HEALTH AND SAFETY (and environmental factors ffs)
@@stevenvater2681 great, that's why NASA and the Air Force are spending 100's of millions cleaning up sites that they irresponsibly made environmental havoc on, FFS!
My Uncle Ronald Urquidi worked at Rocketdyne since Jan. ‘62, and I have been researching some of his patented ideas related to the J2 rocket. He passed about 6 years ago, but I have been reading an interview with him. This video is excellent in relating the design of these engines, and the staggering amount of detail involved. The engineering involved was detailed to such a degree, without computers doing analysis. Mainly things were often overbuilt and tested and analyzed to see what its performance would show. Thanks for the video!
Specifically, he helped design the heat exchange on the J2- using “dimpled coil support” which had never been tried before. I am still learning so much so as to truly appreciate his engineering abilities and contributions. One thing I remember clearly was he mentioned Elon Musk coming to him much later with questions and a copy of my Uncle’s book in his hand. Now as a teacher, I am researching what specifically my Uncle contributed. It’s a real pleasure to begin to understand and appreciate the staggering sophistication of these designs and the engineering behind them.
It's simply nuts how much work went into this engine, you can research it for years and still be amazed.
Indeed.
I used to pride myself on being a creative engineer but the guys who thought this through were in a different league. Truly magnificent.
Project management helped, there were _lots_ of people thinking it through and we benefit from seeing the cream-of-the-crop's best. But on your thread, it was also a concentration of opportunities that none of us will experience, so many firsts.
"...the guys who thought this through were in a different league."
They were the product of a level of academic rigor that sent MANY aspiring Engineers back down the hall to the Drafting room.
Don’t think of it like that. You definitely do some stuff better than anyone of these F1 engineers. They definitely do rocket engines better than most people on the planet 😄. Always both sides.
My dad worked on the Saturn V at Marshal space flight ctr. He met Wernher Von Braun twice. Once at Marshal and a second time at Goddard space flight ctr. in Maryland. I have cherished memories of traveling to Cape Canaveral/Kennedy in the 60's and early 70's and watching many liftoff's. Such an exciting time.
What I would give to have seen a Saturn V liftoff.
So he had 2 chances to assassinate a Nazi? Damn
My dad worked on the V2 Rocket back in the mid to late 50s (Detroit Michigan, Chrysler Corporation) with Von Braun and the other Germans. My dad considered him a Nazi and would not meet him. Later in life he wished he would have talked to him.
@@janeblogs324and go to prison for murder? Lol
Many years ago my Dad stood with me at that Smithsonian F-1 display pointing out the many engineering problems that were overcome in that monster of an engine. IIRC a major issue was protecting the various soft-metal components from the abrasive effect of the massive fuel flow rates. The solution was tungsten carbide powder shot from an acetelyne cannon (d-gun) onto the relevant surfaces, providing diamond-like hardness. He later ran the plant where similar coatings were "shot" onto contact surfaces of jet engine turbine blades. As a computer dude my understanding is limited, but hearing, at age 8, that your Dad helped get us to the moon was pretty cool.
This is one of the most amazing CZcams videos I have ever watched. Thank you for making it.
I still think it's incredible that they managed this at all at this point in history, undoubtedly the research and testing in the space programme accelerated our understanding of physics and fluid dynamics and computing immensely. Hats off to them, lot of clever people.
It's amazing what was done with a slide rule.
Yup definitely impressive, that field has developed rather quickly (if you look at how long it took to establish the early fundamentals compared to where we are now). It's strange to imagine think about what someone who was born in 1890 and lived to 100 years of age (with a sound mind) could've lived through: diesel engine (as a tiny kid), zeppelins, radio (first AM, later FM), first world war, Haber process, second world war, early home computers, humans in space/on the moon, GPS, etc. I'm sure a few in there are out of order and I missed out on a many important ones, but I just find it hard to think about that much change being possible during one lifetime.
Ignition by John Drury Clark also had some less than useful things to say about those early computers from back then for chemistry, nice little book btw if you want to learn more about the development of liquid rocket propellants. The various ways of testing chemical mixtures described in it are interesting, also some of those chemists made questionable choices by todays safety standards.
With my basic understanding of chemistry from secondary school days I managed to understand most of it, it was actually good at reviving some of those basics I learned back then. It surprised two of my older coworkers at my IT job when they were discussing their old military draft days and went over some missile stuff. One of them mentioned it used some kind of hydrazine and another liquid, they didn't expect me to know UDMH and IRFNA (along with their full name and chemical purpose).
Sadly, the Cold War was a hell of a motivator for the U.S.
@@extrastuff9463 My grandfather was born in 1895 and lived to 1997. A local news paper interviewed him when he turned 100 and he said that he felt he'd lived through the greatest time in human history, having seen the advent of the telephone, automobiles, radio, air craft, air travel, television, the atomic age, the development of jet aircraft, rocket development, space travel and landing men on the moon, and computers. He helped with several of those industries, working on automobiles and aircraft engine design and testing during his lifetime. I think he really did experience the best of human history.
@@WATERDOG300 "the best of human history." Easy to forget two World Wars when they are not part of your life experience.
There was an Apollo 19 built, but it never flew. The first stage, the five F1s still attached, sit at the NASA Infinity Science Center off I10 at the LA/MS state line. I was a volunteer for the refurbishment and repainting of the S-1C last year. Laying on its side, I was able to walk right up to the F1s. You can’t appreciate the massive size of these engines until you actually touch them.
I went ot Stennis years ago on a field trip, it was awesome!
@@johnbruhling8018 I would love to paint that beast!
There was a very impressive display of the Saturn rocket and the F-1 engine at the Huntsville space museum, when I was there. Huntsville also had the best IMAX theatre I've ever been to.
@@TheTomBevisit was an awesome Imax! Too bad it is gone..
@@BamaRailfan I particularly liked the awesome Klipsch speaker system it had.
I work for Blue Origin, and am currently sitting in an office inside the giant test stand 4670 where the Saturn 5 booster and all 5 engines were tested! We have retrofitted the stand to test our New Glenn rocket engines, and the history here is just incredible. Thank you so much for this great video!
Being a Flight Engineer (from the 70's and 80's), I have to give you a HIGH FIVE!! This was an AWESOME video!! And to think that this engine/rocket combo was built without computers (as we now them them anyway). WOW! Thank you!
I was with IBM in 1966 on the Guidance and Control group. We actually fed signals to the F 1 to gimbal the engines. The actual movements were done with Moog hydraulic actuators . We called it Power Steering. Funny!!
@@keithtyler9372 People don't realize that all that tremendous thrust was being pushed on those five relatively small gimbals to the frame above, yet they had to be able to move quite a bit, and freely on two axis, to do the "steering"!
Edit: Plus the pump housings bear all the thrust, basically. The first time I saw that initial little 'wiggle' of the engines I thought something broke loose!
The "Pogoing" that you referring to the early F-1 engines produced an incredible effect up close. I was a taxi driver in the early 1960's and was once near the Marshal Space Flight Center's test stand on the Redstone Arsenal while they lit one of those off. It was like the several surrounding miles around that test stand was under a "strobe effect". Even the light from the sun seemed to "strobe". It was an incredible and (obviously), unforgettable experience.
RonRay...You Lucky Git!!..I live in England UK,and would give my right arm to be across there seeing sights like that!! Thanks for sharing with us! Cheers Bill in Beautiful Northumbria in the UK.
I lived in Madison county (close to Moores Mill) a little north east of Huntsville and I still remember the windows rattling during the engine tests.
That’s awesome! I can’t imagine ever forgetting that!
@@davidstephens4261 David, I know the area well. I live a couple of miles from there, in 'Meridianville' right now. (Do you remember the ponds that were there with the osteriches and weird birds & animals.. :) ?
I remember the rattling windows like you, but the time I drove a taxi, I had to pick up a big wig under Von Braun and was REAL CLOSE! Scared the crap out of me! :)
The F-1 engine tests was such a big deal back then, but we didn't realize just HOW BIG! I moved down to Melbourne, Florida in 1967 and would watch those same rocket engines take off from Cape Kennedy, just a few miles north of us. (We would get on our roof for a better view. :)
Nice talking (typing?) with you.
Wow! What a phenomenon to witness! Thanks for sharing with us!
Damn, Fran- this has to be one of the best technical videos on CZcams. A million thanks for not talking down to us; as a scientist and experimental builder and test pilot this is pure red meat. LOTS of food for thought. I mean it.
You took the words right out of my mouth/post - a thoroughly satisfying video - excellent pitch and delivery - and I learned a lot of little details (like the tapered release bolts) that I'd simply not heard about before - fantastic - thanks (and subscribed of course) 👍🏼
And yet, not having finished high school, I found it fascinating! Fran knows the subject well enough to explain it to......
@@phillipbailey70 The six-part 'MOON MACHINES' is another. It covers the 'Saturn V'....'Navigation Computer'....'Command Module'....'Spacesuits'....'Lunar Module' and 'Lunar Rover'. It's a superb documentary including some wonderfully insightful, humorous, and personal commentary from the engineers and project managers.
The six-part 'MOON MACHINES' is another. It covers the 'Saturn V'....'Navigation Computer'....'Command Module'....'Spacesuits'....'Lunar Module' and 'Lunar Rover'. It's a superb documentary including some wonderfully insightful, humorous, and personal commentary from the engineers and project managers.
@@LloydieP I'd say you're one pretty sharp cookie then, education or not!! It is basic rocket science, few will appreciate exactly how significant it is.
Apolli is Still humankind's most amazing technological achievement. And the F1 was integral. The sheer gargantuan power of those engines is mind boggling. Great video about those engines
Been watching clips of these marvelous engines for decades. Thanks to Fran's presentation I learned things I never knew before. She's really done her homework.
Bravo!
There is so much engineering that is hidden within.
Absolutely fantastic presentation.
Thankyou 👍
@Roger partner and to think that there are idiots who think it was all faked! That's an insult to the greatest engineering achievement of mankind.
Fran - many years ago I read about the extrusion bolts used to reduce the jerk (da/dt) of the Saturn V at liftoff but could never find the reference again and after a while I thought I had misremembered that detail. Thanks for that tidbit and especially the line drawing of the bolts.
Collectspace has a topic about it that goes into a bit more detail. One thing not mentioned here is that the number of these extrusion bolts was reduced through the program:
www.collectspace.com/ubb/Forum29/HTML/001327.html
*APOLLO 8 (AS.503) MISSION REPORT M-932-68-08 (supplement)*
See page 61 for diagrams. plus...
"The four holddown arms (Figure 22) are mounted on the ML deck, 90° apart around the vehicle base. They position and hold the vehicle on the ML during the VAB checkout, movement to the pad, and pad checkout. The vehicle base is held with a pre-loaded force of 700,000 pounds at each arm. At engine ignition, the vehicle is restrained until proper engine thrust is achieved. The unlatching interval for the four arms should not exceed 0.050 seconds. If any of the separators fail to operate in 0.180 seconds, release is effected by detonating an explosive nut link. At launch, the holddown arms quickly release, but the vehicle is prevented from accelerating too rapidly by the controlled-release mechanisms (Figure 22). Each controlled-release mechanism basically consists of a tapered pin inserted in a die which is coupled to the vehicle. Upon vehicle release, the tapered pin is drawn through the die during the first six inches of vehicle travel. There are provisions for as many as 16 mechanisms per vehicle. The precise number is determined on a mission basis."
I'm guessing that the number of pull-throughs was determined by vehicle mass.
Yeah Jeff, me too. I've looked for years to find these things. Have been to Houston. Huntsville and Cape Canaveral to look at the rockets. But, could never see the dies. Now, I know what to look for, and where to look. And, it may be that the dies are not on the rockets which are on display. I'll find out next trip. BTW: the V2 on display in Huntsville has a similar implementation. I will now check out mako88sb's link ....
This is incredible engineering for today let alone in the 60’s. I would love to be a fly on the wall in those engineering meetings. Can you imagine being the person explaining the design of these massive engines? Just amazing. What do you say? “Hey, it’s not like it’s everyday engineering, this is rocket science at its finest!!!” Great explanation of these marvels of science. Thank you.
The complete design of this engine and the solution to the boosters not being melted the engineering just to build a controlled burn to braise the boosters would be a great part 2 video, its amazing.
As a teenager around 1974 I remember reading about the shaped bolts which helped a smooth lift off. Again, no computers, no moving parts, just a very elegant solution. I've never seen it mentioned again until watching this great video. I feel I've been lucky enough to see two 'golden ages' of rocketry, The Saturn/Apollo era, and today, with SpaceX and others. And through it all of course, Soyuz, always there, available, reliable, a great vehicle. Every generation produces amazing engineers.....
It took about 75,000 pounds of force to pull each one of those draw pin bolts through a die during the rockets first 6" of travel as it lifted. Just enough to keep the Saturn V from jumping off the pad. That thing was a beast!
This is the kind of classic fran content I like.
X2 !!
It still amazes me to this day how much power each of these beasts could pound out!
I grew up during the Gemini and Apollo programs. The F1 was a fearsome powerplant. That injector plate was definitely the making of many sleepless nights in its day. I remind people that this was done with sliderules and pure hard work. Great video.
And just thrown away after one use...
@@davidlang4442 if they had to make them reusable back in the day, at same level of safety, they'd still be working on them. Elon Musk had a nice point about not throwing away a car after each trip, but if your journey is a quarter million miles, and if your "car" breaks down you don't get to pull over to the curb and wait for help but (with rare exceptions) you just die, maybe it's not a bad idea to use a brand new (but well tested) car for every trip.
When we'll have learned to travel to the stars & a quarter milliin miles from Earth is nothing, maybe it'd be wise to take an old beater to the Moon. That wasn't the case in the 1950s - as the Apollo 1, Nedelin catastrophe, and the two space huttles taught us, even tech aside, we're too dumb to even safely take off and land all the time due to complacency & organizational pressures.
@@AlexKarasev I still think we have a secret space program that grew out of Roswell tech. Apollo 13 was saved when a sag wagon was sent out to help it get back home. Other Apollo missions were also shadowed by these "rescue" ships in another possible 13 Event. These were seen by those aboard 11, 14, and other missions.
@@davidlang4442sag wagon?
@@davidlang4442 If true it sure would be interesting to learn more about it.
This is gold, there are bits I’ve never heard elsewhere
Yeah, I thought I had read all there is about the Saturn V but still Fran gave some facts that were completely new to me.
Amazing information here.
^..^~~
My father was a crew leader building the F-1 in Canoga Park. He had a meeting once with Wernher Von Braun and suggested a modification, that was accepted, that had something to do with fuel flow to make it more efficient.
There was the power of 17 Hoover Dams from EACH engine. 85 Hoover Dams for 2-1/2 minutes. 60 gigawatts each. 300 gigawatts was enough to power the USA at the time. One engine could power the UK at the time.
15,000 gallons of fuel per second. Fuel pump alone was 55,000 hp.
I worked at Rocketdyne '82-'85 - mostly on the Shuttle program. Dream job - young M.E. fresh out of school. There was an F-1 in front of the Canoga Main Lobby - used to love just walking around it and with the help of a Tech. Manual, I.D.'g the components. I was mentored by the people from the Apollo era, and it was a boon to my education. My landlord worked in the Combustion Group, and was part of the team that solved the instability problem. I left there to work at JPL, but always regretted leaving. In my 38+ yr career, it was the most professional organization I had the privilege to work at.
Where are my manners?! Thank you for this, Fran!! Brought back many great memories.
A huge Hi from the Blanche clan in Scotland. Loved the vid.
As you mentioned the most famous pogo oscillation in the Saturn V first stage, S-IC, on the flight of Apollo 6. The cause as I understand it was a cruciform thrust structure thrust spring back that resulted in a sinusoidal thrust oscillation. I had heard the fix was to use helium gas from the propulsion system's pneumatic control system, that acted to attenuate the oscillations like a shock absorber. I never understood how they did that. You gave a nice explanation. Thank you very much. Those were some brilliant engineers to think of that.
I read someplace that the Apollo 13 pre-mature center engine cutoff (followed by Jim Lovell's famous statement "well looks like we just had our glitch for this mission") was due to the pogo effect. But this would have been long after the issue was "fixed". So does anybody know the real reason?
@@mmetzger79 Yes indeed. The fix NASA had developed to address 2nd stage pogo oscillations were not installed in Apollo 13 due to schedule constraints. Apollo 13 experienced the worst Pogo yet recorded. For a second or two, that center J2 was bouncing up-an-down by as much as 3 inches (76 mm), flexing the cruciform support beams at a frequency of 15 or 16 Hz, generating accelerations of 68g relative to the rest of the vehicle and threatening to tear the thrust structure of the S-II apart. Fortunately, the wildly fluctuating pressures within the engine tripped the sensor and the engine was shutdown. It was estimated that the S-II stage was only a second from its complete destruction.
@@WWeronko That pump and the plumbing, don't look like they can do "2 tons per second" or handle the weight of real rocket. So how did they get combustion oscillation from an oversized kerosene torch at the end of a helium balloon, ...my guess is - in the theory only.
I also love how they tested the injector plate baffle solution to see if they solved the instability. They detonated an explosive (small bomb) in the combustion chamber to induce instability. The new baffle design corrected the instability. Once they proved that they felt very confident that the engine would be a solid performer.
Yes...I remember seeing a video clip of that test somewhere. It was either a documentary about the F-1 engines, or someone had posted it on CZcams.
It was awesome to see it and to know they could literally bomb the engine and it would still work flawlessly.
Absolutely amazing.
I still have a couple of my Dad's old slide rules, and he always had one in his pocket protector.
This is the best explanation of the Saturn's F-1 engine's design and function that I have ever heard. Parenthetically, during the launch in 1969, I was in Fairbanks, which, like all of Alaska at the time, had never had live television. But for this launch and landing, a U.S. military relay satellite was assigned to send a live TV signal to Anchorage, where I and my band of brothers on a vacation from college promptly decamped. It was in a hotel lobby in Anchorage that we were able to watch the landing on the moon, and the Eagle's launch from the moon's surface. Yes, I remember where I was, and it was all an adventure of a lifetime. At that time, the population of Alaska was the same as the population of Austin, TX: 250,000 souls.
The mechanical engineering involved in these engines tells me why I held that discipline in such high esteem in college.
This is excellent! Very well explained. It was so difficult to engineer the propulsion systems. Most people assume " It's just a big rocket." without realizing the amazing engineering involved. Especially with the technology of the time. A huge amount of the development was truly trial and error. Most of it was built by hand in the machine shop. No CAD, no software to plot stress and reaction to modifications. Just a bunch of really talented, individuals trying to make it work. Many tests simply exploded or burned into scrap metal. Every launch was a roll of the dice. At the time, the general public had no idea how dangerous it really was. Amazing that it worked at all.
So true!!!!
Thanks Fran!! Great respect to all the passionate engineers designing and building this! Fabulous job!!
That was superb. The thing about Apollo and the Saturn V is that no matter how old you get, you keep finding yourself thinking 'wow!' like you're ten years old. Epic!
The amount of effort that must have gone into this is mind-boggling. I can't even begin to imagine how they identified these problems much less solved them. Fran your ability to study and understand all this information is also astonishing.
Its incredible. They didn't have any of the modern technology we have now.
Good... No... Fantastic!
Watch moon machines here on YT..they explain how fuel instability was fixed.
That was an excellent description of the F1 and it's workings- I was a young 10 year old boy when Apollo 11 landed, and was already an avid Saturn V fan, with an Airfix kit built and allsorts of Space stuff in my bedroom, ever since the Apollo 8 Went around the moon. I was hooked, and you have just added to that pleasure of mine with your presentation. Thank you Fran. ( I am now an avid Space X fan and am intrigued with what they are achieving so quickly and so precisely)
I wish I could have seen it live...its funny how nostalgia and awe can creep into later generations. My mother saw it too, and described it as awesome. But just a part of her childhood that was perfectly normal...it wasn't at all normal to me wishing I had been there.
I recently discovered my niece is infatuated with the 90's and asked me what it was like!
I said... consciousness is a funny thing. lol, you just dont realize the value of a time whilst you live it...i was a kid! Tv was insane with it's crazy advertising to children...the main thing I said was that the question "where are you" barely existed...you called me, you know where I am!! Plus alot more talking was going on.
I never would have thought the 90's would become nostalgic.
@room-ten-oh-nine ! Details !! :)
I was at the Cape for Apollo 8!!!! It was a sight and SOUND I still have trouble describing!
rockets are so simple in concept but so complicated in execution its amazing
My husband and I absolutely loved the details you gave about the F-1 engines! You really are amazing in being able to explain something so complex! We thank you for your light of knowledge! Take care and God bless!
This was great thank you! The right pacing and great info. I've seen several videos and read a good bit on this engine, and I still learned a lot. Thank you.
Fran- Your explanations are fabulous on complicated engineering concepts. Excellently done. Thank you.
Amazing detail, in an easy to understand format, of an extremely complicated piece of engineering history. Thanks so much for sharing!
Amazing video, giving a glimpse into the spectacular complexity involved in this engine/rocket system. Just wow.
I grew up in Huntsville, AL, in the 60s. My father worked for Chrysler on the Saturn IB rocket. They used to test the Saturn engines at the static test stand, south of the city on the banks of the Tennessee river. When they fired the engine off on the stand, it made the dishes in our kitchen cabinets rattle.
@itsabig I've lived in HSV since 2000. Never heard about test firings creating rainy weather, but I HAVE heard (many different times from different folks) they only ever tested F1 engines on nice clear days - except one time they were short on time and fired one off on an overcast day - the cloud cover reflected a lot of the noise and shockwave back down to the city below, shattering a lot of windows and just generally messing stuff up.
@David Ruth Thank you, captain obvious!
@David Ruth Leftists and commies must have taught you to read, because you have zero reading comprehension.
I've no idea why you are saying my comment implied F1's were being tested in the early 2000s. I moved to HSV in 2000, but there were people already living here, then -some of which witnessed the 1950s and 1960s rocket programs. I suggest you re-read my original comment.
@David Ruth Not irrelevant, because I was relating to the OP, who stated he was from HSV. Mentioning "since the early 2000s" was relevant because that demonstrates I have ~20 years experience with the area.
It does not in any way, however, imply any claim that I witnessed F1 tests. In fact, I stated that I've talked to folks who witnessed them.
The sentence structure and statement was clear to everyone - except you.
It would actually be fun to let you really take this and go off on a tangent like a full presentation, Fran. This was fascinating! I've heard so much about them but not to this level of detail, thanks for sharing!!!
It is one of the most fantastic sights to be seen on CZcams; the exciting countdown, slow motion ignition and lift off of the huge Apollo 11 Saturn V moon rocket at the launch pad on July 16, 1969! Its hard to see enough of it! I recently met a retired pilot and engineer who worked on the Apollo project with Werner Von Braun & his team. I just had to shake his hand.
In 1969 I was 6 years old and I was completely immersed in the Apollo mission. This is so interesting and easy to understand. One of the biggest reasons we can not reproduce the F1 engine is because most of... if not all of the small engineering tweaks were handwritten in the margins on the plans... and they are now missing, scattered and incomplete.
Holy smokes if we could reproduce them today... with today’s tech and materials.
Thank you Fran for sharing your passion for this marvel of engineering. I never get enough of it!
Thank you Fran! I never knew the F1 was so complex. Truly amazing engineering! Great analysis and presentation!
Fran you continually surprise and delight. With your unique ability to convey complex information and keep it soooo interesting to the viewer!
You could give lectures on giving lectures. You are a genius! This sets the bar for an explanation of the F-1 engine. Thank you for taking the time to make it. Big fan here in the UK.
Really enjoyed this video. Back in elementary school our class had an Apollo astronaut visit. I forget his name or his mission number. At the end of his talk he asked us if we had questions. My hand shot up. I asked: What does it feel like during lift off? He replied that it really wasn't uncomfortable at all. The astronaut just snugs down into the cushioning layers of the couch. I had hoped for something more exciting but there you go. The Saturn 5 was a comfy ride!
I see why you're so obsessed. Thank you for a fascinating look at the Saturn IV.
I grew up in Simi Valley and it was a routine part of my childhood to hear them testing the engines. The roar would start abruptly, the windows would shake and you could see the plume rising from the hills to the southeast. My dad was an engineer with Rocketdyne when I was really young and was involved in the design of the gimbals for the F1.
My grandfather worked on these rockets back in the day. I was amazed at how a lot of the personal knowledge and skills in the development of these engines is lost as each one is slightly different and have their own unique quirks.
They were hand made , and all engines had their unique tweaks !
That was my understanding that each F1 was a custom job at least from a fabrication standpoint. That is why they are not reproducible today. Lots of finesse went into those engines. I spent my early career in aeronautical engineering and still am a big fan of this era of engineering.
@@drlong08yes. Today's engines are much more efficient now. Today's RS-25, for example.
The biggest immediate difference (and perhaps the most important) is the turbopump itself; the RS-25 redirects *all* its hydrogen (alongside around 1% of its oxygen) through a "preburner" to power it, with the expanded exhaust instead directed into the main combustion chamber. (a staged-combustion, or "closed" cycle, as all hydrogen flows through two different combustion chambers in sequence)
The result is that the RS-25 achieves vastly higher chamber pressure than any Apollo-era engine could dream of; while the J-2 could reach about 53 bar (760 psi) the RS-25D reached 206 bar, (2994 psi) almost quadruple that of the J-2, (and even nearly triple that of the F-1) which gave it vastly better performance.
Thanks Fran. Awesome video. Well explained. Had no idea. Never forget watching these amazing machines lift off live.
Great job young lady! The Saturn V lost over 1,000 lb do to ice falling off from liquid oxygen. Those are the white chunks you see falling. Something that would have been catastrophic for the space shuttle. I was told the rocket had over 160 million horsepower! Truly this was an engineering Marvel. Thank you so much for sharing the video. Greatly appreciated! Verner Von Braun
I bet the SaturnV shook that ice off like a dog shaking off water in his fur.
Those engines have made a life-long impression on me. Along with the famous slow-motion shots of fire and ice, and the letters U S A .
Absolutely fascinating! Thanks for digging up all the tooling information, and everything else!
Wonderful explanation of the cool details of this amazing piece of engineering! ...And nice guitar work on the closing tune! :)
Excellent Fran, very interesting. Incredible engineering. Watching the mighty Saturn V still gives me goosebumps.
That was cool, so much to it, boggles the mind, and thanks for narrating.
I agree. This is very good. Imagine burning 2.5 tons every second. And there were 5 of these on the ship. It's burning 12.5 tons of fuel every *second* . That's insane.
@Decaying Grandeur YIKES. Even *WAY* more than I thought. Mankind really needs to come up with something other than combustion propellants.
I think you mean "bottles the mind"..You know, like, when things are so crazy your thoughts get trapped in there..like all bottled up..lol 😆..I can't remember what movie that is from, but it was a Will Ferrell movie, lol
@USA source? Because everything online points to about 14 tons/second.
Amazing stuff. Thanks for making this. Explained many questions I had.. particularly the dark exhaust plume.
Thank you! This made me more impressed with the skill, knowledge and ability of the engineers and the monster they built.
great video of a very, very impressive engine. When i was still working as an engineer, i got sent to Huntsville, AL for training and while there i just had to go see the space museum there. I worked for 39 years in the aviation business and the Apollo program was very important to me and actually helped me to solidify a career in engineering. I still believe that the space program and subsequent moon landings is the single greatest engineering accomplishment of all time. I can only wish we had a president who believes in science and we can continue our space endeavors.
I am at a age that I remember being amazed when those Saturn's lit up and hurled itself toward and into space with such accuracy. Now I know a little more of how the engineers designed it. Thanks.
My grandfather was the lead engineer who helped invent the propulsion system for the Saturn F-1 Engine, the Saturn 5, and the Apollo rocket engine.
Incredible! I loved your presentation. I was able to follow most of it, and appreciate what they accomplished, just with the engines, so much more.
It's truly hard to wrap your head around the complexity of it all but you did a wonderful job. Thank You
That was amazing. Can really feel her passion about these engines.
I loved this video! You explained it so well. (I didn't know anything about the engine of the Saturn or any other rocket for that matter!). The slo-mo footage was fun to see and it really accentuated the force. If you ever want to do an in-depth video, I'm there!
Thank you Fran for such a fantastic insight into the wonderful feat of engineering that is the Saturn V. Loads of invaluable information passed on by you but not in a pretentious way. Wonderful video that I shall probably have to watch again to take in all of the information that it contains.
What is truly amazing is the fact that not a single fatality or stage loss occurred in actual flight. Considering what had to be created totally from scratch, just using sliderules and the human mind, the accomplishment is mankind's greatest feat.
I'm an Apollo super fan and I learned a lot of new stuff from this video - the best I've seen so far. Super Cool. Thank you.
Mind boggling Fran. So much I didn't know. 25 mins passed in a flash, thanks for getting this together. The Saturn launch really was the ultimate case of an explosion being turned into a controlled burn, wasn't it ? The footage at the end looks like a disaster zone :o)
Isn't it? That slo-mo footage of the launch platform getting scorched by the Saturn V exhaust is my favorite. Just a hellscape....
Fran Blanche
Absolutely incredible ‘journey’. Thanks for the ‘tour’. 😊
I done a lot of research on the F1 and Rocketdyne but you just blow my mind, thanks Fran and great job
Outstanding detail Fran! Would of loved to have you as my engineering professor....Thank you so much for this gem of a post...
The genius of the design and Fran's cogent, concise and understandable explanation how it all worked!
This is one of the most fascinating things I've ever watched.
This is a stunning video by you and is one of the very finest of technical explanation videos. The amount of work that went in to understanding the material and the perfection of its distillation into your teaching here leaves me without words.
Fascinating. This achievement can never be allowed to fade away.
You mean Franscinating
As long as there are humans around to appreciate it, these achievements will never be forgotten.
A few years ago, Stennis mounted and fired up one of the original F-1’s. I have a camp twenty plus miles away, so we hear the distant thunder. The full blown Artemis tests with multiple 25’s was awesome to hear.
OMG... I stumbled across this and was mesmerized. ended up watching the entire thing. great video on the mighty F-1!!
Hands down the most competent explanation of the mighty F-1 on CZcams....hands down,...and second place isn't even in the same area code !! No gimmicks....just knowledge. Thanks, Fran !!
It's really hard to describe watching one take off because it's not just visual. It's so loud your body feels like it's being assaulted.
My father told me we were watching a rocket launch. Cool. Sounds like fun...
When the countdown reached lift off, I thought something was horribly wrong.
It looked like it exploded.
It vomited such a massive amount of fire that it just looked like something really bad happened.
Then the sound hits you.. hard.
I remember a constant roaring that was so loud the ground shock.
You felt it deep inside your body.
Not hurting but powerful.
I never felt anything touch me inside my body before. It didn't feel right.
Like something was overpowering me and squeezing my heart.
The only way I can describe it was like a constant, never ending thunder exploding over your head.
It was a relief for it to diminish and finally end which seemed to take forever.
This was in broad daylight with a clear sky, which made it even worse.
I was really young so it made an impression.
We were really far away and it was still that loud.
I don't know if anything living could survive being even half the distance we were at.
It was like seeing Godzilla in real life.
Sounds like it'd be really cool but in real life, it would completely suck to be close enough to see Godzilla.
It was probably because I was so very young but I was really glad when it was over.
I witnessed the static test firing of just *one* F1 at Edwards AFB AFRPL. Hard to imagine 5 at once. At 3.5 mi it was earth shaking.
Have you ever been near a top fuel dragster when it launches?
When I was about 5 we went to a drag strip and they fired up a top fuel dragster in the display section just to scare people - and it did. Me at 5 it was as you describe above. We were maybe 8 feet from it at the time, it felt like my entire body was been thrown back and forth violently.
I was so terrified that was the whole day over, they had to go home.
@@Anon54387 Exactly what I was thinking!
Imagine what it was like inside the rocket.
You’re right Fran those engines are fascinating i too have a obsession with the F1’s and the Apollo rocket. Thanks for posting very well done.
Overwhelmingly Amazing!!! Thank you for this presentation!
Congratulations on this video. Lots of amazing engineering feats, perfectly explained. I learned a lot, and will follow your channel with great interest. Thank you again. Diego.
The five engines also had a staggered startup. You can hardly see it with the naked eye, but two engines, then about 250 ms later two more and finally the fifth (at least as I remember). It's also pretty amazing that although they only run for 3-4 seconds before liftoff, that's still something like 40-50 tonnes of propellants burned. Just to let the engines 'spin up' and the primitive computer verify all are running. Boggles the mind just how much propellant these things burned.
This is one of the most detailed videos I've seen on the F1 engines so far, well done!
She'd love a ride on it
I always wondered about the dark color of the flame for the first few feet, and this explains it, thank you!
Fascinating information that I had never heard before. Thanks for sharing and educating us about this marvel of engineering. I wish we were still able to make these amazing machines.