/sci/ - Science & Math

>>15690775
If SpaceX didn't exist they might actually put serious efforts into reviving the Rocketdyne F1 and doing a modern Saturn
>we lost the contractors and the blueprints
nope, it's all there

>>15556442
>>15556403

But yeah let me expand on that. You'd be surprised by how rare this type of expertise and knowledge really is. "Why can't we build the Saturn V (or an even more powerful vehicle) again?"
Saturn V was built by dozens of different companies operating under three general contractors. NASA has the "plans", but not the details. Just one example: late in development, Rocketdyne was struggling to address a combustion instability caused its F1 rocket engines to explode. The sort of computer modeling we have now didn’t exist, so the engineers guessed that something about the uniform pattern of holes inside the injector cone must be allowing for harmonic action inside the engine. Their solution was intuitive and simple: have a human being DRILL A BUNCH OF HOLES in odd places. So that’s what they did. By hand. And it worked, but we don’t know why or whether they were solving the right problem or just got lucky. In a machine of this complexity and at those times, a lot of things were just like that - decisions made on the spur of the moment by instinct, often with no formal analysis of the plan.
TLDR: we didn’t lose the plans for the Saturn V; they never existed outside of the minds of those who build her.
Take it a step further - those who built her literally just INTUITED the damn thing. IQ.

>>15502052
Be the change you want to see in the world <|^:)

How did we go from von Braun (ubermensch) to this current NASA (SLS + UAPs)?

Daily reminder that the Apollo program was a technological miracle, a feat that should have been "impossible" by 20th century standards.

Ok, who came up with the idea for Starship? SpaceX doesn't have the talent to come up with such a revolutionary idea. Last time it took an utter genius to make a rocket this good.

>>15409035
>not my finest work