Saturn V: First Stage

That's me providing 6'2" of scale down below the business end of NASA's massive Saturn V display.

This particular S-IC first stage, serial number S-IC-T, was used for static fire testing and was the first built by Boeing during the Apollo program. It now lives in NASA's Apollo / Saturn V Center at Kennedy Space Center and is accessible year round by tourists.

The five Rocketdyne F-1 motors at the base of the S-IC stage were capable of producing up to 7,648,000 pounds of thrust for 150-165 seconds, getting the massive Saturn V off to a rapid start for the first 61 kilometers of the ascent. The F-1 was (and still is, as of June 2009) the most powerful single-nozzle liquid fueled rocket motor ever used for active launches. The four outer F-1 engines could be hydraulically gimbaled, or adjusted, to orient the rocket while center engine was fixed.

The S-IC first stage was also utilized for the Saturn INT-21 launch vehicle that brought Skylab into orbit in 1973.


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