In article , says...

On 2020-05-31 10:05 PM, Scott Kozel wrote:
On Sunday, May 31, 2020 at 12:32:42 PM UTC-4, Jeff Findley wrote:
In article ,
says...

On Saturday, May 30, 2020 at 9:24:25 PM UTC-4, Alain Fournier wrote:
Nice launch.

This rocket is a lot bigger than it looks, it is taller than the Saturn 1B and has
greater payload to low Earth orbit.

Yep. Falcon 9/Merlin first stage is quite a bit more advanced than the
Saturn 1B first stage (cluster's last stand) which was made from
existing tanks clustered together and was therefore less mass efficient
than a "clean sheet" would have been.

The upper stages are just different (kerosene on Falcon upper stage
versus LH2 on the Saturn), so hard to tell which one is "better".

Saturn 1B is clearly old technology, I just thought it was an interesting
comparison, that now we have a modern working rocket that exceeds its payload capacity.

Saturn 1B was huge and it dwarfed the Titan 3C, which was a large rocket in its
own right.


...The times they are a'changin....

Of note: I think it was Doug H. that mentioned in yesterday's presser
that F9 2nd stage was a rougher ride than shuttle when on SSME's only.
It might be that combustion flow through the MVac Merlin 1D leads to
more vibration of the engine, but it could also have been due to the
lower overall mass of the vehicle as well. Too bad all the surviving
Apollo astronauts are now too old to fly. I'd love to have had a
comparison. I'd bet $ that F9 is helluva lot smoother ride than a Saturn
5 or a Saturn 1B. Can we talk Walt Cunningham into a free ticket to ISS?
Heck 88 is the new 58 right? I'd get the feeling he'd say, "What? Are we
even moving?" :-)

Dave

PS: Good job SpaceX, looked like a nice ride from what I could see.

I'd guess the Saturn IB and Saturn V would be a smoother ride (same
upper stage really), simply because LOX/LH2 likely makes complete mixing
easier resulting in more complete combustion. But, it certainly would
be more apples to apples than the shuttle due to the in-line stage
design and the single engine. The shuttle had that giant, heavy, ET
structure hanging off the side that likely dampened some of the
vibrations (it certainly did when the SRBs were firing!).

An in-line design is more likely to transmit vibrations straight from
the engine to the capsule with the propellant acting to dampen a bit of
that out. Remember the horrible time NASA had trying to dampen the
vibrations of Ares I? That's about as bad as it gets. Giant SRB in-
line with a smallish upper stage.

Jeff
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