Build Your Own Saturn V

Illbay writes "Space.com has a great story about a company in Colorado that has introduced an incredibly detailed scale model of the Saturn V rocket booster that flies a lot like the real thing! Apogee Components has "taken the time to research the actual vehicles and then used that information correctly in creating the kits," with a scientist from the team that designed the Delta 2 rocket on staff. I remember the old Estes model rocket version of the Saturn V back in the 60s, but they were not very detailed and very difficult to get to fly properly. Looks like Apogee might have a winner."

Comments

Very interesting

[edmz]

I'm not much of a fan of rockets nor space flying history, but this quote from the saturn 5 page got me quite interested:

The sound waves could easily pulverize a human's skeleton if he was unlucky enough to be within a mile of the launch pad. Even at further distances, the sound waves felt like someone was thumping on your chest with their fists.

Re:Very interesting

[EvanED]

Yep. As with the Shuttle launches, the noise is actually what makes the safe distance 3 miles, not anything having to do with the rocket exhaust.

Re:Very interesting

[mraymer]

In fact, according to History Channel's show Modern Marvels, the only man-made sound louder than a Saturn V at liftoff is the detonation an atomic bomb.

Re:Very interesting

[twiddlingbits]

There are at least two errors in your post. 1) Safe distance has nothing to do with Sound at all, it's the maximum range of the debris pattern at ground level if it blew up on the pad. 2) The Saturn V launch was close to 200db, while thats VERY VERY loud, its not going to kill you. It's not as loud as say a 155mm howitzer, but its louder than most jets. Think standing at the end of the runway and see a jumbo jet taking off and then add a bit. 200db WILL make you stone deaf but it won't kill you. NASA also had the exhaust of the Saturn V channeled down under the Pad and massive water Jets also sprayed the pad to keep it cool and it also reduced the sound levels. I have observed (and heard) a SSME on a Test Stand from about 300 yards away and that was insanely loud but there was not any noise dampening and I can still hear fine . But the SSMEs are not nearly the thrust of a Saturn V (393,800 pounds per each SSME vs 1.5 Million for a F-1 (of which there are 5 on a Saturn V)). Calculating acoustics effects is complicated; the level at a given distance depends on many details, such as source power and size, frequency, wavefront form, and humidity (higher humidity dampens sound faster..at the Cape it is VERY humid). Three miles sounds like an exaggeration, and without any reference data it cannot be verified.

Re:Very interesting

[imsabbel]

200db is a energy density of about 100 MW/m^2.

This will kill you in a few milliseconds.
140db->deaf after a hour or so
160db->deaf at once
180db->danger of internal injurie, blood vessel ruptures, ect
200db-> RIP
This ofcource is only true if this noise level is reached where you are. If the 200db are 1meter below the thrusters, and you are 250m away, you may only get 150or so and still be alive and kicking.

Slashdotting's effect on sales?

[subk]

I wonder how many of us geeks will click add-to-cart tonight?

Reasons why I'm not impressed:

[cmowire]

1) Solid rocket engines. They have made Peroxide+Gasoline rocket engines in small scale. Use one of them. At the very least a pressure fed John Carmack special style engine.
2) One stage. The Saturn V has 3 stages. This one, and all of the injection-molded toys before it, were only 1 stage. Where's the fun in that?
3) Injection molding. Where's the work in that?

Good ol' rocket days

[mharris007]

I remember the good ol' days of rocket launching, always a blast; Estes was awesome back in the day. Have any of you seen the movie October Sky, that was an excellent film. Anyways, they had all kinds of scale rockets, and planes, nowhere near this detail though, but fun none the less.

Estes rocket not detailed ?

[LouSir]

I remember getting the Estes Saturn V kit around 1971. Not detailed ? How about cutting long balsa rods exactly to spec then gluing them together to form that steel lattice work at the top of the rocket. That's detail. I never managed to complete it cause it had about 841,231 pieces. It also took about $5 in engines which in 1971 was a lot of money for a kid. LouSir

Re:Scale

[drinkypoo]

The question is, how many atoms in size does your model have to have before you have something recognizable as a Saturn V, whose design can carry out all the basic functions of a Saturn V? We're talking about multiple stages of rocket here, with propellant, and so on. (The site is pretty slow so I'm not interested in all the details.) The model uses solid rocket engines, so your model can too within the purposes of this question.

The model might end up being less than 100 atoms across, though I doubt it. I'm guessing at least 500. Still quite small enough to make it a considerably different game than the larger rockets... But a question whose answer I am genuinely interested in. Anyone having tea with drexler tomorrow?

Still good in the rerun

[poptones]

This is a really old story. I don't recall if I read it here or on ars, but I first read about this thing a really, really long time ago (like maybe July, 2002?)

Anyway, it's worth the trip to follow the links to the website of the people who make this thing. There are some fantastic MPEG clips of flights of this model that (were, maybe not are) available for download.

Why is it so cool to watch a model fly? Check it out and see. The thing is so big nad heavy it "lifts off" just like a "real" rocket. None of this 3-2-1 disappear in a puff of smoke. You actually get several frames of liftoff before it really picks up speed... very cool.

Re:I NEED one of these

[sakusha]

Is it only 5 years old? IIRC, it has to be one of the original 1970s kits to be worth anything. If it's 5 years old, it's probably still in production and thus less valuable. But put it up on eBay and see what you get. Or better yet, finish it, but not with the multiple Estes D motors, which were almost impossible to light simultaneously, rip that crap out and put in a mount for a single G engine.
Anyway, the coolest rocket I ever built was also the last kit I ever built, a very simple design of a 2-stage rocket with a G motor and a second stage D motor. Construction was critical, it had laminated pine fins. The manufacturer said it would hit the sound barrier, and either smash to bits, or emit an audible sonic boom. But you had to stand in exactly the right spot to hear the faint boom, IIRC it was 180 feet from the launch pad. Yep, I heard the boom, it went up and up, and vanished forever. Must've gone at least 3000ft.

booster models

[igny]

I would be interested in a working 1:60 (~1/60^3 in weight) model of the most powerful launch vehicle in the world . Imagine:

Standing ~40 inches (1.0 meters) tall and weighing about 10 kilograms (quite chubby) at launch...

If the scale doesnt matter in laws of physics one can expect a useful payload to be ~ 100t/60^3 ~ 460grams ~ 1 pound to be launched to low orbits, and about 100 grams to the geostationary orbit, and about 150 grams to be sent on the lunar mission trajectory.

how about a 1x scale version

[ksheff]

NASA needs something to launch big heavy payloads into space. The shuttles are ok, but a unmanned vehicle would be extremely useful for shipping new sections to the ISS or a hubble replacement.

Re:Speaking of Estes...

[ducomputergeek]

Not like that. I have flown scale lear jet kits that had ducted fan engines that were gas powered. However, at $15 a gallon for the special fuel, it got expensive and I went back to prop jobs that used regular ole 2-cycle fuel (gas with oil mixture like you put into your chain saw).

This was like 10 years ago, the engines were a tad bit under powered and expensive. I think that plane took about 5 months and $6000 with engines and all to put together. It flew fine, but couldn't do any fancy manouvers.

Any serious R/C plane gear will cost you about $150 for a starter kit. Anything less than that is more of a toy than a hobby kit. I just got into R/C planes again and it cost me about $300 for a gas powered trainer with remote.

Re:Scale

[pVoid]

It's just a matter of scale as far as the rockets are concerned. The laws of physics don't change

The laws might not change, but the constants in the equations do. Specifically, air is much 'more viscous' for a model, after all, if the model is 1/70th the scale, then the atmospehere it's going in should be 1/70th of a bar.

Also the drag coefficient of everything doesn't scale properly. It's really a question of scalability, and I think the IT crowd of all people should understnad that.

Re:I saw [multiple] Saturn V launch[es] myself.

[NormalVisual]

Yeah, I grew up just south of PAFB, had both parents who worked out there, and watched 'em all (excepting Apollo 17 and Skylab, I was off in Hawaii playing tag with 10 meter waves)

Looks like we were neighbors - my dad was stationed at PAFB in the early/mid 70's, at the radar site at the corner of A1A and Pineda Causeway. I saw all of the post-Apollo 11 launches, all the Skylab launches, have seen probably about half of the Shuttle launches, and was unfortunately in Rockledge watching when the Challenger exploded.

I'd agree that the Shuttle launches are spectacular, but they simply don't compare to the Saturns. :-)