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Tucked away in a corner outside the main entrance to Building 4205 were three signs with no accompanying engines. This one reads
The fact that the J-2 was "the first liquid-hydrogen-fueled American rocket engine" might come as a surprise to quite a few rocket scientists (not to mention us Space Race nuts). The first production hydrogen engine was the RL-10, which powered both the Centaur upper stage and the S-IV (second) stage of the Saturn I. And I'm not quite sure to make of the "No. of Flights: 87". If it meant "Total No. of Engines Flown", the number would be 86 (which is at least close to 87): As the engine on the S-IVB (second) stage of the Saturn IB, a single J-2 flew on each of the unmanned AS-201 through AS-204 missions (4) and on Apollo 7 (5). Five J-2s flew as second stage engines on each of the 13 Saturn Vs launched (70) and a single J-2 flew as a third stage engine on the first 12 Saturn Vs (82; the final Saturn V launched Skylab, so there was no third stage engine). After the last of the Saturn Vs, a single J-2 flew as second stage engines on each of the three Saturn IB missions to service Skylab (85), and one final J-2 powered the second stage of the Saturn IB used for the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP) (86). Perhaps the missing engine was the one which was secretly developed and launched before the RL-10? :-) | ||||||||||||||||
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