F-1 Engine at the Marshall Center

Travis Davis, a cooperative education student at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., helped disassemble a Saturn V F-1 engine in the center's Propulsion Research Development Laboratory. A group of young engineers refurbished the F-1 engine’s gas generator and are hot-firing it in Marshall Center Test Stand 116. Modern instrumentation is recording test data not originally recorded in the 1960s. Digital data is more suitable for use in computer models than data collected during the Apollo-era. These NASA F-1 gas generator tests and other industry research designed to mitigate risks will enable NASA to build not only the most powerful rocket ever launched but also the most affordable.

Image credit: NASA/MSFC