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The S-IVB was built by the Douglas Aircraft Company and served as the third stage on the Saturn V and second stage on the Saturn IB. It had one J-2 engine. For lunar mission it was used twice: first for the orbit insertion after second stage cutoff, and then for the trans lunar injection (TLI) when the timing was right.

1 History

The S-IVB evolved from the upper stage of the Saturn I rocket, the S-IV, and was the first stage of the Saturn V to be designed. The S-IV used a cluster of six engines but used the same fuels as the S-IVB - LH2 and LOX. It was also orginally meant to be the fourth stage of a planned rocket called the C-4, hence the name S-IV.

Eleven companies submitted proposals for being the lead contractor on the stage by the deadline of 29 February, 1960. NASA administrator T. Keith Glennan decided on 19 April that Douglas Aircraft Company would be awarded the contract. Convair had come a close second but Glennan did not want to monopolise the liquid hydrogen fuelled rocket market as Convair was already building the Centaur rocket stage

In the end the Marshall Space Flight CenterThe George C. Marshall Space Flight Center is a lead NASA center for propulsion and for computers, networks, and information management. It is abbreviated as MSFC. Located on the Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, in Madison County, Alabama, the center was named decided to use the C-5 rocket (later called the Saturn V), which had three stages and would be topped with an uprated S-IV called the S-IVB which instead of using a cluster of engines would have a single J-2 engine. Douglas was awarded the contract for the S-IVB basically because of the similarities between it and the S-IV. At the same time it was decided to create the C-IB rocket (Saturn IB) that would also use the S-IVB as its second stage and could be used for testing the Apollo spacecraft in Earth orbit.

Douglas built two distinct versions of the S-IVB, the 200 series and the 500 series. The 200 series was used by the Saturn IB and differed from the 500 in the fact that it did not have a flared interstage and had less helium pressurisation onboard as it would not be restarted.

The S-IVB carried 72,700 liters (20,000 gallons) of LOX and 229,000 liters (63,000 gallons) of LH2LH2 is an acronym used in the aerospace industry, which stands for Liquid Hydrogen''. Hydrogen is found naturally in the H form, thus the name. LH2 is a common liquid fuel for rocket applications. Liquid hydrogen has a very low density of 70. 8 kg/m³ (at.

An un-used S-IVB provided the hull for SkylabAlternative meaning: research facility in the South Pole Station America's first space station, the 75 ton Skylab was in Earth orbit from 1973-1979, and visited by crew three times in 1973 and 1974. It was launched May 14, 1973 on an unmanned mission by a, the United State'sThe United States of America also referred to as the United States U. America ¹ or the States is a federal republic in central North America, stretching from the Atlantic in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west. It shares land borders with Canada in first space stationSpace stations A space station is a man-made structure that is designed for human beings to live on in outer space. A space station is distinguished from other manned spacecraft by its lack of major propulsion or landing facilities instead, other vehicles.

During Apollo 13This article is about the Moon mission. There is also a ''movie by the name of Apollo 13''. Apollo 13 was an American space mission, part of the Apollo program. It was intended to be the third mission to land on the Moon, but instead is famous for the cri, Apollo 14Apollo 14 was the eighth manned mission in the Apollo program and the third mission to land on the moon. Crew Alan Shepard (2), commander Stuart Roosa (1), command module pilot Edgar Mitchell (1), lunar module pilot Mission Parameters Mass CSM 29,240 kg;, Apollo 15, Apollo 16 and Apollo 17, the S-IVB was crashed into the Moon in order to perform seismic measurement used for characterizing the lunar core.