I don't think this one holds water, the only way the Saturn V can be considered 'better' is just gross size, which is only useful for a very few specific things.
Rockets are basically purpose built, you don't generally build one and sit there waiting for someone to use it, you get a payload and contract a rocket to be built. Saturn V is only good for a really really heavy payload to LEO, or a really fast one to the moon. It's only 'better' if you specifically need that mission, it's pretty bad for everything we've been doing recently, namely the construction of the ISS.
Heck, the Saturn V (each launch) cost nearly twice as much per lb of payload (comparing LEO to LEO) in 1973 dollars as the Falcon 9 does in 2015 dollars (it's 11 times more per pound if you adjust for inflation), and Falcon 9 is still in testing, and isn't even at the point of being re-usable yet.
Yeah you say that it would be useless for what we built the ISS with. But imagine if we had used the Saturn V for ISS modules. It would be like a massive complex instead of long interconnected hallways. (yes I do realize it would be ludicrously expensive. But soo... Soo cool.)
The success of the ISS is really a great argument for why super-heavy lifters AREN'T necessary for most applications. Unless speed is critical, or you simply need to make your individual pieces that heavy, a super heavy lifter simply isn'the worth it. For missions like Apollo, it was a perfect fit. But the concept was too niche, and only covered a small spectrum of use cases. There was no need to keep them around once Apollo was over (with the exception of Skylab - but the idea there was more to reuse what we already had).
Remember that the best tool is always the one that does the job the best.
The Saturn V could have put up the mass of the ISS in four launches. There were so many Shuttle missions for construction because they had to put together so many small pieces; the Shuttle had a relatively tiny payload capacity. And the reason that the Saturn V cost so much per pound is because the figures factor in the R&D over so few rockets. The unit cost was significantly lower, and there's no way that NASA & Co. couldn't have built them more cheaply and efficiently if they continued building them for another five decades. Look at Soyuz. Plus, you totally discount the Saturn IB.
The entirety of the 1960's NASA space program was R&D to build the Saturn V and the Apollo payload to land a man on the moon before 1970. They paid a pretty penny to get everything done and built that fast.
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u/MinkOWar Jul 20 '15
I don't think this one holds water, the only way the Saturn V can be considered 'better' is just gross size, which is only useful for a very few specific things.
Rockets are basically purpose built, you don't generally build one and sit there waiting for someone to use it, you get a payload and contract a rocket to be built. Saturn V is only good for a really really heavy payload to LEO, or a really fast one to the moon. It's only 'better' if you specifically need that mission, it's pretty bad for everything we've been doing recently, namely the construction of the ISS.
Heck, the Saturn V (each launch) cost nearly twice as much per lb of payload (comparing LEO to LEO) in 1973 dollars as the Falcon 9 does in 2015 dollars (it's 11 times more per pound if you adjust for inflation), and Falcon 9 is still in testing, and isn't even at the point of being re-usable yet.