Whenever I drive past a junkyard, it’s always a struggle to keep my focus on driving and not crane my neck sideways to scrutinize every interesting bit of twisted metal rusting in the yard. Sometimes, though, that instinct can pay off in big, unexpected ways. Like how this guy happened to notice a rocket motor from a Saturn rocket just sitting in a Missouri scrapyard.
The person who noticed the rocket motor posted the picture on Reddit’s Rocketry forum, asking “What kind of engine is this?”
Though we’re primarily car geeks, we can all understand the powerful draw of such a picture and question, and the hardcore rocket geeks had a pretty definitive answer in no time: it appears to be an H-1 rocket engine, an engine that was built by Chrysler, builders of the Nitro, as part of the Saturn I and IB rockets that were part of the Apollo lunar program.
And, looking at that rocket motor, it sure as hell looks like it’s an H-1.
Sure, it’s in rough shape and some bits are missing, but this appears to be a genuine Saturn rocket engine, the same kind used to send Apollo spacecraft into Earth orbit for testing, and also the kind that was used to launch crews to Skylab, and send up the American half of the famous 1975 Apollo-Soyuz mission.
It’s a big deal.
So what the hell is it doing out in the middle of Missouri?
Some commenters on the thread found that the scrapyard itself appears to be for sale, just in case you’re considering getting into a new line of work.
As for how this engine ended up there, another commenter found that there was once a factory that used to make these not too far away in Neosho, Missouri, which gives a plausible reason how this engine could have settled in that particular scrapyard.
It’s still about two or so hours away, but it’s not like it would have had to have traveled from Florida or California, maybe.
Looking at the site on Google Street View is sort of unintentionally hilarious, as a big aluminum trailer happens to be blocking the view perfectly, showing only the faint reflection of the Google Street View car in the trailer:
Switching to the opposite view, though, gives you what you need, and clearly shows the rocket engine just sitting there:
We’ve reached out to A_Cup-O-Dirt, the original poster, to see if there’s any plans to find out more about the engine, see how much it is, get that baby going again, or whatever. So far, we have yet to hear back, but we’ll let you know if we do.
Until then, what would you do with this? Let’s say you had the money to buy it—though knowing exactly how much it’s worth is pretty tricky. Other Apollo engine hardware has been going for around $100,000, much less complete, so assuming this could get anywhere from $75,000 to, oh, $150,000 I think is a safe bet.
Assuming you could get it working again, this engine can produce up to 200,000 lpf of thrust—that would certainly give your old AMC Matador project car some kick, right?
Should the Smithsonian buy it for display? Should a rich dude make it into his personal sex-tepee? Should you have it for your Untitled 2019 Jetpack Project? I want to hear ideas, people!