CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Thirty-three years after a mighty Saturn 5 rocket launched the first Apollo astronauts to land on the Moon, the mammoth booster still is flying high -- albeit on a much smaller scale.

Standing more than 62 inches (1.6 meters) tall and weighing about three pounds (1.4 kilograms) at launch, the most detailed reproduction of a Saturn 5 readily available today is 1/70th the size and 1/2,166,666th the weight of the original.

"It's just a matter of scale as far as the rockets are concerned. The laws of physics don't change," said Tim Van Milligan, president of Apogee Components of Colorado Springs, Colo., the company responsible for producing a model rocket that has hobbyists and space enthusiasts alike buzzing with excitement.

	Images
	Apogee Components president Tim Van Milligan displays the company's new Saturn 5 (left) and Saturn 1B model rockets.
	A close-up view of Apogee Component's Saturn 5 model rocket details the five Rocketdyne F-1 engines that powered the lunar launcher's first stage.
	A Saturn 5 lifts off from Kennedy Space Center on Apollo 16 in this picture by Moose Lavigne taken from the public viewing causeway using a Pentax camera with a 300 mm lens and a 2x adapter.
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	Apogee Components

Other versions of the rocket exist, mostly as smaller plastic models or as toys. But this version is as faithful to the real thing as possible, designed to look as much like the Saturn 5 that launched Apollo 11 toward the Moon 33 years ago Tuesday as possible, Van Milligan said.

"Finally, someone has taken the time and given the attention to detail that these amazing vehicles deserve," said Wes Oleszewski, a 45-year-old self-described "child of the space program" who used to stay home from school while growing up in Michigan to watch the Saturn 5 launches on television.

"Using common sense, Apogee has created kits that can be flown or displayed or both. They have taken the time to research the actual vehicles and then used that information correctly in creating the kits," said Oleszewski, an author of nine books about Great Lakes shipwrecks who is now producing historical CDs on lifting body research and the Saturn family of rockets.

And what makes this particular Saturn 5 even more interesting is that it is the carefully crafted product of a real rocket scientist who once helped launch Delta 2 boosters.

"I was hired by McDonnell Douglas right out of college as a launch operations engineer. My job was to help see the rocket from the factory, help the engineers get it ready and keep track of things like the schedule and push paperwork," said Van Milligan, a 36-year-old graduate of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Fla. After a few years, Van Milligan gave up a reasonably secure job at Cape Canaveral to design flying models instead.

"By the time I left we had launched about 35 Delta 2's and I was looking for a new challenge," Van Milligan said.

Moving west to Colorado, Van Milligan joined Estes Industries -- the aerospace giant of model rocketry -- where he soon designed the wildly successful Skywinder, a rocket that launches normally but instead of popping out a parachute for the "return to Earth" it deploys three blades and "helicopters" to a soft landing.

His reputation for designing quality rocket kits established, he soon struck out on his own and wound up the owner of Apogee Components. Responsible for paying all the bills, Van Milligan decided it was time to expand the product line and do so in a bold fashion with a highly detailed kit. The choice of rocket was a no-brainer.

"We needed a rocket that was easily recognized, something that everybody knew and loved. And the Saturn 5 was at the top of the list," Van Milligan said. "Only one rocket put man on the Moon and that was the Saturn 5."

Thirteen of the boosters flew from 1967 to 1973, all successfully. Ten flew with astronauts onboard, while three flew unmanned -- Apollo's 4 and 6 were test flights while the final Saturn 5 to fly was a modified two-stage version that carried the Skylab orbital workshop into Earth orbit.

Five of the smaller, two-stage Saturn 1B rockets were used on Apollo 7, the three Skylab expeditions and the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. Many more Saturn 1 and 1Bs were flown on tests.

Enough components were built to fly three more Saturn 5's, but their flights were cancelled and the various stages all wound up in different places and assembled to present three full-sized historical exhibits in Florida, Texas and Alabama.

However, there's more to the Saturn 5 than "just" its place in the history books. After almost three decades since its last launch, the memory of the 363-foot-tall, three-stage monster booster still evokes a basic sense of wonder among those who were alive when they flew, said Brian Nicklas, a deputy reference chief at the archives of the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

"The Apollo-Saturn combination looks like a rocket should when you go deep down in our memories," Nicklas said. "We can't help but have thoughts based on inept science fiction movies and tawdry novellas, but we do. Saturn may not have had huge fins, but it is sleek and shiny white, and it produced lots and lots of flames."

That same sense of awe turned almost religious for those who witnessed Saturn 5's power and glory in person.

"There is nothing else like it short of perhaps witnessing a thermonuclear blast from minimal distance," said Marc "Moose" Lavigne, who saw five Saturn 5 rockets take flight. "Graceful yet powerful. Magnificent and functional. Mesmerizing and beautiful. Yet, those words don't do it justice. It was simply unforgettable."

Lavigne, 47, a Boeing engineer who is often heard during launch coverage as the voice of Delta 2 telemetry, also is well-known for his skill at building and flying model rockets. He counts himself among those who are thrilled with this year's release of the Apogee Saturn 5, as well as the smaller Saturn 1B.

"The new Saturn models look simply outstanding and are a scale model builders delight," said Lavigne, who worked with Van Milligan on the Delta program at the Cape. "Knowing the designers who assisted Tim in the scale reproduction work, I wasn't surprised to see the outcome. It has details not found in any other kit."

Those details add to the complexity of building the model, as well as the cost. The Saturn 5 is a pricey $225 and the smaller Saturn 1B is $175.

"These new kits are part of the new breed of scale model, one where the producing company is going to the Nth degree to obtain scale realism," said Nicklas, who is himself an accomplished modeler with several aircraft on display in museum exhibits.

"Models like this are priced somewhat beyond the means of most kids, but adults with a bit of spare cash are eager to recapture the fun modeling times they had in the past. When this can be done with a subject like the Saturn 5, which they hold in such high regard, so much the better," Nicklas said.

For science teachers, scout leaders or parents, the investment in a kit such as Apogee's Saturn 5 -- or in any model rocket -- can pay big educational dividends for kids, said Patrick McCarthy, a manager of program control with CSR, Inc., at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station and long-time space modeler.

"Model rockets fly using the same physics and mathematics as real rockets. Kids can get interested in the fun of rockets and in the process, just happen to learn math and science skills," McCarthy said. "I've yet to meet a student that flies model rockets who has trouble finding a science fair topic -- they're made for each other."

In terms of the Saturn 5, model builders can learn more than just science, he said.

"Aside from the history of the vehicle, they'll learn an appreciation for the complex nature of a moon rocket. The same kinds of engineering that Wernher von Braun and NASA put into the real Saturn 5 went into the design and construction of the model Saturn," McCarthy said. "And Apogee's Saturn is just plain spectacular-looking, on display or in flight. It's way above the usual three-fins-and-a-nose-cone."

For more information about the kits, or to order the Saturn 5 or Saturn 1B models, see the Apogee Components web site.