Category Archives: RLV:s

SpaceX Interplanetary Transport System Architecture Unveiled

Posted on Wed, 2016-09-28 by gravityloss

They didn’t seem to optimize so feverishly for low trans Mars injection mass. Kudos for orbit refueling and planning for refueling on Mars, Asteroids, Europa, Callisto or what you have! I’m sure the architecture will still change drastically, it looks … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, RLV:s, SpaceX | Leave a comment

SpaceX Did It – What It Should Do Next

Posted on Wed, 2015-12-23 by gravityloss

Congratulations to SpaceX who landed the first stage intact. Assuming cost is roughly related to stage mass and engine count, reusing the first stage saves 9/10 of the whole rocket cost. If they can run the stage ten times, that … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Depot, Design, engines, industry, Launchers, Lunar, RLV:s, Spacecraft, SpaceX, Transportation | Leave a comment

“Space Is Hard” Is The Wrong Answer

Posted on Mon, 2014-11-03 by gravityloss

They say “Space is hard” Orbital Sciences crashed a rocket equipped with two 40 year old engines. Physically that old. They were an interim solution and they were working towards new engines. We don’t know at this point if the … Continue reading →

Posted in Design, engines, Homebuilt, industry, Journalism, RLV:s, Suborbital | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Building rockets like disposable gloves

Posted on Wed, 2014-07-09 by gravityloss

There’s two fundamental approaches to lower space launch cost: K-strategy: Building sophisticated reusable rockets that can fly quickly again after landing. r-strategy: Instead building simple expendable rockets by the mass as cheaply as possible. Firefly, looks to do just the … Continue reading →

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Semi-homebuilt ramjet blog thing

Posted on Mon, 2011-04-04 by gravityloss

At http://www.appliedthermalsciences.com/blog/ATSVB0026.html

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21st Century Jet – Making The Boeing 777

Posted on Wed, 2011-03-09 by gravityloss

The movie’s available on Google Video, embedded above. Enjoy!

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Hero Designers and Testing

Posted on Sat, 2011-01-29 by gravityloss

This shows the “golden age” during and just after the war. Even large things with a lot of design input could not be designed to be close to optimal right from the start. The B-36 experienced failures in structural testing … Continue reading →

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Various re-entry vehicle shapes in a low speed wind tunnel

Posted on Sun, 2010-11-07 by gravityloss

Or another excuse for testing video embedding again… It seems tumbling is quite common, which is not a nice thig.

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Even more on Skylon

Posted on Sat, 2010-10-30 by gravityloss

They stop airbreathing at 2 km/s. Let’s compare this to staging. Assuming an upper stage of the weight of Skylon at that point (230 t), what kind of a rocket would be required for that? With a hunch of 3000 … Continue reading →

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Why precool but not liquify – Skylon and SABRE

Posted on Fri, 2010-10-29 by gravityloss

Well, I thought maybe I could add some content. Everybody’s heard about the British Hotol follower Skylon and its airbreathing SABRE engines. What’s special about them? My understandin’s based on this excellent document from Reaction Engines explaining why the system … Continue reading →

Posted in airplane, Architecture, Design, Energy, engines, ESA, industry, Launchers, RLV:s, Suborbital, Transportation, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments