On 10/01/2011 09:13 PM, Robert Heller wrote:
At Sat, 1 Oct 2011 08:17:56 EDT wrote:
I would love to hear opinions about Elon Musk's announcement a
fully reusable, two-stage launcher. In this SpaceX animated video --
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p176UpWQOs4 -- the launcher reminds me
of the Falcon 9; it looks like the first stage has nine engines.
I would think SpaceX would need a much more capable launcher, perhaps
something more like the Falcon X or Falcon XX (sans its NERVA-based
NTR, for political reasons) to get a decent payload and have enough
fuel for a tail-first, soft landing.
Would a LOX-kerosene first stage provide enough capability for such a
launcher, or would SpaceX have to switch to a LOX-LH2 first stage?
You do know that the Saturn 5 first stage was LOX-kerosene, and it was
able to send the Applo missions to the moon...
The S-IC didn't attempt to fly back to the launch site, either.