3 ms·
> If you build too big, your launch rate isn’t high enough to get the full advantage of reuse. But if you throw away second stages, your rate of reuse goes waa
by CarVac 6y ago
> If you build too big, your launch rate isn’t high enough to get the full advantage of reuse.
But if you throw away second stages, your rate of reuse goes waaay down.
I don't think an 8-ton lift vehicle is going to achieve second stage reuse.
- Robotbeat 6y agoOn the contrary, there are MORE viable methods for reuse with a smaller vehicle. They can do mid-air recovery with such an upper stage, for instance, but no hope of that with a Starship-sized upper stage.
- CarVac 6y agoMore ways to land, but the performance penalty of heat shielding will be crippling on a smaller stage.
- Robotbeat 6y agoI doubt that. SpaceX was going to make Falcon 9 fully reusable, and it wouldn’t have been crippling. Might be too small to launch a full crewed Dragon or 60 Starlinks, but I doubt if its payload would’ve even been halved compared to partial reuse.