Klotz discusses on how SpaceX and others are incorporating reusability into today's expendable rockets or the blueprints for the next generation versions, to find out how far the trend could be taken. The Hawthorne, California-based company this year completed two commercial satellite launches with Falcon 9 first stages that previously landed on drone ships. Competitor United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin, has embraced the concept of reusability for its forthcoming Vulcan rockets by proposing to recover spent stages via helicopter. In Europe, ArianeGroup (formerly Airbus Safran Launchers) wants to someday fly back first stage engines for runway landings and reuse them. Technological and business hurdles lie ahead, if SpaceX and these competitors succeed such as whether the U.S. Air Force, which is responsible for delivering the country's military and spy satellites safely to orbit, can be convinced to trust the technology.
RECYCLING ROCKETS
Aerospace America ; 55 , 8
2017
Aufsatz (Zeitschrift)
Englisch
Online Contents | 2017
|Engineering Index Backfile | 1928
|SLUB | 2002
|Engineering Index Backfile | 1946
|Wiley | 1998
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