h down.
Proposed by Star-Raker Associates, Star-Raker is a single stage to orbit horizontal take off and landing ( SSTO HTOL) vehicle intended to launch payloads of upto 50,000 lbs and 200,000 lbs in its standard and largest configurations, with an esitmated cost of $100/lb of payload to LEO.
Low altitude engines comprise of ten supersonic multi-cycle airbreather ramjets, based on current existing technology, that lift the vehicle to 100,000ft at a speed of Mach 6 from take off at a conventional commercial airport, at which point rocket propulsion takes over. The aeroshell is a tri-delta form with Whitcomb airfoil lifting sections that provide a high volume for LOX/LH storage, the conical fuel tanks imparting increased strength and resiliance to the wing sections in normal flight and volumetric properties of comparable efficiency to normal rocket fueltanks when ballistic.
A smaller potential X-Prize contender with a payload of 10,000lbs also exists.
Kitten is a suborbital resuable vehicle taking three people, 1 pilot and two passengers, proposed by the Cerulean Freight Forwarding Company. Designed to attain an altitude of around 235km, the expected flight time is 45 minutes, of which 6 are in zero G. The craft is powered by novel ceramic composite engines with a fuel mixture of either Propane/Lox or Methane Lox.
As well as being a potential X Prize contender, an expendable second stage named 'mitten' is also planned, to enable Kitten to launch microsatellites to LEO. CFFC intend to market Kitten as a kit for assembly as well as sold as a completed vehicle.
Two larger versions of the vehicle are also proposed for the future: Calico, a short stay LEO vehicle capable of carrying 9 people or 2 tonnes of payload, and Angora, a much large vehicle capable of sustaining 40 people in LEO for up to two weeks, aimed at the space tourism market. Both these larger vehicles are designed to use a metallic wire mesh parafoil to assist in reentry.
|SPACE CRUISER SYSTEM ®||
SCS is a fully recoverable fully reusable piloted passenger carrying sub-orbital 2-stage spaceplane being offered by Vela Technology Development and the basis of the ticket deposit scheme being offered by Zegrahm Space Voyages, intended to operate from and return to a commercial airport with a flight time of the order of 2½-3 hours. The booster stage, Sky Lifter, carries the second stage Space Cruiser underneath it on a pylon on twin turbojet engines. After separation, the second stage uses Nitrous Oxide/Propane pressure fed rocket engines to reach space.
Zegrahm ultimately expects to be able to fly two flights a week whilst the vehicles are being designed to be capable of upto two flights a day.
Space Cruiser ® and Sky Lifter ® are registered trademarks of Vela Technology Development, Inc.
As an example of how airbreathing engines could be used, the Pogo is intended as the first stage of a TSTO or MSTO launch system. Shown here using existing jet engines from the F-15 it is expected to reach at least Mach 2.5 and 80,000 ft before releasing a Pegasus-sized vehicle. Jet engines being developed for a proposed hypersonic commercial transport ("Hypersonic Transport Propulsion," Aerospace Engineering, June 1996, pp 7-11.) could take a much larger Pogo to Mach 5 and 100,000 ft. For many payload sizes, low-cost jet engines can do the job of rockets in the region where rockets are most expensive and inefficient.
SKYLON is the successor to HOTOL being developed by Reaction Engines Ltd. It is an unpiloted fully reusable aircraft-like vehicle capable of transporting 12 tonnes of cargo into space and is intended as a replacement for expensive expendable launchers in the commerical market.
An unusual and innovative strategy, SpaceCub is a sub-orbital four-seater rocket vehicle aimed at the future hobbyist market as an all-inclusive kit for an expected price of somewhere between a quarter and half $million, though you'll have to supply the fuel yourself. A possible X-Prize contender.
The Space Van is designed to carry 16 passengers plus a flight crew of 3 to LEO. A reusable booster 