Henry, your opinion please. What's better, tandem or parallel staging,i.e.
Saturn 5 vs SpaceX Heavy? Not counting the Space Shuttle.
On its face it seems like they're less structural loads with parallel to a
tall tandem stacked vehicle. But the latter looks better maybe because it's
traditional.
Parallel stacking allows propellant transfers during assent.
Thank you,
Ken
On Thu, Nov 11, 2021 at 9:19 PM Henry Spencer <hspencer@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
On Thu, 11 Nov 2021, William Claybaugh wrote:
Henry:
Or...your SSTO uses cheap solid strap-on's for Polar and other such
orbits....
I'd prefer to make them liquids, and preferably reusable -- good solids
aren't as cheap as they look, and moderate-performance liquids don't have
to be expensive -- but yes, it's a defensible idea. Provided, that is,
that the strap-ons are *only* for unusual cases; otherwise you're really
building a TSTO, and you will get a better design if you're honest with
yourself about that.
Henry