Re: Spaceship One in perspective

From: Neil Gerace (geracen_at_iinet.net.au)
Date: 06/30/04 

Date: Wed, 30 Jun 2004 23:51:11 +0800

"Jeff Findley" <jeff.findley@ugs.nojunk.com> wrote in message
news:oUAEc.9948$1F6.1891@fe37.usenetserver.com...

> As for the empty weight issue, with a solid, your fuel/oxidizer container
> and your combustion chamber are the *same* structure, so it's got to be
able
> to withstand the pressure and temperatures of the combustion chamber.
When
> you look at a shuttle SRB, pretty much the entire length of the SRB is
> (heavy) combustion chamber. These things are so sturdy (heavy), they are
> dropped into the ocean (with parachutes), fished out of the water, and
> re-used.
>
> On a liquid fueled booster, the tanks are just tanks, so they have to deal
> with considerably less pressure and can be made much lighter weight. On
the
> old Atlas ICBM (liquid fueled) the tanks were extremely lightweight. The
> tanks were so thin and light they called them balloon tanks. They had to
be
> pressurized to several PSI on the ground or else they would collapse. If
> you ever see an old Atlas ICBM on display, don't be surprised if it's
> attached to an air compressor. ;-)

If you want to compare apples with apples, you could start by making your
liquid-fuelled rocket reusable, and then see if it's still lighter than the
SRB.

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