M
mlorrey
Guest
<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>"The Falcon1 actually has the highest mass fraction of all the launchers out there, about .9, as I recall, which is well within SSTO range for the Isp they are operating at. I believe,...... . "<br /><br />The first stage needs to reach orbit in order to claim SSTO. Stying in orbit after reaching it is even tougher, however. <br /><br /><br />"Making SSTOs is easy, making them reusable is not. "<br /><br />True enough. But making SSTO is plenty tough enough. <p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br /><br />That Elon decides to never try launching the 1st stage alone does not mean it isn't SSTO capable. The numbers do not lie, as, in a rare agreement with Jeff Bell, the 'cold equations' of spaceflight don't let you pull a rabbit out of the hat, or to hide one there in the first place. The numbers say that for x average Isp there is a mass fraction for which a vehicle is SSTO capable, no matter whether its launchers find doing so to be economically useful or not.