Technical Report on different RLV return modes’ Performances

Abstract

Complex, high-performance, high-cost rocket stages and rocket engines are disposed today after a short operating time. Used components fall back to Earth, crashing on ground or into the Oceans. Returning these stages back to their launch site could be attractive - both from an economical as well as an ecological perspective. However, early reusability experience obtained by the Space Shuttle and Buran vehicles demonstrated the challenges of finding a viable operational and business case. Recently, the emerging private companies SpaceX and Blue Origin have successfully demonstrated the landing, recovery and reuse of a first booster stage. Blue Origin launched their suborbital launcher New Shephard, which shall transport paying customers to the edge of space, several times with a reused first booster stage (see Figure 2-1). SpaceX has successfully landed around 40 stages and has flown 19 missions with reused stages of the Falcon 9 launch vehicle as of November 2019. Their successes have proved the possibility to develop, produce and operate low-cost reusable launch vehicles. Hence, the interest in reusable launch vehicles has experienced a recent boost. However, different methods of reusing first stages are known and each method comes with its unique advantages, drawbacks and technical challenges. It is of crucial importance to understand these differences to identify a return method that is suitable for a European application.