Comparison of SpaceX's Starship with winged heavy-lift launcher options for Europe

Kurzfassung

The remarkable progress SpaceX made in the first four integrated flight tests of their Starship and Super Heavy launcher configuration indicates that a fully reusable space transport system might become a reality within a few years. Such a system could revolutionize the global launch market, especially if it is able to achieve its forecasted payload capacity of more than 100 t into LEO. Therefore, it is necessary to gain a deep understanding of the capabilities of this system and compare it to potential future European options for heavy and super-heavy space transport systems. This paper uses the publicly available data from Starship’s first four integrated flight tests for a thorough technical analysis of its current capabilities. The flight tests allow a calibration and update of our earlier-presented Starship models with real flight data. These updated models will be used to gain an understanding of its high-level system properties and to extrapolate the actual LEO capabilities of the early operational Starship versions. The second part of the paper will investigate a potential European option for launching similar payloads of 50 t and more into LEO, based on building blocks currently proposed or under investigation. This configuration employs a reusable winged first stage based on the SpaceLiner concept’s booster stage. The stage uses cryogenic liquid hydrogen and cryogenic liquid oxygen and is recovered with in-air capturing (IAC). For the second stage, an expendable cryogenic stage is optimized to maximize the payload capacity. Finally, the paper compares the technical characteristics of the presented winged launch vehicle to the Starship’s capabilities to highlight the key advantages of the two differing approaches and identify promising future development roadmaps for European launchers.