Tag: single stage to orbit

SASSTO (Saturn Application Single-Stage-to-Orbit) combined launch vehicle and spacecraft. Only 62.3 ft (19m.) tall, a single plug-nozzle engine would serve both as launch vehicle and for soft-landing back on Earth after an orbital mission. The craft – seen here with a Gemini two-man capsule – would be recovered intact and could be used repeatedly. It would be a particularly appropriate for ferry missions into Earth-orbit including the emergency rescue of astronauts.

1. Optional fairing around the two-man Gemini Capsule;
2. Gemini adapter section;
3. Transition support structure;
4. Orbit injection / retro and control propellant tanks (6);
5. Toroidal liquid-oxygen tank;
6. Annular combustion chamber;
7. Truncated plug nozzle and re-entry heat shield;
8. Attitude-control system (4);
9. Retractable landing legs (4);
10. Spherical liquid-hydrogen propellant tank.

Frontiers of Space
Philip Bono & Kenneth Gatland
Macmillan, 1969

SASSTO at Astronautix

Image credit: Douglas

Image source(s):

SDASM Archives

Numbers Station