Seems to me that making all those incremental steps and designing for missions that do not exist would be awfully, awfully expensive.
Some of those steps (for instance, "use composites") should come at the very beginning, and others ("- switch to deeply throttleable engine, add landing gear, extend flight software for landings - lunar surface missions") would be better left to a vehicle designed for that mission when the requirement arose, rather than try to cut-and-paste existing into a frankenship.
I understand that the White Knight reached 367k and mach 3.09 on it's first flight without anything special in regard to it's construction.
All things being equal, where is the aerodynamic center of a rocket?
Quote from: Antares on 06/26/2009 04:28 amAll things being equal, where is the aerodynamic center of a rocket?In the center of its longitudinal area projection.
Quote from: Jim on 06/30/2009 07:21 pmQuote from: Antares on 06/26/2009 04:28 amAll things being equal, where is the aerodynamic center of a rocket?In the center of its longitudinal area projection.I think that is center of pressure.
Quote from: Danny Dot on 06/30/2009 07:26 pmQuote from: Jim on 06/30/2009 07:21 pmQuote from: Antares on 06/26/2009 04:28 amAll things being equal, where is the aerodynamic center of a rocket?In the center of its longitudinal area projection.I think that is center of pressure.You're both right. For an airfoil, the rule of thumb is quarter-chord subsonic, half-chord supersonic. Just wondering if there was an analogue for rockets, without airfoils.Which would be like a plane with no wings, which would be a fuselage. Except this would be a variable area fuselage... I think I answered my own question.