[FPSPACE] throwweight vs. burst rate

[Robert G Kennedy III]

Phil Clark wrote:

>   4 launches in 19 days                  4 launches in 18 days
>                                          5 launches in 36 days
>
>I usually describe this in "US" terms, saying it's the equivalent of
>the same launch rate for Saturn-1B or Titan-3/4 vehicles - a launch
>rate which was never possible for the US vehicles because of the long
>on-the-pad time which they required.

This is indeed impressive, as well as useful information, Phil. Many people
might know what the maximum throwweights are for individual launchers, but
I'll bet very few have a feeling for what the "sustained national burst
rate" might be. If you were writing a credible future scenario, this is the
sort of information you'd need to base it on.

The Russian performance is all the more impressive considering the
underlying economic problems over there.


--
Robert Kennedy, PE
http://www.ultimax.com