Aquarius is a launch vehicle concept designed for low-cost by

Space Systems/Loral SSL, formerly Space Systems/Loral, LLC (SS/L), of Palo Alto, California, is a wholly owned manufacturing subsidiary of Maxar Technologies. SSL designs and builds satellites and space systems for a wide variety of government and commercial cus ...

to carry small, inexpensive payloads into LEO.

Concept

The vehicle was primarily intended for launching bulk products, like water, fuel, and other consumables, that are inexpensive to replace in the event of a launch failure. The target launch cost was $1 million. Aquarius was designed to be a single-stage vehicle 43 meters (141 ft) high and 4 meters (13.1 ft) in diameter and powered by a single

pressure fed The pressure-fed engine is a class of rocket engine designs. A separate gas supply, usually helium, pressurizes the propellant tanks to force fuel and oxidizer to the combustion chamber. To maintain adequate flow, the tank pressures must exceed th ...

engine using

liquid hydrogen Liquid hydrogen (LH2 or LH2) is the liquid state of the element hydrogen. Hydrogen is found naturally in the molecular H2 form. To exist as a liquid, H2 must be cooled below its critical point of 33 K. However, for it to be in a fully l ...

and oxygen propellants stored in a

composite Composite or compositing may refer to: Materials * Composite material, a material that is made from several different substances ** Metal matrix composite, composed of metal and other parts ** Cermet, a composite of ceramic and metallic materials ...

pressure tank. Launch would have taken place from a floating position in the ocean to minimize launch infrastructure with the ability to place a 1,000-kilogram (2,200 lb) payload into a , 52-degree orbit. The payload, located in the base of the vehicle, would be extracted by an orbiting

space tug ''Space Tug'' is a young adult science fiction novel by author Murray Leinster. It was published in 1953 by Shasta Publishers in an edition of 5,000 copies. It is the second novel in the author's Joe Kenmore series. Groff Conklin gave it a mixed ...

for transfer to its ultimate destination, like the

ISS The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA (J ...

or a

propellant depot An orbital propellant depot is a cache of propellant that is placed in orbit around Earth or another body to allow spacecraft or the transfer stage of the spacecraft to be fueled in space. It is one of the types of space resource depots that ...

, after which the vehicle would de-orbit and be destroyed.

Vortex Cooled Chamber Wall Engine

Space Systems/Loral teamed wit
Microcosm
an
Wilson Composite Technologies
to study Aquarius under a $110,000 grant awarded by the state of California in April 2001 and delivered a final report in June 2002. Funding of $1 million was provided in the FY 2004 Defense Appropriations Act to develop a prototype of the low-cost engine for the vehicle. The engine would provide 400,000

pounds-force The pound of force or pound-force (symbol: lbf, sometimes lbf,) is a unit of force used in some systems of measurement, including English Engineering units and the foot–pound–second system. Pound-force should not be confused with pound-ma ...

(1.8 MN) of thrust using liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen as propellants. For the engine development, Space Systems/Loral is partnered with Aerojet
ORBITEC
and Microcosm, under the auspices of the

Air Force Research Laboratory The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) is a scientific research organization operated by the United States Air Force Materiel Command dedicated to leading the discovery, development, and integration of aerospace warfighting technologies, pl ...

and was completed in 2006. It confirmed that an ORBITEC engine design with inherently low cost can be scaled up to an intermediate thrust level, from which the next scale-up step to Aquarius should be achievable.

COTS bid

The proposal made with Constellation Services International for

Commercial Orbital Transportation Services Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) was a NASA program to coordinate the development of vehicles for the delivery of crew and cargo to the International Space Station by private companies. The program was announced on January 18, 200 ...

in 2006 was not selected.$150 million was the planned development cost, as part of a $700 million project (that included a space tug). 100 launches per year were needed to be profitable. One third of the launches were by design allowed to fail. Target costs were $1 million per launch or $1000/kg to LEO.

Design specification

* Diameter: 4 meters (12.6 feet) * LH2 tank length: 21 meters (69 feet) * LOX tank length: 8.4 meters (28 feet) * GH2 Pressurant tank length: 4 meters * Total height : 43 metres (140 feet)

References

* ''Space Time'' magazine, May/June 2001

External links