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News: Japan’s JAXA tested a prototype reusable rocket, while China successfully achieved its first reusable rocket booster landing.
About Reusable Rocket
- Reusable launch vehicle (RLV) is a space launch system designed to recover and reuse some or all of its component stages.
- Goal: RLVs aim to transform space launches from a disposable model into a transportation model, thereby reducing the cost of access to space.
- Scientific Basis: Rocket motion follows the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation, under which carrying more fuel increases rocket weight and demands even more fuel.
- Working Principle: After completing its mission, the reusable stage separates, returns to Earth in a controlled manner, and is recovered instead of being discarded.
- Recovery Types:
- Vertical Take-off, Vertical Landing (VTVL):The booster uses retro-propulsion (firing its engines downward) and grid fins to stabilize itself before landing vertically on a pad or barge.
- Examples: SpaceX’s Falcon 9 (United States) and Blue Origin’s New Shepard (United States) follows this recovery approach.
- Horizontal Landing (Winged Body): The reusable vehicle glides through the atmosphere and lands on a conventional runway like an aircraft.
- Example: ISRO’s Pushpak (RLV-TD) (India) follows this recovery approach.
- Vertical Take-off, Vertical Landing (VTVL):The booster uses retro-propulsion (firing its engines downward) and grid fins to stabilize itself before landing vertically on a pad or barge.
- Refurbishment: The recovered stage is inspected, repaired, and tested before being reused for future missions.
Reusable Launch Vehicles in India
- ISRO started developing reusable launch vehicle (RLV) technology in 2010 for a two-stage-to-orbit (TSTO) launch vehicle.
- First Trial: In 2016, the Reusable Launch Vehicle–Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD) completed its first trial by touching down at a predetermined landing site in the Bay of Bengal.
- Vehicle Design: The RLV uses a two-stage configuration in which the first stage separates after fuel exhaustion, while the second stage continues the mission.
- Recovery Concept: The first stage re-enters the atmosphere, lands autonomously at a predetermined location, and is prepared for reuse after maintenance.
- Technology Demonstrator: The RLV-TD helps ISRO test key technologies required for developing a fully reusable launch vehicle, including hypersonic flight, autonomous landing, and powered cruise flight.
- Future Plan: ISRO plans to build a fully operational reusable launch vehicle by using the technologies demonstrated through the RLV-TD.
