Patent

Launch vehicle with engine mounted on a rotor

HMX, Inc.

US 5,842,665GrantedGranted Dec 1, 1998Filed Sep 9, 1996

A launch vehicle which employs a rotor similar to a helicopter. The vehicle has a four bladed rotor which is mounted on the vehicle body. The body of the vehicle includes propellant tanks and a payload compartment contained within an integral aeroshell. Rocket engines used to propel the vehicle into earth orbit are mounted at the ends of the rotor blades. The engines are connected by propellant feed lines to a propellant transfer hub surrounding the axis of rotation of the rotor. Propellants are fed from an oxidizer tank and a fuel tank through a propellant transfer coupling to oxidizer and fuel lines which extend to the engines at the rotor blades ends. The rotor blades incorporate air foils. To operate the vehicle the vehicle is positioned on a concrete or asphalt pad and fueled with liquid oxygen and kerosene. The engine are positioned tangent to the blade paths and ignited. The…

Claims
15
3 independent claims
Filing to grant
2.2 years
Pendency

1ClaimsFirst of 15

  1. 1

    A rocket powered vehicle for transporting payload to an earth orbit comprising: a vehicle body, the vehicle body including an oxidizer tank and a fuel tank; a rotor having at least two arms extending from a central hub, the hub being mounted to the vehicle body for rotation, rotation of the arms defining a direction of motion, the hub rotation defining an axis about which the hub rotates; at least one rocket engine mounted on each arm, the engines being mounted to the blades so the engines may…

2Description

Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to launch vehicles and rocket propelled vehicles in general and to reusable rocket propelled vehicles in particular.

Showing a preview — retrieve the full document via the Exa API.

Powered by the Exa API

See something wrong or missing on this page?