Booster Fly-Back Analysis of Reusable Launch Systems

Within the last decade, the use of launch vehicles has increased as private companies have emerged in the space exploration industry. Compared to the early 1980s, the market for launch vehicles has become significantly more competitive, introducing the desire to have fully reusable launch vehicles. The true benefits of fully reusable launch vehicles can only be achieved once both stages are fully operational and recoverable. This stimulates the need for a comprehensive mission design. In this paper, this is achieved by revisiting the mission profiles of flyback boosters. An extensive analysis of the design-space is performed to identify the contributions of each decision variable to the trajectory design. The results concluded that such an approach supports achieving a more efficient optimization, with better convergence speed and solution performance.