6 ms·

No, it's single stage to orbit; it's a poorly written article. It goes to mach 5.4 with atmospheric air before switching to liquid oxygen. The article makes it

• trhway 12y ago
  it is lost on me why Skylon would be noticeably better than a Mach 5-6 plane boosting a second stage. Such 2 stage system would have obviously less trade-offs and thus would be easier/cheaper to design and build.
  • icegreentea 12y ago
    Staging isn't free. While true that the second stage vehicle will be simpler, the combined second and first stage together could be more complicated/heavier than the Skylon. Noticeably, the point of the Skylon and SABRE is that it's possible to use a common engine core in airbreathing and pure rocket mode, thus potentially generating weight savings. I'm sure someone sat down and did the calculations. I have this feeling that a lot of the times when you actually sit down and work out the math for a range of assumptions, you generally come down to 'eh, maybe A, maybe B, so may as well try A'.
• blueskin_ 12y ago
  >it's a poorly written article. It's the BBC, so I'd say it's an averagely written article in their context.
  • ris 12y ago
    It's by Jonathan Amos, who generally knows his stuff and whose articles are usually well above most bbc tech articles in quality. It's an unfortunately worded paragraph I'd say.
    • blueskin_ 12y ago
      Well, I suppose 'poor' is above 'awful'.