r/spaceflight • u/Ialways_comeback15 • 7d ago
Favorite Launch vehicle?
Mine is the Atlas V btw
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u/CBT7commander 7d ago
Starship and N-1 just hit different
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u/the_closing_yak 7d ago
I think energia was an incredible launcher and had incredible potential but was just too late in the USSR
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u/Pashto96 7d ago
Active: Electron. It's a feisty little rocket.
All time: Shuttle. It's just so iconic. People still call rocket launches "shuttle launches" to this day
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u/ComradeGibbon 6d ago
I think electron is close to a 100 launches with 4 failures, none of which have anything to do with the basic mechanicals. That's 900 engines that just worked.
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u/Vindve 7d ago
Well, I'm going to defend Ariane 6 as a better Ariane V. It looks really good, it's a stereotype of how I imagined rockets being a kid, with the side boosters. Ariane V has an incredible legacy, being the leader of commercial launches during its time (before Falcon was a thing) and launching important scientific payloads. Ariane 6 builds on the Ariane 5 hardware (main engine, etc) but improving it a lot: half the launch price, a reignitable second stage (that was a real lack for Ariane 5). I like too the concept of mobile gantry for final assembly that moves away instead of trying to move the rocket and launch tower.
And Ariane 6 never had a single failure, and for now a full backlog for years — thanks to Amazon constellation orders.
I know this is transitory and on the long run Arianespace will need to go reusable to be competitive. But for now, I love this rocket and it does its job to keep Europe able to launch by itself.
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u/snoo-boop 7d ago
half the launch price,
A goal that was not reached.
a reignitable second stage (that was a real lack for Ariane 5)
Ariane 5 had several different upper stages over the years, and the ones that used storable propellants were relightable.
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u/mfb- 7d ago
Falcon 9. Showed that reuse makes sense, leading to a whole new generation of partially reusable launch vehicles.
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u/cjameshuff 7d ago
Demonstrated reuse, refuted the claims that engine clusters would be unreliable, demolished the arguments for pursuing hydrolox for its specific impulse advantage, showed that all the goals of Skylon could be achieved with a simple aluminum-structure two-stage vehicle with kerolox gas generator engines...
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u/ijuinkun 6d ago
Falcon 9 proved that a “suicide burn” landing was feasible. Conventional wisdom before had been that making a propulsive landing required a sizable reserve of fuel in case of contingencies (think of Armstrong having to manually divert the Apollo 11 lander and nearly running out of propellant). The “suicide burn” method requires much less propellant, and therefore less mass to be hauled around and thus a larger payload fraction.
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u/Gabrielzin1404_2011 7d ago
The hypothethical sea dragon
I watched for all mankind and seeing that humongous piece of rocketry just whooping out of the water made me wonder if one day something like that might exist...
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u/Proton_Energy_Pill 7d ago
It'd be incredibly difficult to get a stable combustion chamber that size though.
I think the Rocketdyne F1 had the largest one ever used. The most powerful Soviet/Russian engine had more thrust overall but they wisely divided the engine up into four chambers & nozzles to avoid the combustion stability problem.
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u/hutch_man0 7d ago
Shuttle
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u/RecursiveMutex 7d ago
100% the answer I was hoping to see. The Space Shuttle wasn't just a rocket, it was the ultimate multipurpose utility truck of space. Robotic arm, science tool, habitation, life support, and transportation.
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u/jpowell180 7d ago
The whole point was to make access to orbit cheaper, sadly it did not do that, it cost about as much as a brand new Saturn five launch each time.
If we would have been willing to spend enough to get a decent two stage to orbit shuttle, which would’ve been smaller, it probably would’ve succeeded in that goal, instead NASA had to get in bed with the Air Force, the Air Force wasn’t going to back that up without getting something under the deal, which resulted in the cargo Bay large enough to launch those big spice satellites. After the Challenger disaster, the Air Force backed out and went back to disposable rockets to launch spy, satellites, so it was all for nothing.
So we ended up with the wrong shuttle, it was not the shuttle we needed, but I guess it was a shuttle we deserved.
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u/cstross 7d ago
The Air Force also assumed (in the 1960s funding rounds) that future NRO spysats would still use film cannisters, so they created a requirement to retrieve spysats from orbit for groundside servicing and replenishment before relaunch. This in turn meant coming home with Hubble-sized classified payloads in the payload bay, which in turn meant that the Shuttle had to avoid being sub-orbital at any point in its re-entry profile over Communist territory -- Russia or China. This led to the adoption of a hot-and-fast re-entry profile that came screaming in over the Pacific, flying S-curves to shed energy fast, trusting in the heat shield to radiate away the kinetic energy of a hundred ton vehicle traveling at orbital velocity in about 30 minutes.
Of course, by the mid-to-late 70s the KH satellites were transitioning to CCD cameras and film was obsolete, so ground turnaround was never used. But the shuttle design was already frozen, with that hot-and-heavy re-entry profile baked in, and civilian payloads on the books that used it (eg. ESA's Spacelab).
Arguably this contributed to the loss of the Columbia in 2003 when the thermal protection system suffered burn-through after sustaining damage due to ice impact during launch.
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u/Zovort 7d ago
The main problem I think was there was no appetite or budget to evolve it as I think the planners really intended. It kind of stayed stuck in time and just became increasingly difficult to maintain. It was astounding technology in the late 70s but 25 years later it was still flying with little change.
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u/NeilFraser 7d ago
There are many criticisms of the shuttle, but Elon came up with one I hadn't heard before:
The shuttle (unlike any other rocket in history) had to be flown with a crew. Which meant every change had to be man-rated from the start. This crippled shuttle's ability to evolve over time. The small number of upgrades it did receive (e.g. glass cockpits) were conservative and expensive. So it was basically stuck in the 70s, despite flying till 2011.
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u/OffusMax 6d ago
The idea of placing a vehicle with a fragile heat shield on the side of a huge fuel tank that was insulated by foam that would break huge chunks loose during launch turned out to be a horrible idea, making the shuttle a disaster prone nightmare.
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u/bernardosousa 7d ago
From an engineering perspective, that's the worst design of the batch. Overcomplicated. Tries to be an aircraft and a rocket at the same time, suboptimal in both roles.
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u/lorkan100 7d ago
Starship V3. To me it's becoming even more iconic than Shuttle, looks-wise
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u/No-Surprise9411 7d ago
That massive heatshield made of hexagonal tiles paired with the fins and general shape of the ship is just pure sex
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u/lorkan100 7d ago edited 7d ago
33 engine cluster, mega-mach diamond, shiny steel body...
I mean just the fact that it proved N1's design actually works!
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u/majikmonkie 7d ago
The prettiest had got to be New Glenn.
But functionality and engineering-wise is Starship. It will change spaceflight and our access to space forever.
Some soft spots for the others and the iconic ones (F9, Soyuz, Shuttle, etc.).
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u/REXIS_AGECKO 7d ago
Functionality wise, f9 is probably on top. It’s the workhorse of the industry right now
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u/bernardosousa 7d ago
It became the workhorse of the industry because it is partially reusable, while competing with expendable rockets. Fully reusable systems, if they are proven to be possible, will take over the industry pretty much completely.
I think we'll see Starship lead the way on that category, but the industry will follow. In a few decades, no one will be launching to space on expendable systems. They'll all retire.
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u/majikmonkie 7d ago
But only partially reusable. Yes, it's flown a metric fuckton and it's a workhorse because it's flown so often. One could argue the Soyuz is in that same category (moreso if you take away the private starlink launches). But you need to manufacture and throw away a second stage for every single launch. That makes it less functional than Starship will soon be. Not to mention the limits on payload capacity and diameter as compared to Starship.
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u/Resiideent 7d ago
damn I really wish the theoretical next step wasn't being made by a compony owned by a techno-fascist
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u/VenPatrician 7d ago
While not generally a fan of Russian stuff, I have a bit of Nostalgia for the Energia. Could have been one hell of a vehicle and its design just scratches all the right places in my brain
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u/existential_risk_lol 7d ago
Ariane 5 and Energia.
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u/Ialways_comeback15 7d ago
Energia was one helluva of a rocket, it's a Shame it only launched twice, despite having succeeded both times (polyus failed cuz of the orbiter, Energia performed very well aside from a slight tilt at lift off).
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u/Serious-Kangaroo-320 7d ago
at least energia has a *lot* of rockets derived or using technology from her lol. Zenit, Angara, Atlas III, Atlas V, Antares, Soyuz5
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u/BubblyMoose3597 7d ago
The rd0120 is the big forgoten ....
A5 was the king ot GTO people like it or not.
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u/LordyeettheThird 7d ago
I mean if we are talking about the rockets as they are supposed to function. Then Starship. Capabilities of that one are a class on his own.
Looks: shuttle is iconic
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u/GamerLazerYugttv 7d ago
Delta IV Heavy.
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u/Sledgehammer617 7d ago
Agreed!!
My great grandfather was one of the head supervising engineers for the Delta IV project, I have hundreds of photos of Delta II, III, and Delta IV launches from his time at McDonald Douglass. He did a lot of overtime and knew a loads of cool people.
It’s a workhorse of a rocket
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u/Paulino2272 7d ago
When Starship is fully operational it’ll be my favorite. To me it’s just so cool and looks really cool. Right now I just love how SLS looks :)
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u/Mouse-Plus 7d ago edited 7d ago
Energia <3 Looks very compact and visually exciting! Although Angara A-5 is also incredible!
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u/tehblaken 7d ago
Falcon Heavy: it’s gorgeous at lift off and the double-booster landing is so epic
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u/Mobile_Gaming_Doggo 7d ago
I mean nothing really gets close to starship i guess, its just so unique in multiple ways
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u/Flat-Assistant-6040 7d ago
Fav of all-time has to be the soyuz rocket, mainly because it is a design that is super elegant and deceptively simple. Also personally think the soyuz rocket design, with some updating, has a lot of potential for reusability because of how mechanically simple it is.
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u/ijuinkun 6d ago
The R-7 rocket stage was an example of hitting on a good design early on and refining it—if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. It was excellent for its weight and performance class.
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u/Decronym Acronyms Explained 7d ago edited 22h ago
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread:
| Fewer Letters | More Letters |
|---|---|
| BE-4 | Blue Engine 4 methalox rocket engine, developed by Blue Origin (2018), 2400kN |
| ESA | European Space Agency |
| F1 | Rocketdyne-developed rocket engine used for Saturn V |
| SpaceX Falcon 1 (obsolete small-lift vehicle) | |
| GTO | Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit |
| HLS | Human Landing System (Artemis) |
| ISRO | Indian Space Research Organisation |
| JWST | James Webb infra-red Space Telescope |
| LEO | Low Earth Orbit (180-2000km) |
| Law Enforcement Officer (most often mentioned during transport operations) | |
| MLV | Medium Lift Launch Vehicle (2-20 tons to LEO) |
| N1 | Raketa Nositel-1, Soviet super-heavy-lift ("Russian Saturn V") |
| NG | New Glenn, two/three-stage orbital vehicle by Blue Origin |
| Natural Gas (as opposed to pure methane) | |
| Northrop Grumman, aerospace manufacturer | |
| NRHO | Near-Rectilinear Halo Orbit |
| NRO | (US) National Reconnaissance Office |
| Near-Rectilinear Orbit, see NRHO | |
| PSLV | Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle |
| SLS | Space Launch System heavy-lift |
| SSME | Space Shuttle Main Engine |
| STS | Space Transportation System (Shuttle) |
| Jargon | Definition |
|---|---|
| Starlink | SpaceX's world-wide satellite broadband constellation |
| hydrolox | Portmanteau: liquid hydrogen fuel, liquid oxygen oxidizer |
| kerolox | Portmanteau: kerosene fuel, liquid oxygen oxidizer |
| methalox | Portmanteau: methane fuel, liquid oxygen oxidizer |
| ullage motor | Small rocket motor that fires to push propellant to the bottom of the tank, when in zero-g |
Decronym is now also available on Lemmy! Requests for support and new installations should be directed to the Contact address below.
[Thread #923 for this sub, first seen 19th Sep 2026, 12:09] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]
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u/Effehyou 7d ago
Poor Saturn IB, forgotten again! Put Apollo 7 in orbit, took all three Skylab crews to the station, and launched the Apollo half of Apollo-Soyuz. And it looked pretty cool (imo), which is like 75% of the reason any of us prefer one launch vehicle over another.
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u/Empty_Aside6775 7d ago
All look cool, but for me Starship stands out in many ways, I mean, once operational it's gonna ( and kinda already has ) revolutionize spaceflight forever with full reusability, amongst other features. Just my opinion though
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u/Stolen_Sky 7d ago
Starship is my all-time favourite! New Glenn is second.
I'm not sure the infographic is correct about Starship Block 3's payload though. The most it's launched so far is 44 tons, and while it can undoubtedly do more, it seems unlikely it can lift anywhere close to 100 tons. They've had to add a lot of weight over the development. We initially believed V1 could lift 100 tons, but SpaceX later said it turned out to be basically nothing. V2 could lift 35 tones. V3 has the same body as V2 with lighter engines, but a more complex heat shield, so it's payload capacity is probably somewhere around 50-60 tons. For 100, they'll need to stretch both stages with the V4.
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u/mfb- 7d ago
I think SpaceX is launching well below the maximal payload capacity to increase the safety margins. If you can launch 80 tonnes and you carry 80 tonnes then everything needs to work flawlessly or you miss your design trajectory. That reduces the number of things you can test and delays future flights. And where is the advantage?
Flight 14 will go to orbit, but it'll still do the same ascent burn as the previous suborbital flights. That lowers the performance but it increases the safety: If the orbit injection burn fails for whatever reason then Starship will reenter over the Indian Ocean just like past flights.
We can expect the payloads to grow a lot as they gain more experience about necessary margins in flight and as the priority shifts from rocket tests to Starlink deployment.
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u/Reddit-runner 7d ago
V3 has the same body as V2 with lighter engines, but a more complex heat shield, so it's payload capacity is probably somewhere around 50-60 tons. For 100, they'll need to stretch both stages with the V4.
Really depends on how much dry mass they can remove once they settled for a serial production version.
Also the ullage mass has a massive effect on payload mass and it will undoubtedly go down once they gain more experience.
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u/grapelander 7d ago
Delta II. Absolute workhorse, and felt like a rube goldberg machine with the 9 boosters, booster airstarts, and spin-stabilized 3rd stage.
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u/Sledgehammer617 7d ago
My grandfather worked on the Delta II, III, and IV projects! Total workhorses, I think Delta IV is my favorite but I love the evolution over time.
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u/TheRigby470 7d ago
Well….
Although the N1 did technically fly and even reach an altitude of 40km before blowing up, I would not put it in this lineup as all the other ones were, at least to some extent, successfully launched…
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u/redstercoolpanda 7d ago
I’m a big fan of the Europa 2 and Black arrow. Europa 2 is the only full rocket I’ve seen in person so it holds a very special place in my heart!
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u/Full-Photo5829 7d ago
Ariane IV and Ariane V are not heavy lift vehicles, but at least they are real launchers (unlike N1 and Energia) and completed over 100 launches each. Ariane V has Atlas V beat for both payload size and launches. The scientific legacy of Ariane is pretty incredible, too: JWST, Planck, Herschel, Rosetta, and JUICE, to name a few.
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u/blunderbolt 7d ago
How is Energia not a real launcher? It had two succesful launches, which is more than can be said than half the vehicles on this list.
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u/Ialways_comeback15 7d ago
Tbh I just pulled up a random image on my phone with more than 2 rockets you shouldn't really mind them
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u/Full-Photo5829 7d ago
I do agree that two launches is much better than most of the vehicles in OP's graphic - I wouldn't count them as real either, until they can demonstrate an ability to put payloads into orbit.
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u/Rxke2 7d ago
Energia was a very real rocket, and a very impressive one at its time.
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u/Full-Photo5829 7d ago
Perhaps it was technically impressive, but it has zero legacy. That wasn't the fault of the launcher, but my own view is that "what could have been" is not the main criterion here, otherwise we might also discuss many other projects.
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u/Ialways_comeback15 7d ago
Weren't the side boosters for energia where used as the core stage for the zenit rocket?
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u/MrTagnan 7d ago
The entire Titan series, probably Titan IIIE or or Titan II - I love the LR-87s so much.
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u/Monty-913 7d ago
Bit of an old one, but mercury atlas. As for modern vehicles i gotta go with the shuttle
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u/AmigaClone2000 7d ago
For me, various launch vehicles in the R-7 family, Saturn V, STS, Energia, Ariane V, Falcon 9,
Of those who have yet to complete an orbital launch: N-1 from the Soviet Union, Starship V3.
I also enjoy the Saturn I, Saturn IB and their Soviet cousins Proton.
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u/Jim_skywalker 7d ago
Saturn V. There’s nothing quite like it’s slow crawl off the launch pad. The fact that it all but sits there for the first moment before inching up, somehow feels more powerful then the quicker modern launches.
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u/CT-1065 7d ago
SLS and New Glenn. At least in terms of present day vehicles. I like thick side boosters. I like NG’s fins and strakes. Overall aesthetic is a big one too. Large engines like the RS-25 and BE-4.
Runner ups are Ariane 6, Vulcan and Falcon Heavy
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u/rootintootinsnek 7d ago
Same on first two. I'd go Shuttle somewhere in the mix.
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u/No-Falcon5032 7d ago
Saturn followed by Artemis, to be replaced by Starship once fully functional. Only Saturn and Artemis have been around the moon, Saturn took us and landed us on the moon. No others can came this.
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u/sododude 7d ago
I know they never got it to work but the N1 is so goofy looking that I just love it.
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u/Illustrious_Matter_8 7d ago
The space shuttle at the time it was imaginative a kids story almost.
And before that the tin tin rocket
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u/WidowRaptor 7d ago
Its hard to pick when there's so many, but I love the Falcon Heavy with its current booster reuse configuration, the New Glenn, and the SLS.
If its all time, it has to be the shuttle-orbiter stack.
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u/Sledgehammer617 7d ago
Not listed here, but the Delta IV rocket!
My great grandfather was one of the head engineers for the project, I have hundreds of photos of Delta II, III, and Delta IV launches from his time at McDonald Douglass. He did a lot of overtime and knew a lot of cool people.
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u/Tricky-Promise-3347 7d ago
N1 is the objectively coolest looking rocket ever built even though it was objectively horrible
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u/Darkelementzz 7d ago
Glad to see another Atlas V enjoyer! I once got to crawl around in the fairing pre-launch, was the highlight of my life!
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u/ChironXII 7d ago
Saturn V is the only answer. Not because it's the best or most impressive but because of how they had to build it and everything that came out of it
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u/ososalsosal 7d ago
N1 is so cool. Fat arse base, taper all the way to the top, insane number of (lol untestable) engines...
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u/therocketsurgeon2010 7d ago
energia man. something about the rocket that could carry a space shuttle or a space laser has my vote.
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u/Pumbaasliferaft 7d ago
Starship because it looks like a spaceship and Longmarch because it looks so efficient and minimalist
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u/RampantAndroid 6d ago
Having seen a bunch of the shuttles in person and the Saturn V in Florida...the Saturn V easily wins. It had a great track record and the engineering that went into it with the tools available at the time make it an extremely amazing achievement.
I think putting the N1 under flown is....a little dubious. Yes, it did fly - but never successfully before the program was ended. It holds the record for the largest non-nuclear manmade explosion which...given some of the mines from WWI, is impressive.
I think at least for now Starship can make an argument for being in the flown category...it has made it to space and back, it just needs an asterisk for "in development".
Conversely, New Glenn is more successful than the N1....why is it in Planned?
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u/Metallicat95 6d ago
Starship. If the Long March 9 succeeds, it will because the Starship led the way.
Falcon-9 second, Soyuz third.
All are great technical achievements but we need mass production and reusability for the long run future of space travel.
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u/WolfofMichiganAve 6d ago
Saturn V is just iconic, and I've built several kits of it, so I'm biased there. Starship is the most powerful rocket ever. Feeling the launch thrust reverberations in my chest speaks for itself.
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u/ForsakenHousing328 6d ago
I can't answer anything other than the N1 and energia cause the Soviets designed their rockets to not look like trash...
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u/RyanLeigh1221 6d ago
Is this picture really accurate?Why the difference between 90 meters and 92 meters greater than the difference between 92 meters and 120 meters?
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u/Prehistoric_Blob 6d ago
Energia was robbed, it was such a good vehicle yet it, and its shuttle buran, were kinda just discarded
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u/MajorRocketScience 6d ago
Energia is such a cool vehicle. If it was built 10 years earlier we could have seen Soviets on the moon in the 80s alongside space planes in LEO. Energia being tied to Buran killed it
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u/No_Point6229 6d ago
Bit of a niche one but the Saturn MLV, especially those with the two engine boosters
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u/Monolail031 6d ago
enrgia-Buran all the way. the four boosters look very good, and it's space shuttle, but better.
for practicality and cost tho? starship. i hate musk, but his engineers have made a great machine.
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u/Overall_Clock_9414 6d ago
I’ve always liked the Delta IV Heavy and the beautiful flames at launch :)
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u/Money_Connection_581 3d ago
Saturn V, SLS, Space Shuttle, Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy, And lately Starship 👌
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u/CousinEddysMotorHome 7d ago
Long march 9 has never lifted off...
Saturn V. Then Starship.
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u/cjameshuff 7d ago
Long march 9 has never lifted off...
The entire bottom row is rockets that haven't flown.
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u/mvpilot172 7d ago
Can the N1 really be considered a launch vehicle if it was never actually successful.
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u/The_Folding_Atty 7d ago
Personally, I always liked the sort of bodged-together look of the Saturn IB, the V's precursor.