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| Launch Loop vehicle rates will be very high, perhaps more often than one 5 tonne vehicle per minute. The very low cost of launch (and the very high infrastructure costs) require high throughput handling with many automated inspection stages. It also means that missions will typically be assembled from many combined low-cost payloads. For example, an Apollo style Moon mission series might assemble a 100 tonne vehicle and a 200 tonne support station in a [[ HighApogeeConstruction | high apogee construction orbit ]], with a permanent support staff on the support station readying a series of monthly manned lunar orbit or landing missions. Every step of each mission will involve multiple redundancies; for example, a complete spare unmanned lander and return vehicle will be landed on the Moon a month in advance of a crew in an identical lander a month later. If the later crewed lander is somehow disabled, they can return in the spare, or survive on the supplies in both vehicles. These manned probes would be sent to sites identified by orbital mapping and robot landers as sites needing specialized human attention; the vast majority of missions will either be small tele-operated robots controlled from Earth or lunar orbit, or large-crew long-duration missions with shielded centrifugal habitats buried under lunar regolith. |
Launch Loop vehicle rates will be very high, perhaps more often than one 5 tonne vehicle per minute. The very low cost of launch (and the very high infrastructure costs) require high throughput handling with many automated inspection stages. It also means that missions will typically be assembled from many combined low-cost payloads in a construction orbit. |
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| Repair parts will be usually be urgent and survival-critical, and must be sent fast, anywhere, anytime. | Repair parts will be often be unplanned, urgent and survival-critical, and must be sent fast, anywhere, anytime. The quickest method to near-Earth destinations will be redundant multistage high performance liquid fuel rockets lofted at maximum loop velocity (11.5 km/s?), perhaps further accelerated into a [[FastHyperbolic | fast hyperbolic]] with an additional boost stage to perhaps 14 km/s while in the deep gravity well, then decelerated fast near arrival. |
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Launch Sequence
Launch Loop vehicle rates will be very high, perhaps more often than one 5 tonne vehicle per minute. The very low cost of launch (and the very high infrastructure costs) require high throughput handling with many automated inspection stages. It also means that missions will typically be assembled from many combined low-cost payloads in a construction orbit.
Cargo
The vast majority of launches will be cargo: critical repair parts, supplies, and construction materials. Humans are launched after temporary accommodations are assembled by robots and thoroughly tested.
Repair Parts
Repair parts will be often be unplanned, urgent and survival-critical, and must be sent fast, anywhere, anytime. The quickest method to near-Earth destinations will be redundant multistage high performance liquid fuel rockets lofted at maximum loop velocity (11.5 km/s?), perhaps further accelerated into a fast hyperbolic with an additional boost stage to perhaps 14 km/s while in the deep gravity well, then decelerated fast near arrival.