Lift Assisted Launch Vehicles

I always thought that the 10* rule to reach low planetary orbit was kinda
dumb.

After all, any vehicle that is capable of reaching orbit is going to have to
have a thrust to weight ratio of greater than one anyway.  Therefore, the
aircraft could effectively go verticle and climb out as a normal rocket!

You take off normally from a runway, and after you've climbed a few hundred
feet, pull the nose up.  WAY up.  If you've got the engines, you don't NEED
lift!

However, in my view, anything that is going to 'Fly' ie with wings and lift
and not rockets pointing down, you HAVE to design it with COACC.  I sort of
agree with Rob about the extra cost of the airframe, but I'm not really sure.
The X-15 was a hypersonic airframe, and it could have handled re-entry if
it came in slow enough.  So, maybe they would cost extra, maybe that's already
included.  I don't know.  But, I would say that the added cost it probably
not gonna be all that much compared to the rest of the ship.  (unless it's
really huge)  And besides, the costs in this case are relatively unimportant.
Players aren't gonna be buying one of these anyway.  So, *I* think the extra
cost could be seen as trivial.

Scott Kellogg
"Let's Go Down!" --Darkwing Ducvax