Something Big & Conventional - Artemis

[Flaser]

This is a fairly simple, yet effective rocket. It needs the Wobly Rockets, Triple & Radial Parachutes parts to make. It's the product of a line of predecessors, some byzantine others simple like this the finished product. The final improvement was moving from boosters+2-stages, to a booster+3-stages design, splitting the big, double fuel tank and adding some lighter LF engines.

I can routinely push this design to a 40-60 kms high before even starting the NERVA for the orbit stabilizing burn... and the later has more than enough juice for that, deorbiting and landing.

The boosters of the craft are recoverable, and so is the 1st stage.... and the 2nd stage if it somehow survives re-entry. The 3rd stage contains a NERVA engine and the command pod can *NOT* be detached, as leaving nuclear material scattered is very bad PR. (Actually it's possible to land the command 'stage' with the engine alone).

If you're 'cost' conscious, you may probably get away with using only 6 medium boosters, as well as removing the engines of the second stage (but keep the fuel!), the previous versions all flew with that design...