New Rocket Idea

[OpossumRPG]

I had this idea about creating a rocket that once it reaches orbit you can rotate the ship 180 degrees and decouple a covering to a engine that used to be at the front. That would make it so it would be more aerodynamic from surface to orbit but turning it around to reveal a heat-shield that would allow you to actually fly down on re-entry. It may sound stupid but I need your opinion on it, thank you.

[Frida Space]

Why would it make it more aerodynamic? It would still need fairings, and that would make it the same as before. And even if it could survive launch without fairings, I'm not sure that having a nozzle pointing straight up would be more aerodynamic, if I understood what you are saying (which I might not have)

[Black Dog]

Ehm, you can do exactly as you wish - just use the WASD keys to rotate the pieces while constructing your rocket. That means you can build a rocket with two engines facing each other 180°, or make the top of the rocket into the bottom of a future stage.

[Red Iron Crown]

Why would it make it more aerodynamic? It would still need fairings, and that would make it the same as before. And even if it could survive launch without fairings, I'm not sure that having a nozzle pointing straight up would be more aerodynamic, if I understood what you are saying (which I might not have)

You can have two different engine types in the frontal area of a single stack, that's the aero advantage.

I used a similar design principle in oldStock aero to make a small jet/ion hybrid plane, jet in the tail and ion in the nose.

[Slam_Jones]

I had this idea about creating a rocket that once it reaches orbit you can rotate the ship 180 degrees and decouple a covering to a engine that used to be at the front. That would make it so it would be more aerodynamic from surface to orbit but turning it around to reveal a heat-shield that would allow you to actually fly down on re-entry. It may sound stupid but I need your opinion on it, thank you.

Okay, so I'm having a little difficulty understanding this...

So it's got an engine on the bottom, to propel it up to space.

In space, it releases the fairings, revealing an engine. Flip ship 180 degrees.

Fire booster.

Coming back down, a heatshield appears where the first engine was? or do you decouple the first engine, revealing a heatshield below it?

A few more nitpicks:

It seems that both engines would be drawing from the same fuel source, right?

If so, you would want your vaccum engine to be more efficient than your ascent engine... but having two engines adds more weight, potentially reversing any boost to efficiency.

If the engines use different types of fuel, why not just stage away the empty fuel tank/useless booster?

Also, a side note, your username reminds me of a "joke" game I've talked about with friends... Urban Cat Simulator xD

Edited May 22, 2015 by Slam_Jones

[magnemoe]

I have done this a few times in KSP, Eve landers using the aerospike, an tug with 8 LV-N around an central one and did not want the fairing to wreck the others, this is not real world issues.

Apparently some Russian 3rd stage has forward facing engines, however it was taken from an ICBM with multiple warheads and wanted to burn and drop one then do adjustment burn and drop next fast, they adjusted this to doing multiple satellites even if you have more time.

[Kryten]

Apparently some Russian 3rd stage has forward facing engines, however it was taken from an ICBM with multiple warheads and wanted to burn and drop one then do adjustment burn and drop next fast, they adjusted this to doing multiple satellites even if you have more time.

That's Dnepr, formerly the R-36M ICBM. The engines are also actually placed at the front of the stage (when used as an LV), meaning payloads need special covers to protect them from the plume.