Most Fuel To LKO

[Altimaden]

so i'm only getting a bit over 6,000 units of fuel, around 31 tons into orbit for the low price of only 10,000 credits per flight as it is almost all recoverable 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3L9bDFpeiU4

[Temstar]

There are two ways to approach this problem as seen above which is why people have been asking for more specific requirement on this $200,000 launch business.

• if you don't care for reusability then it's just a case of fine tuning big asparagus launchers, which is the top example, capable of putting 229 tons into orbit with room for improvement to specifically tailor for this challenge, that should cost you somewhere around $800 per ton to orbit
• if you instead allow $200,000 for a single launch, but you allow the vehicle recovery value to be dedicated from the initial cost then the solution would be the bottom, where an even bigger fully reusable design can launch something in the region of 500 tons to orbit with a cost per ton of $400 (the example only lifts under 150 tons to orbit, but can be fairly easily scaled up to any size your computer can physically handle)

In either case, fine tuning a launch vehicle to a specification is a time consuming business, which is why before I commit my time to fine tune a launch vehicle for a challenge the rules needs to be very clear what's allowed and what's not.

[ihtoit]

since the atomic motors don't need oxidiser, nobody's particularly bothered about you using nukes in space anyway (like they'd know??), throwing up LF tanks (ie the jet fuel ones) is the way to go here. You're getting more fuel for the payload mass as opposed using combined tanks.