Experimental Thrust

[spinomonkey]

I'm sure there's plenty of wild ideas for thrust beyond just fuel + rocket = boom. But I had one I discovered about a week ago and was wondering what else people have thought up of.

Basically by adding a detachable Jet Engine below a booster, then feeding fuel from the booster tank and adding air intakes works as a first stage. I usually add a few short burning solid states for an added kick. But really even that isn't necessary. The drawback is it's slow, but since the jet engines get you out of the thickest atmosphere, it makes the entire rocket lighter and more fuel efficient. Prob wouldn't work in the real world, but hey it works for the time being.

[HazelPine]

It's a cool concept, but only work on kerbin and laythe, and you could use rapiers instead. But still, it is cool! Not sure if it is in the right subforum though.

[SSSPutnik]

Its been done, copiously I'm afraid.

[Claw]

I haven't built any like yours, but I have used them radially. They can turn into SSTOs if you let them.

[Taki117]

The issue you are going to run into using that set up is that you are burning Liquid fuel needed for your engine. What you can do is place a liquid fuel tank below the decoupler to facilitate using a jet engine. Additionally you can add a decoupler and seprotrons between the air intake and fuel tank so that when you jettison the jet engines you also jettison the air intakes.

[Dispatcher]

I've had success with jet boosters which use small fuel tanks. These are radially mounted to an upper stage and set up to be decoupled shortly before flame out (which is sometimes at the same staging to decouple a lower stage). These boosters contain the jets of course, as well as their small tanks and air intakes. The radial decouplers need to be those with maximum explosive force so that the spent boosters clear the rest of the craft. I start the jet engines as the first stage, so as to let them warm up for several seconds before igniting the main rocket engine(s) and releasing the launch stabilizer clamps.