Super heavy-lift launch vehicle
A super heavy-lift launch vehicle is a launch vehicle capable of lifting more than of payload into low Earth orbit.
Flown vehicles
Never made it to orbit
- N1, Soviet Moon rocket. Developed in late 1960s and early 1970s. Made 4 orbital launch attempts but did not reach orbit on any one of those flights. After the 4 failed launches, the project was cancelled in 1976.
Retired
- Saturn V, with an Apollo program payload of a command module, service module, and Lunar Module. The three had a total mass of. When the third stage and Earth-orbit departure fuel was included, Saturn V actually placed into low Earth orbit. The final launch of Saturn V placed Skylab, a payload, into LEO.
- The Space Shuttle orbited a combined shuttle and cargo mass of when launching the Chandra X-ray Observatory on STS-93. Chandra and its two-stage Inertial Upper Stage booster rocket weighed.
- The Energia system was designed to launch up to to low Earth orbit. Energia launched twice before the program was cancelled, but only one flight reached orbit. On the first flight, launching the Polyus weapons platform, the vehicle failed to enter orbit due to a software error on the kick-stage. The second flight successfully launched the Buran orbiter.
Operational, but unproven as super heavy-lift
- Falcon Heavy is rated to launch to low Earth orbit in a fully expendable configuration and an estimated in a partially reusable configuration, in which only two of its three boosters are recovered. Neither of these super-heavy lift configurations have been flown or are being planned to fly as of 2019. The first test flight occurred on 6 February 2018, in a configuration in which recovery of all three boosters was attempted, with a small payload of sent to an orbit beyond Mars. A second and third flight have launched a and payload. Since the vehicle is operational but has not yet been demonstrated to launch payloads over to orbit, it is as yet unproven as a super heavy-lift capable launch vehicle.
Comparison
Includes mass of orbiter and payload during STS-93; deployable payload is
Required upper stage or payload to perform final orbital insertion
Falcon Heavy has only flown in a fully recoverable configuration, which has a theoretical payload limit of around 45 tonnes; the first planned flight in a partially expendable configuration is planned for late 2020.
Side booster cores recoverable and centre core intentionally expended. First re-use of the side boosters was demonstrated in 2019 when the ones used on the Arabsat-6A launch were reused on the STP-2 launch.
Does not include dry mass of spaceship
Since payload mass of all flights includes mass of orbiter, the maiden flight had a greater than 50 tonne payload despite no deployable payload.
Proposed designs
The Space Launch System is a US super heavy-lift expendable launch vehicle, which has been under development by NASA in a well-funded program for nearly a decade, and is currently slated to make its first flight in November 2021., it is slated to be the primary launch vehicle for NASA's deep space exploration plans, including the planned crewed lunar flights of the Artemis program and a possible follow-on human mission to Mars in the 2030s.The SpaceX Starship is both the second stage of a reusable launch vehicle and a spacecraft that is being developed by SpaceX, as a private spaceflight project. It is being designed to be a long-duration cargo and passenger-carrying spacecraft. While it will be tested on its own initially, it will be used on orbital launches with an additional booster stage, the Super Heavy, where Starship would serve as the second stage on a two-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle. The combination of spacecraft and booster is called Starship as well.
New Armstrong is a super heavy-lift rocket proposed by Blue Origin to be developed after New Glenn. Payload and timeline are unknown.
Long March 9, a to LEO capable rocket has been proposed by China. The concept has a targeted capacity of to lunar transfer orbit and first flight by 2030.
Yenisei, a super heavy-lift launch vehicle using existing components instead of pushing the less-powerful Angara A5V project, was proposed by Russia's RSC Energia in August 2016. If developed, this vehicle could allow Russia to launch missions towards establishing a permanent Moon base with simpler logistics, launching just one or two 80-to-160-tonne super-heavy rockets instead of four 40-tonne Angara A5Vs implying quick-sequence launches and multiple in-orbit rendezvous. In February 2018, the КРК СТК design was updated to lift at least 90 tonnes to LEO and 20 tonnes to lunar polar orbit, and to be launched from Vostochny Cosmodrome. The first flight is scheduled for 2028, with Moon landings starting in 2030.
ISRO is conducting preliminary research for the development of a super heavy-lift launch vehicle which is planned to have a lifting capacity of over 50-60 tonnes. Contrary to its designation, the "super heavy-lift" variant of the Unified Launch Vehicle, called SHLV, has a planned payload capacity of 41,300 kg which, being less than 50 tonnes, means it does not qualify as a super heavy-lift launch vehicle as per the definition on this page, but it does qualify as a heavy-lift launch vehicle.
Cancelled designs
Numerous super-heavy lift vehicles have been proposed and received various levels of development prior to their cancellation.As part of the Soviet Lunar Project four N1 rockets with a payload capacity of, were launched but all failed shortly after lift-off. The program was suspended in May 1974 and formally cancelled in March 1976. The Soviet UR-700 rocket design concept was competed against the N1, however the UR-700 was never developed. In the concept, it was to have had a payload capacity of up to to low earth orbit.
During project Aelita, the Soviets were developing a way to beat the Americans to Mars. They designed the UR-700m, a nuclear powered variant of the UR-700, to assemble the 1400 t MK-700 spacecraft in earth orbit in twp launches. The rocket would have a payload capacity of 750 t and is the most capable rocket ever designed. It is often overlooked due too little information being known about the design. The only Universal Rocket to make it past the design phase was the UR-500 while the N1 was selected to be the Soviets' HLV for lunar and Martian missions.
The UR-900 would have had a payload capacity of 240 tons to low earth orbit. It never left the drawing board.
The American Saturn MLV was proposed as a successor to the Saturn V rocket. It would have been able to carry up to 160,880 kg to Low earth orbit. The Nova designs were also studied alongside the Saturn MLV.
Based on of the recommendations of the Stafford Synthesis report, First Lunar Outpost would have relied on a massive Saturn-derived launch vehicle known as the Comet HLLV. The Comet would have been capable of injecting 254.4 tons into low earth orbit and 97.6 tons on a TLI making it one of the most capable vehicles ever designed. FLO was cancelled during the design process along with the rest of the Space Exploration Initiative.
The U.S. Ares V for the Constellation program was intended to reuse many elements of the Space Shuttle program, both on the ground and flight hardware, to save costs. The Ares V was designed to carry and was cancelled in 2010, though much of the work has been carried forward into the Artemis program.
A 1962 design proposal, Sea Dragon, called for an enormous tall, sea-launched rocket capable of lifting to low Earth orbit. Although preliminary engineering of the design was done by TRW, the project never moved forward due to the closing of NASA's Future Projects Branch.
The Rus-M was a proposed Russian family of launchers. It would have had two super heavy variants: one able to lift 50-60 tons, and another able to lift 130-150 tons.
SpaceX Interplanetary Transport System was a -diameter launch vehicle concept unveiled in 2016. The payload capability was to be in an expendable configuration or in a reusable configuration. In 2017, the large 12-meter design was succeeded at SpaceX by a -diameter concept Big Falcon Rocket which, since 2018, was renamed to as SpaceX Starship.