SpaceX launch vehicles

All three boosters are capable of being recovered and reused, although most flights use unrecoverable stripped-down center cores to increase performance.

SpaceX successfully launched the Falcon Heavy on February 6, 2018, delivering a payload comprising Musk's personal Tesla Roadster onto a trajectory reaching the orbit of Mars.

Starship is a two-stage fully reusable super heavy-lift launch vehicle under development by American aerospace company SpaceX.

[10][11] Starship is the latest project in SpaceX's reusable launch system development program and plan to colonize Mars.

The Falcon 1 was a small, planned to be partially reusable rocket capable of placing several hundred kilograms into low earth orbit.

[15] On 26 March 2006, the Falcon 1's maiden flight failed only seconds after leaving the pad due to a fuel line rupture.

[16][17] After a year, the second flight was launched on 22 March 2007 and it also ended in failure, due to a spin stabilization problem that automatically caused sensors to turn off the Kestrel 2nd-stage engine.

[18] The new cooling system turned out to be the major reason the mission failed; because the first stage rammed into the second-stage engine bell at staging, due to excess thrust provided by residual propellant left over from the higher-propellant-capacity cooling system.

[18] On 28 September 2008, the Falcon 1 succeeded in reaching orbit on its fourth attempt, becoming the first privately funded, liquid-fueled rocket to do so.

[21] The design is an EELV-class vehicle, intended to compete with the Delta IV and the Atlas V, along with launchers of other nations as well.

[23] It includes realigned first-stage engines[24] and 60 percent longer fuel tanks, making it more susceptible to bending during flight.

[25] The stage separation system has been redesigned and reduces the number of attachment points from twelve to three,[23] and the vehicle has upgraded avionics and software.

[citation needed] The second flight for the Falcon 9 vehicle was the COTS Demo Flight 1, the first launch under the NASA Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) contract designed to provide "seed money" for development of new boosters.

[32] Dragon orbited the Earth twice, and then made a controlled reentry burn that put it on target for a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Mexico.

[citation needed] The first flight of the Falcon 9 v1.1 was September 29, 2013 from Vandenberg Air Force Base carrying several payloads including Canada's CASSIOPE technology demonstration satellite.

[43] Falcon 1e launches were intended to occur from Omelek Island, part of Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands, and from Cape Canaveral, however SpaceX had announced that they would consider other locations as long as there is a "business case for establishing the requested launch site".

[48] In comparison, the Space Shuttle only had partial engine-out capability, meaning that it was not able to achieve proper orbit by burning the remaining engines longer.

[51] As initially conceived with the SpaceX Falcon 9 Air (F9A) launch vehicle, Stratolaunch was to initially place satellites of up to 6,100 kg (13,400 pounds) into low Earth orbit; and once established as a reliable system, announced that it would explore a human-rated version.

[53] As initially announced, Stratolaunch Systems was a collaborative project that included subcontractors SpaceX, Scaled Composites, and Dynetics, with funding provided by Microsoft co-founder Paul G. Allen's Vulcan investment and project management company.

[52] The whole system will be the largest aircraft ever built; with the first test flight of the carrier aircraft originally expected in 2015 from Scaled Composites' facilities in Mojave, California,[52] while the first test launch of the rocket was not expected before 2016 at the time of the project getting underway.

[56] On 27 November 2012 Stratolaunch announced that they would partner with Orbital Sciences Corporation—initially on an air-launched vehicle study contract—instead of SpaceX, effectively ending development of the Falcon 9 Air.

[56] In May 2013, the Falcon 9 Air was eventually replaced in the development plan by the Orbital Sciences Pegasus II air-launched rocket.

[57] SpaceX Falcon rockets are being offered to the launch industry at highly competitive prices, allowing SpaceX to build a large manifest of over 50 launches by late 2013, with two-thirds of them for commercial customers exclusive of US government flights.

Nevertheless, "somewhat incongruously, its primary US competitor, United Launch Alliance (ULA), still maintained (in early 2013) that it requires a large annual subsidy, which neither SpaceX nor Orbital Sciences receives, in order to remain financially viable, with the reason cited as a lack of market opportunity, a stance which seems to be in conflict with the market itself.

"[60] SpaceX launched its first satellite to geostationary orbit in December 2013 (SES-8) and followed that a month later with its second, Thaicom 6, beginning to offer competition to the European and Russian launch providers that had been the major players in the commercial communications satellite market in recent years.