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The Principia (Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica)
Isaac Newton publishes the Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica talking about physics and his three laws of motion which lay down the basis of all future rocket designs. -
Goddard's Propellant
Goddard used gasoline as their fuel and LOX (liquid oxygen) as their oxidizer. The reason he used gasoline was because it was the cheapest fuel and he had to pay for everything by himself. It lifted 12 meters above the ground. Although this was not a great achievement compared to the space rockets, this had the basis idea for all future designs. -
Sputnik 1
Used T-1 kerosene as fuel and LOX as oxidizer. Was bigger, had greater launch power, had oxygen tanks to store energy to launch to space. Used kerosene instead of gasoline as it is safer to store and use. They used a sphere shape for the design as it is the strongest shape for a pressurized vessel (They had pressurized nitrogen inside). -
Apollo 11
"One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." Apollo 11 managed to send a spacecraft into space, send itself back to Earth with the passengers alive. Used liquid hydrogen instead of kerosene because of its high energy content of unit per weight, making hydrogen fuel lighter than kerosene fuel. Made the payload a nose cone to minimize drag (air resistance) and to provide stability and control. -
Falcon 1
(Used Merlin engine so it uses RP-1 kerosene and LOX) Falcon 1's launch stages and future innovations using RP-1 saved much more money than NASA’s liquid hydrogen. The total cost of Apollo 11 was 25.4 billion, whereas Falcon 1 was only 7 million. RP-1 is also denser making it more powerful by volume. Their Merlin engine had a better thrust to weight ratio (giving more thrust with lighter weight) and it could also reduce thrust where Apollo 11’s F-1 engine could not. -
Falcon 9
(Used Merlin engine so it uses RP-1 kerosene and LOX) The Falcon 9 was able to be reflown 70 times, because they had cold-gas thrusters at the top to keep it upright and then near descent they had carbon-fibre legs at the bottom to keep the fuselage stable. -
Falcon Heavy
(Used Merlin engine so it uses RP-1 kerosene and LOX) Falcon Heavy’s purpose was to send humans out of low-orbit range to potentially colonize Mars and the Moon. The design heavily depended on the Falcon 9 rocket. The center core of the first stage was Falcon 9 and the side rockets were also Falcon 9s serving as strap-on boosters. It was able to lift 64 metric tons (64k kg) into space and all 3 booster rockets returned safely to Earth. -
Inspiration 4 (Crew Dragon Resilience)
(Used SuperDraco engines so they used monomethylhydrazine (MMH) and dinitrogen tetroxide (NTO).) This is the first all civilian space crew to fly in space. This mission was a part of colonizing the Moon and Mars however Falcon Heavy was built to get out of the low-orbit range in space (using the boosters), and Inspiration 4 was meant to get civilians into space.