...the who's who,
and the what's what 
of the space industry

Displaying items by tag: REL (company)

Monday, 22 April 2013 12:06

Reaction Engines Limited

Reaction Engines Limited (REL) is a British aerospace company based in Oxfordshire, England.

The company conducts research into space propulsion systems, centred around the development of the Skylon re-usable SSTO spaceplane. The three founders worked together on the HOTOL project, funding for which was withdrawn in 1988, largely due to significant technical obstacles.

Published in Organisations
Saturday, 19 January 2013 07:43

Skylon (spaceplane)

Skylon is a design for a spaceplane by the British company Reaction Engines Limited (REL).

It uses SABRE, a combined-cycle, air-breathing rocket engine, to reach orbit in a single stage. A fleet of vehicles is envisaged; the design is aiming for re-usability for more than 200 times.

As of 2012, only a small portion of the funding required to develop and build Skylon had been secured. The research and development work on the SABRE engine design is proceeding under a small European Space Agency (ESA) grant. 

Published in Projects