Staging

Why rockets drop pieces

An interactive lesson with 6 steps, about 5 minutes: you predict, drag and solve, with instant feedback on every answer. It runs in your browser and needs JavaScript.

What you’ll learn

• Staging drops empty tanks so later stages push less dead weight.
• Stage $\Delta v$ values add: $\Delta v = \sum v_e \ln R_i$.
• Only a few percent of a rocket’s launch mass reaches orbit.

Steps

1. Throwing away dead weight
2. Two stages
3. Three stages
4. Why not ten stages?
5. The tyranny of the rocket equation
6. Saturn V