Dec 28 1975
From The Space Library
Lutz T. Kayser, an aerospace engineer from Stuttgart, Germany, had established a business called Orbital Transport and Raketen A.G. to build and launch rockets on a commercial basis, starting in 1980: if successful, it would be the world's first private space-launch venture. NASA had been charging at least $25 million to put a $12-million satellite into space; Kayser had designed a "space truck" to put satellites in orbit for half the NASA price. His rockets could not be used for military purposes, he said, as he had no plans to sell equipment, but would do the launches himself and sell only booster services. As the launches could not take place in crowded West Germany, they would have to be done from either a ship at sea or from abase in some sparsely populated country. After ground tests of Kayser's rocket engines last summer, German scientists had been convinced that his spacecraft would fly.
Kayser said that if the Germans would not support him, he would seek backers elsewhere, in South America or Asia. He had hoped more than half the backing would come from private investors, and the rest from banks. The West German government had spent about $2 billion to encourage German and European space projects that could offer an alternative to the NASA monopoly, but such projects had not succeeded.
The first "space truck"-now under construction for suborbital test next year-would be 39.62 m high and consist of inexpensive conventionally produced materials. To make mass production possible, all stages would use identical engines; the stages would be placed in concentric rings that would drop off as the craft climbed. (NYT, 28 Dec 75, 18)
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