Talk:Skylon (spacecraft)

message: So, there is still not a single working prototype, no  technology developed and tested, - actually nothing, just some concept drawings + some speculations from REL about how they believe "it could possibly work", somewhere in the future. A proper material for a serious encyclopedia, indeed. But then again, when you have nothing to show well into half a century of the space age, you'll at least be glad you have some sketches.   —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.176.154.9 (talk) 19:57, 23 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You who? UK Black Arrow--Kitchen Knife (talk) 20:33, 23 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Why bother building real-world craft that really works? it's so old-school, when merely a pdf presentation is all you need these days  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.176.153.214 (talk) 20:09, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Is that a bit of bitterness from a German because the ELDO stage 3 which failed and but the European Space program back years, was designed by Germany.--Kitchen Knife (talk) 21:06, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Dear Mr. Alan Bond, sir, please log in under your real name. Thank you.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.176.152.212 (talk) 08:53, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah didums.--Kitchen Knife (talk) 12:44, 25 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: This sounds like a highly national program—Go UK!  So the theoretical HOTOL was proven to be unworkable… and was replaced by the theoretical Skylon, right?  I’m guessing  Skylon has little chance of seeing flight (why? oh, just a hunch ; ).  What will replace Skylon?  If you ask me, you're going to waste a perfectly good name.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 143.115.159.54 (talk) 17:25, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:  They are working toward this goal with all the funding available.. which is not alot. Think that they got a grant from the ESA for the sabre engines which is the key to the whole design (using the atmosphere as reaction mass at low altitude).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.102.47.176 (talk) 02:18, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Science fiction ? 

message: Since Bobblewik has already started this discussion on Talk:SABRE I will continue it there.  In my edit comment, I don't mean that nobody uses it as if it were dimensionless--but more on that page.  Gene Nygaard 06:42, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Thrust-to-weight ratio 

message: The article says Skylon uses water-cooled brakes, but the water is jettisoned on takeoff. So how will it land?
: Frankie 16:59, 2005 August 11 (UTC)
The worse-case for the brakes are when the vehicle loses thrust *just* before takeoff. Then the vehicle is full of fuel, and has to stop before the end of the runway and needs to dissipate all the energy that represents.
Landing after reentry, the thing is light as a feather, and you don't need the extra cooling tricks (or atleast not nearly as much).WolfKeeper
I do not like the sound of this.  If the flight has to be aborted near the start, say due to a bird strike, after the water has been dumped how does the aircraft land?  Dumping liquid hydrogen is not safe. Andrew Swallow (talk) 20:24, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: FWIW dumping liquid hydrogen is perfectly safe. It will mix with the air and evapoarate and dissipate. Obviously you would really, really want there to not be an ignition source around, although Skylon's reentry-proof skin would probably handle this better than an awful lot of things if it did ignite.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 01:57, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: The hydrogen is near the ground it will land on people, animals, plants, machines and buildings.  At liquid hydrogen temperatures it can produce cold burns.
Andrew Swallow (talk) 20:45, 9 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: No, it wouldn't the aircraft flies quite fast even to take off so the hydrogen would have evaporated by the time it reaches the ground because it would be diluted down, and the aircraft wouldn't fly over anyone like that anyway. In any case talk pages are not places to discuss technical issues related to the article's topic.- Wolfkeeper 00:31, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: The spread of the fuel would mean it would very rapidly heat to tolerable temperatures - and further, the liquid hydrogen likely wouldn't be dumped. The liquid oxygen is much warmer, so less dangerous to dump, much denser, so it can be dumped more rapidly for emergency weight reduction, and there's four to five times as much of it to get rid of. Note that the water is specifically dumped after takeoff - hence at a point where the aircraft would have to loop around, giving it time to lose the fuel required to meet landing requirements. 31.205.21.4 (talk) 15:35, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Aren't brakes supposed to be for landing? 

message: "The weight of the rear-mounted engine tended to make the HOTOL vehicle fly backwards"... shouldn't this be tip backwards?
:Not exactly, it's sort of like a shuttlecock thrown feathers first; it tends to spin around in the air .WolfKeeper 14:07, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Alan Bond addresses this in one of his lectures - to paraphrase closely, to simply make it relaxed stability, HOTOL became "a system for transporting flaperons to orbit". They had to be so large to counter the pitching moment that they consumed a very large portion of the would-be payload capacity. It is far better to simply make an aircraft that is naturally in trim throughout the flight profile. Also note that relaxed stability does not mean unstable, only a very large reduction in static margin. 31.205.21.4 (talk) 15:43, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Center of mass

message: I rfemoved the following statement from the article, as it seemed to violate WP:OR:
:The overall shape of the fuselage of Skylon bears a resemblance to the similarly named futuristic structure, the Skylon at the Festival of Britain.
Anxietycello (talk) 03:57, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Alan Bond said he named it after this structure in a lecture he gave. Reference to the structure is 21 minutes in. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2G-HPHNrrLQ#t=1260s 98.203.242.147 (talk) 10:48, 16 July 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: He gave the same information at a recent lecture at the European Astrofest 2013. Björn Sandberg (talk) 11:33, 10 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removed oringinal research 

message: The article states, as of 26 March 2010, "The payload would be carried in a standard payload container."  What is a "standard payload container" in this context?  Is there some kind of "industry standard" payload container defined by some industry or government organization?  Is that standard widely adopted?  Is that the standard that is meant here?  If so, let's specify what the standard is.
On the other hand, I suspect that, to date in the space industry, there have been few standards since government programs have been the major efforts in space programs and launch payload specifications have tended to be rather proprietary and launch-vehicle specific.  In any case, I think we need to clarify the "standard payload container" claim in this article.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 18:15, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: There aren't any standards for space vehicles at the moment, but Skylon would have a standard payload container, the linked reference talks about it somewhere or other.- Wolfkeeper 18:39, 26 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: To explain in short, I believe the articles describing their standardised container concept say it would be based on standard airline freight containers, meaning they're already compatible with other transport, but specially lightened and provided with the required opening door for deployment in space. It it not specified how close the resemblance would be, but the implication is mainly that they would fit readily in cargo aircraft for ease of delivery. The plan would be for payloads to be built to fit the containers, for simplicity and cost reduction, then the container can easily be fitted to skylon for rapid launch. 31.205.21.4 (talk) 15:53, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  "standard payload container" 

message: Right, like I said, serious neutrality issues.  YUK! 
108.7.9.7 (talk) 21:07, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Probably not. REL have published in reputable journals, and have delivered public lectures on the idea, there's no known howlers, although there is the odd tricky bit, and they've come from a background of conventional rocketry, and are well respected individuals. They've also been awarded funding from various government and non governmental organizations, those guys are not that easy to pull the wool over their eyes.- Wolfkeeper 21:41, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Neutrality in the wikipedia is about trying to match the overall written analysis on the subject. There isn't that much criticism written about skylon that I'm aware of.- Wolfkeeper 15:40, 12 July 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I think Wolfkeeper is largely correct:  there has not been much written analysis by other sources that would make for WP:V-compliant criticism.  That being said, I think there is some copyediting we could do to make the article less WP:POV-ish.  I made a first-pass attempt to do so with a few paragraphs in the lede:  clarifying that this is a design concept/proposal/paper-studies-not-prototyped-fact/etc., and that most of the [{WP:V]] info on which the article comes from is from the development team, even if some of it is peer-reviewed-published.  I think more of this sort of thing would probably be appropriate.  And if this were done more thoroughly, I suspect it would partially ameliorate the sort of neutrality criticism by 108.7.9.106.  N2e (talk) 19:26, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  SERIOUS NEUTRALITY ISSUES HERE 

message: Hi User:Terra Novus.  Looks like you have made a lot of useful edits, and added a number of helpful inline citations to the article recently.  I am happy to see that as this article needed that.  I have a thought to offer on the use of refnames, especially as used for citing primary sources from the company website.  My thought is that a refname is somewhat more useful—and importantly, a bit less likely to be misused in the future by other editors who may try to reuse the refname when looking at the source at a later date—if it contains an embedded date within the refname.  
For example, if the article is a reliable secondary source, I generally embed the date of the source (e.g., for an Aviation Week article, something like <ref name=aw20100827>).  However, for primary sources, my sense is that it is important to embed the date I looked at the source into the refname (e.g., if I looked at the Reaction Engines company website on 25 Jan 2011, I would do something like <ref name=re20110125>) which of course would then match the "accessdate=2011-01-25" in the citation metadata.  
Many of your recent citations are to the company website, and have generic refnames such as <ref name=userskylon> or <ref name=skylonfaq>.  While totally correct today (where you have noted the correct date accessed in the citation metadata), I would anticipate many future editors may look at those company websites, on future dates, and simply reuse the userskylon or skylonfaq cites, only now their new cites will be looking at a website that may be quite different from the website you looked at on 2011-01-25.  
What do you think?  Too much ado about nothing?  Or useful input?  If you are interested, I would be happy to help make some changes to existing refnames—but don't want to offend you recent good faith and diligent work.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 18:33, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: That is an excellent idea. Go for it. I will be happy to help.--  Novus  Orator    04:10, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I followed your suggestions on all the related references. Please feel free to help improve this article.--  Novus  Orator    04:48, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Great work Novus!  I think that will be helpful to the future quality of the article.  And thanks very much for your kindness in taking the suggestion so well.  N2e (talk) 14:14, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citations and sources 

message: I made what I hope is a fairly minor, and also accurate, copyedit of the part of the lede that summarizes funding on the project.  My intent was to write at a lead-worthy level of abstraction (summary level) and ensure that the detail is adequately explicated in the body of the article.  
On whether or not citations are required for each sentence or major assertion in the lede, I'm sort of agnostic.  As long as the details are articulated, and fully sourced, in the body of the article, I'm okay with the citations not being repeated on the summary claims in the lede.  I think this practice helps the lede stay at a high-level-summary level of abstraction.  And it can oftentimes assist with the claims and cites not getting out of synch so quickly (when they are summarized differently but still redundantly cited in two parts of the article).  Therefore, on the edits I just did, I did not duplicate the citations in the final lede paragraph (which is the only part of the lede I edited).  Other editors preferences may vary.  So if someone wants that paragraph sourced in the lede, as many other paras in the lede currently are, I'm okay if someone adds them back in. N2e (talk) 17:07, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes the funding sourcing wasn't the best.  I'm not so sure about some changes though, particularly that reference to the novelty of SABRE has been removed!  This is the main feature of the spaceplane, the design of Skylon is built around its engines, they are fundamental to the subject.  The only reason the Skylon proposal exists is because of the airbreathing engines, as such I think the lede now doesn't adequately get across what makes Skylon different to other concepts. ChiZeroOne (talk) 17:25, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I have no problem with more about the engine uniqueness being in the lede.  The lede should be about four paragraphs, which is currently is.  So if more about the engine is to go in (which is, as you say, probably quite appropriate) it might be necessary to copyedit the several paras of the lede that I did not just copyedit with my recent edits.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 17:39, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Minor copyedit of the lede 

message: Congratulations to all the editors who contributed to getting this article to Good Article status.--  Novus  Orator    07:28, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: GA pass

message: Quite a bit of the article is sourced with primary sources.  While a lot of this is unavoidable—we must use Reaction Engines as a source for many claims where the information exists nowhere else—it is the case that we really ought to get more secondary sources supporting the major claims of the article.  I will add below one recent source I just read, from CNN, in the mainstream press.  Others please add secondary sources you run into as well.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 17:01, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: This is a conclusion that I agree with; it would be helpeful to increase Secondary Sources, and it would look more professional to do so. I've brought in a good document from Parliament, now inserted in the Bibliography, which I recommend a good reading of for further referencing to. If wanted, I can fish around for more sources from good Secondaries as well. Kyteto (talk) 00:19, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

text: I can't see that factoid quoted anywhere in the sources.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.208.114.181 (talk) 16:33, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sourcing 

message: As per this discussion there appears to be consensus that company names as disambiguators are not favoured for spacecraft.  The actual name of the vehicle here is officially Skylon, not Reaction Engines Skylon.  I suggest it would be consistent to rename the article "Skylon" or, given that there are other common uses, "Skylon (spacecraft)".  This would be in line with the advice developed at the Spaceflight Wikiproject, WP:SPACENAME. ChiZeroOne (talk) 18:54, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Support: Seems reasonable enough to me. --Xession (talk) 18:57, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

text: Support: Good. If this thing is successful it will most likely be referred to as just Skylon anyways...--  Novus  Orator    07:56, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

text: I have gone ahead and made the changes. ChiZeroOne (talk) 17:14, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rename? 

message: There appears to be a mismatch in a number of the figures given throughout this article because they are using values assigned to different iterations of the Skylon design.  The figures given at the bottom of the page mostly use the latest C2 specification (which is effectively baselined with similar capabilities to the final D1 specification, which is part way through its design) given in an update of the manual.  However the payload (12 tonne max, around 10 tonnes more likely though) comes from the "classic" C1 version, not C2's or D1's 15 tonnes.
The problem is because D1 isn't complete REL still often talk about Skylon based on the "current" C1 specs so mostly do not refer to the increased capablilities in media interviews, while their publicity does discuss these.
So what do we propose to do?  The most detailed document, the user manual, is now written for C2/D1 but for the time being media reports for example will still report based on C1. ChiZeroOne (talk) 02:28, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: We follow WP:RS. We use the most reliable sources, which (in this case) would be the user manual, at least until more media coverage surfaces.--  Novus  Orator    07:53, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: In that case, the article should be proofed to consistently read for C2 specs. Part of the issue is likely that many sources were written when C1 was the current spec, as recently as 2008, so there are conflicting numbers from sources that appear current. Anywhere possible numbers should be drawn from the manual, which specs C2, or sources which can be confirmed to be on the same spec. As a future note D1 will not have the same payload capacity as C2 - Alan Bond claims in recent interviews the target is "25% greater" - around 18 tonnes, so the article will need updating and/or clarifying the distinction when that specification is complete and public. 31.205.21.4 (talk) 16:05, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Consistency 

message: Wikipedia:WikiProject Spaceflight would like to see more articles of Featured quality. Please post below if you are interested in helping raise this article to the next level.--  Novus  Orator    06:33, 25 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: [[WP:FA]] drive

message: There is an illustration in the "Technology and Innovations" section with a caption stating that the Skylon is to be "tailless", but in the illustration itself  - and in fact in all the illustrations of the Skylon in the article - there is a tail visible.  What gives? LowKey (talk) 01:36, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: See Tailless aircraft, the "Tail" on aircraft usually refers to just the horizontal surfaces which Skylon lacks at the rear, it only has the vertical.  Though it does have canards so technically it isn't tailless, but not for the reason you mean! ChiZeroOne (talk) 20:44, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tailless? 

message: "The complete Skylon project has a projected R&D cost of over $10 billion and will continue for another 7–10 years.[2]"
The source is the FAQ page on Skylon's website, but all the page says right now is coming soon. The BBC news article from 2012 quotes 250m pounds to take the project into the final phase.  98.203.242.147 (talk) 10:49, 16 July 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: In accordance with this dispute, the content has been removed. Kyteto (talk) 00:06, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cost 

message: A technical lecture by Alan Bond reveals this about Skylon :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2G-HPHNrrLQ (as shown above)
*fuselage inspired by airships with Warren girder frame rather than stressed skin 21min
*glass ceramic aeroshell 23min
*insurance cost is the major part of launch cost 48min
The video has unclear origins, and therefore cannot be used as a reference. TGCP (talk) 20:48, 8 December 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: This is just a cut down version of the reference I added to the SABRE article over two years ago, Travelling at the edge of space: Reaction Engines and Skylon in the next 20 years, that was given at the University of Strathclyde. ChiZeroOne (talk) 11:01, 9 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Technical details 

message: I noticed that some of the references had red missing title parameter errors in the article display. I have corrected these by using  instead of the previous definitions. This provides a link from the reference to the bibliography citation and removes the necessity for maintaining extra ref name attributes. Unless someone objects, I will make a similar change for the Hempsell and Longstaff (2009) refs: this will make all the references to items in the bibliography uniform. --Mirokado (talk) 14:39, 21 July 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citations and sources, part 2 

message: Valkyrie and VDSR are suborbitals rockets designed for various tests of the Skylon and SABRE components.   I see no mention of them in the article, which is unfortunate, imho.  Informations can be found on forum.nasaspaceflight.com, and on the RE website I guess.  Of course it would require third party sources, but if those can be found, it'd be interesting to add them in the article, I think.
link to the forum.nasaspaceflight.com about valkyrie and VDSR
--Grondilu (talk) 10:55, 11 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Valkyrie and VDSR? 

message: With the recent successful launch and vertical recovery of the first stage by American companies Blue Origin and SpaceX, the prospect for any further development of Skylon has dimmed significantly. One of Skylon's financial suppliers, the ESA, is under cost pressure from upstart launch provider SpaceX. There is a dawning realization throughout the industry that the vertical launch/recovery design is the most economically efficient and achievable method for the future. 
To complete the highly speculative and unproven design of Skylon, billions would have to be spent to even construct a prototype composed of cutting edge technologies--some of which have yet to be built.  Note that we are discussing the prototype, not the final production design capable of lifting 15 tons, which will be several magnitudes more complex--not to mention the staggering financial resources that will be required to build and test it.  Maybe it could be built by the Americans (possibly the Russians or Chinese), if they wanted to pour in the necessary funds, but certainly not the UK (who weren't able to overcome the technical challenges in building the Nimrod AEW Surveillance aircraft).
Contrast that to the methods employed by Blue Origin (New Shepard) and SpaceX (Falcon 9): proven, reliable technologies, albeit with the addition of a fabulous twist (vertical landing). 
Surely the desire by the UK and the ESA to provide precious funds for Skylon is vanishing quickly.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 143.115.159.58 (talk) 18:19, 22 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Skylon Competition - from vertical recovery eg SpaceX - 2016 

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thread_title:  Blacklisted Links Found on the Main Page 

message: (see also section above ~2010) Article says "it would require a specially designed runway which is strengthened more than usual" with a now dead reference. This seems very important (possibly a major hindrance) so can we have some more details on what the runway requirements are (length and strength) (maybe compare to existing strong runways) and likely cost to build/upgrade ? - Rod57 (talk) 13:55, 14 December 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: ref name=JBIS2004  states that it can use conventional runways. I deleted the opposite comment and its dead link. Thx. BatteryIncluded (talk) 18:13, 14 December 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: PS: Some Boeing 747 weigh 450 tons and use regular runways. BatteryIncluded (talk) 18:17, 14 December 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a dead link, but the article exists, which I trivially googled and found, and can be downloaded, as well as a new version you can also download. Neither version states it can take off from a conventional runway. Indeed, it indicates it would have it own, extended runway.GliderMaven (talk) 00:22, 15 December 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: The 2014 Reaction Engines web site states it will require a reinforced runway. Having edited that, you have to learn that in Wikipedia, your edit is as good as your reference. If the link is dead, so is your edit and your argument. If you have a live link, then WTF, use it! Last, the "offending" 2004 reference (JBIS vol. 57 2004) states: The vehicle is capable of taking off and landing from conventional runways on its own undercarriage.  BatteryIncluded (talk) 03:14, 15 December 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Stop deleting the weight of the spaceplane and the live reference to the reinforced runway. If you want a pissing contest, Wikipedia is not the place. Thank you. BatteryIncluded (talk) 03:27, 15 December 2015 (UTC)

text: I believe, particularly in earlier earlier cases, REL use "conventional runway" as opposed to unconventional horizontal take off methods, such as rocket sleds or ski-jumps — i.e. something that someone looking at would say "that's a runway"  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.22.197.128 (talk) 17:31, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Need for a stronger runway 

message: "The second grant of £10 million was approved by the European Space Agency in July 2016" I understand the 10 million was paid to the ESA to have them oversea the development (to lend credibility?) 213.205.194.179 (talk) 23:28, 22 July 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  50/60m funding

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replies: text: checkd Stgpcm (talk) 08:42, 20 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified - 2017 

message: "since 2000, the firm has been working with the University of Bristol to develop a suitable engine design, which has been deemed to be vital to the success of Skylon. 
This seems to suggest a great deal of involvement from Brisol, STRICT/STERN were 2007-2010 and were about validating nozzle designs, rather than "developing a suitable engine design". A number of other features are vital to the success of Skylon, e.g the precoolers, TPS, undercarriage...
Please could more information about the start and finish dates, and work undertaken be provided? Stgpcm (talk) 01:07, 23 August 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  University of Bristol 

message: I'm increasingly uncomfortable with comparing Skylon with ATV for payloads to ISS - it's very much an apples to oranges situation. Skylon would need a payload container, and it would need engines to provide the reboost cabability (the fuel for which was two thirds of the ATV payload).
Using the SPLM would reduce the amount of cargo delivered to ISS to 3.2 tonnes, but that's overkill for just payload, containing life support and control facilities. Stgpcm (talk) 15:30, 22 September 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comparison to ATV 

message: The following claim is not in agreement with the linked reference...
"...   In paper studies, the cost per kilogram of payload carried to LEO in this way is hoped to be reduced from the current £1,108/kg (as of December 2015) ..."
The linked reference shows a couple figures around 5 mT cargo around 60+ million pounds, which computes to an order of magnitude higher cost than provided in this article in thw quote above.
BGriffin (talk) 03:47, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: I think I used the Falcon Heavy reusable price with the expendable payload, the expendable price would have been around 1500 GBP/kilo. The heavy was used to prevent accusations of cherry-picking as it gave lower per kilo prices - Stgpcm (talk) 14:41, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mistake in current cost peg kg. 

message: The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:
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thread_title:  A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion 

message: As far as I can see, the last update in this article is from 2018. I appreciate this is to some extent a confidential project, but is there any information on any further development since then?  The article currently includes: 'if all goes to plan, the first ground-based engine tests could happen in 2020'. It's 2020 now, did all go to plan? It seems like an update is needed. Robofish (talk) 20:46, 24 March 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: No, construction of TF1 was terminated implying the supplier unfulfilled promises. Too depressed (lockdown) to continue editing. Stgpcm (talk) 23:53, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Update needed 

message: ((1) Sentences are too long.)
(2) Nevertheless, the third and final sentence has an omission.  It currently includes : "... attain a peak altitude of roughly 28 kilometres (92,000 ft), where payloads would typically be launched prior to the vehicle's re-entry into the atmosphere, ...".  For SSTO, the rocket part must not be forgotten. Re-entry cannot start below the Karman line. --94.30.84.71 (talk) 12:46, 9 February 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: (2) is very wrong.Stgpcm (talk) 00:00, 27 February 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: we were lucky to receive one of Kyteto's overhauls, which I believe accounts for both of these issues (and possibly others.) Stgpcm (talk) 10:22, 27 February 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Technology and Design : Overview : Important omission? 

message: The intro says "7.3 tonnes (16,000 lb) to Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO)," without a citation. The Skylon operations videos (on vimeo & YouTube eg Skylon operations show a recoverable "Upper Stage" used to put payloads into GTO. I'll just add  for now. - Rod57 (talk) 20:02, 12 February 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Payload to GTO  - Use of recoverable Upper Stage 

message: The redirect Skylon (spacecraft has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at  until a consensus is reached.  Utopes (talk / cont) 18:15, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  "[[:Skylon (spacecraft]]" listed at [[Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion|Redirects for discussion]]