LOX-Methane Rocket Engines

XCor has some interesting rocket engine designs that could serve the purpose of landing on the Moon.

I am going to put a speculation alert on this.

It is also quite preliminary, so it is very, very speculative at this point.

Anyway, my spreadsheet study last night concluded that a Methane/Lox engine pod could propel the spacecraft towards the Moon.  The XCor's engines could work, but you will need 3 of them, I'd estimate.  That would be for the Earth Departure Stage.

There's a question about what you would do with the EDS.  I think send it to  a LaGrange point and tow it back to LEO with an ion engine.  It would take months, but then you would save on another launch as it would now be reusable.

An insertion burn would be needed.  This would include fuel for the burn and lunar surface operations.  I am really allowing only a small mass to land.  About 2k kilograms dry mass.  This is about the mass of the ascent stage of the Lunar Module during the Apollo Era.  The plan is to refuel on the surface and return to dock in lunar orbit.  This saves considerable mass, which makes the EDS much smaller, which makes the liftoff rocket much smaller.

An XCor rocket could do the honors of the landing.  The same as above.  Only one should suffice.  Even then it may be overpowered.

More thinking on this is necessary as is it all very preliminary.

Perhaps you could use the EDS for the insertion burn and for the landing.  How?  Make them detachable.  Somehow.  Otherwise, you need to add engines, tanks and etc.

Here's a possibility.  Go to a LaGrange point on the TLI.  From the LaGrange point, do the landing and then return.  This will require a longer burn, but it may save having to use a lot of hardware and possibly be forced to make expensive equipment expendable.  If that idea works, then a reusable lander can take off from the LaGrange point with one XCor engine.

Back to the original thought.  Perhaps you could use Xcor's EZrocket for the lunar ops.  It runs on LOX too, so lunar oxygen can help reduce the reaction mass needed.  These may be expendable, or kept in lunar orbit as needed.

At any rate, all of the masses should be considerably less than Apollo.  Which means it could be launched on a Falcon heavy once the infrastructure is in place.  This means a Moon base is necessary, or it doesn't make sense.

The whole point should be a Moon base, or what the hell are you doing there?