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Let’s Unpack the Pendulum Rocket Fallacy | WIRED

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And explore how it relates to Iron Man’s flight strategy.

Save this story Save this story It's difficult to make a rocket if you are one of the first rocket makers. Sometimes, you simply don't know the best way to design a rocket so you just have to pick something. This is exactly what happened with the early rockets. Robert Goddard's early design put the thruster at the very top of the rocket with the fuel tank at the bottom . The idea was that a top-mounted rocket would make the whole thing more stable. If the vehicle deviated from a perfect vertical motion, its lower center of mass would just make it swing back to the vertical position—just like a

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