Project Daedalus

Project Daedalus (named after Daedalus, the greek mythological designer who created wings for human flight) was a study made between 1973 and 1978 by the British Interplanetary Society to make a uncrewed interstellar probe.

An artist's view for the spacecraft.

Daeldalus would be constructed in Earth orbit and have a weight (mass) of 54,000 tonnes including 50,000 tonnes of fuel and 500 tonnes of payload. It was to be a two-stage spacecraft.

The first stage would work or two years, taking the spacecraft to very fast speeds at 7.1% of the speed of light,

The second stage would fire for 1.8 years, making the spacecraft faster up to about 12% the speed of light, before shutting down for a 46 year trip to Barnard's star.

Daeldalus would be propelled by a fusion rocket using pellets of a deterium/helium-3 mix that would be ignited in the reaction chamber.

The ship would also contain eqquipment, such as probes, telescopes and other equipment. The spacecraft would also be protected from interstellar medium using a beryillium disc.