Loki solid-propellant antiaircraft missiles were used as sounding rockets. JPL fired first of a series of 3,544 Loki solid-propellant antiaircraft missiles at WSPG, the Army program ending after September 1955. Loki rocket was later used in ONR Rockoon upper atmosphere balloon-launched rocket research soundings.

The Rockoon low-cost technique was conceived during an Aerobee firing cruse of the Norton Sound in March 1949. The Rockoon (balloon-launched rocket) consisted of a small high-performance sounding rocket launched from a balloon above most of the atmosphere. Rockoons were first launched from icebreaker Eastwind off Greenland by an ONR group under James A. Van Allen. They were later used by ONR and University of Iowa research groups in 1953-55 and 1957, from ships in sea between Boston and Thule, Greenland.

Rockair technique (resarch rocket launched from aircraft) by ONR and University of Maryland. A 2.75-inch FFAR rocket was fired from a Navy F2H-2 aircraft to an altitude of approximately 60,000 m. Rockair technique first suggested by Herman Oberth (1929) and others.

Black Knight missiles of the United Kingdom was launched from the Australian range at Woomera to an altitude of over 500 km. Gamma engines were manufactured by Bristol Sidney and used on the Black Knight and Black Arrow launch vehicles. Propellants were High Test Peroxide and Kerosene. Black Knight used 4 chambers in two pairs on the Y and Z axes. The motors were gimballed to provide thrust in all axes. Black Knight was flown in both one and two stage versions. When fitted with a second stage, a solid propellant Cuckoo motor was used, manufactured at RPE Westcott.

Produced by Marquardt for the Army, Roksonde meteorological sounding rockets first completed a series of tests at White Sands Missile Range and Pacific Missile Range. They were later successfully fired from Cape Canaveral, telemetered measurements of winds and temperatures at altitudes above 600,000 m.

The Athena was designed to simulate the re-entry environment of an intercontinental ballistic missile and was one of the few examples of sustained interstate missile tests within the United States. The project was begun in February 1964 with the first of several hundred launches from Green River, Utah, to impact points in the US Army's White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. The vehicle would reach altitudes of over 300 km and peak velocities of 6700 m/s on a trajectory that would lead to impact 760 km from the launch point. By August 1965 85 flights had been completed in a series of 149 that was to run to 1969. The US Army ran the instrumented test range while the USAF Space and Missile Systems Organization was the program manager.

Flight test vehicle for Exoatmospheric Re-Entry Interceptor Subsystem, an anti-ballistic missile hit-to-kill interceptor warhead. The ERIS vehicle itself consisted of surplus Minuteman ICBM second and third stages. Lockheed was awarded a five year contract in November 1985 worth at that time $ 490 million that included integration of the rocket. Four test vehicles were built. First launch was made on 28 January 1991 from Kwajalein Atoll against an Aries sounding rocket. A second test on 13 March 1992 against a Minuteman I was considered successful enough that no further tests were planned. Further develoment of the technology was to be accomplished by the Orbital Sciences' Aries test vehicle with spectacularly poor results.

Launch vehicle using surplus missile motors. PLV was part of the Boeing Lead System Integration (LSI) effort on the National Missile Defense (NMD) program. Lockheed Martin was the manufacturer and prime integrator. PLV used elements first seen on the ERIS program.

Minotaur, the first Orbital/Sub-orbital Program (OSP) Space launch vehicle, was scheduled for a late 1999 first launch. The OSP project office, located at Kirtland AFB, was tasked by the Air Force to convert and utilize excess Minuteman II missiles for government satellite delivery. Spaceport Systems International was selected to provide commercial launch services and the launch site for the OSP/JAWSAT mission. Spaceport operations consist of payload processing services provided in the Integrated Processing Facility (IPF) located on Space Launch Complex Six (SLC-6) and include launch services from facilities just south of SLC-6. The Minotaur launch vehicle was made up of modified Minuteman II Stage I and Stage II segments mated with Pegasus upper stages and avionics by Orbital Sciences Corporation (OSC). This program demonstrates the U.S. government�s commitment to utilize excess cold war assets for research and education, while at the same time using commercially available launch services to reduce their overall program costs, as directed by the Commercial Space Act of 1994.