X-Nico

3 unusual facts about Rocket engine


Rocket engine

400 BC, a Greek Pythagorean named Archytas, propelled a wooden bird along wires using steam.

During the late 1930s, German scientists, such as Wernher von Braun and Hellmuth Walter, investigated installing liquid-fueled rockets in military aircraft (Heinkel He 112, He 111, He 176 and Messerschmitt Me 163).

Ninth Century Chinese Taoist alchemists discovered black powder in a search for the Elixir of life; this accidental discovery led to fire arrows which were the first rocket engines to leave the ground.


British National Space Centre

In February 2009, BNSC, ESA and Reaction Engines Limited announced a public–private partnership funding scheme to demonstrate key technologies of the SABRE engine for the proposed Skylon spaceplane.

Falcon 9 v1.0

The Falcon 9 v1.0 first stage was used on the first five Falcon 9 launches, and powered by nine SpaceX Merlin 1C rocket engines arranged in a 3x3 pattern.

Modular Common Spacecraft Bus

The fast development time is due in part to the novel use of repurposed SCUBA air tanks and a rocket engine that uses cold gas, in place of a conventional fuel/oxidizer or monopropellant engine.

Velocity XL

The Rocket Racing League is utilizing a highly modified Velocity XL FG airframe and an Armadillo Aerospace 2,500 pound thrust liquid oxygen (LOX) and ethanol rocket engine in both its Mark-II X-Racer and Mark-III X-Racer demonstration vehicles.


see also

Aerospike

Aerospike engine, a rocket engine without a traditional rocket nozzle

Bell Aircraft

Bell also designed the rocket engine used in the Apollo LEM Ascent Propulsion System, which was responsible for getting NASA's astronauts off the moon.

BMW 003

The BMW 003 began development as a project of the Brandenburgische Motorenwerke (The Brandenburg Motor Works, known as "Bramo ") under the direction of Hermann Östrich and assigned the RLM designation 109-003 (using the RLM's "109-" prefix, common to all jet and rocket engine projects).

Furfuryl alcohol

In fall of 2012, Spectra, a concept liquid rocket engine using white fuming nitric acid as the oxidizer to furfuryl alcohol fuel was static tested by Copenhagen Suborbitals.

Livingston L. Holder, Jr.

Under his leadership AirLaunch achieved several technical milestones including the largest and heaviest object ever dropped from a C-17 and the largest and longest Vapor Pressurized rocket engine firings in history.

Mizuno Shinryu

If it did not need a tow-plane to get it into the air nor was it catapult launched, then the Shinryu had an almost identical take-off/landing profile as the Mitsubishi J8M Shusui which was the Japanese variant of the German Messerschmitt Me 163 in that it took off under its own rocket engine, expended its fuel, then glided back to its base for landing which would, in some eyes, take it out of the glider category.

Sombold So 344

Then it would ignite its single Walter HWK 109-509 rocket engine and dive towards the enemy bomber fleet at a 45 degree angle.

TR-106

The TR-106 or Low Cost Pintle Engine (LPCE) was a developmental rocket engine designed by TRW under the Space Launch Initiative to reduce the cost of launch services and space flight.

WSTF

White Sands Test Facility - a NASA rocket engine test facility located in the foothills of the Organ Mountains, eleven miles east of Las Cruces, New Mexico