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Commercialization

SpaceX Ready for Raptor Engine Components Testing at Stennis

By Marc Boucher
NASA Watch
April 24, 2014
Filed under ,

SpaceX Set to Test Raptor Engine Components at NASA Stennis, SpaceRef Business
SpaceX has been working on the Raptor methane-fueled rocket engine since 2009. The new engine, a reusable engine is destined to be used in future versions of the Falcon Heavy and in the long term for the notional SpaceX Mars Colonial Transporter.
Testing is set to begin within the coming days after the E-2 test stand activation is completed a spokesperson for SpaceX confirmed to SpaceRef.

SpaceRef co-founder, entrepreneur, writer, podcaster, nature lover and deep thinker.

47 responses to “SpaceX Ready for Raptor Engine Components Testing at Stennis”

  1. DTARS says:
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    In the american engine thread Mr. Wingo said it cost NASA 3.3 billion to develop the J2 engine. I asked him what it really cost to build the engine. His answer Immaterial. Well how much will it cost Spacex to develop merlin????? I bet well under a billion??? Anyone have a clue???

    How much should it cost to develop a new rocket engine???

    How bad have I been ripped off over the years??

    How much should it REALLY cost to build a BFR like SLS or Spacex’s Mars Colonial Transport?????

    Is it not NASAs job to ask this question over and over? Isn’t that what NASA does????

    Joe Q Taxpayer

    • HyperJ says:
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      SpaceX developed Falcon 1, Falcon 9, The Merlin engine variants, *and* Dragon for less than $500 million.

    • Hug Doug ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ says:
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      Is it not NASAs job to ask this question over and over? Isn’t that what NASA does??

      the answer to that question is No. nowhere in NASA’s charter is there a requirement to ask questions about cost.

      NASA’s job is:

      Expansion of human knowledge of the Earth, the atmosphere and space

      Improvement of aeronautical and space vehicles

      Development and operation of vehicles for space flight

      Establishment of long-range studies of aeronautical and space activities for peaceful and scientific purposes[4]

      Preservation of the role of the United States as a leader in aeronautical and space science technology

      The making available to agencies directly concerned with national defense of discoveries that have military value or significance

      Cooperation by the United States with other nations in the peaceful application of space research

      Effective utilization of scientific and engineering resources of the United States in order to avoid unnecessary duplication of effort, facilities, and equipment

      In 2012, a ninth objective was added: “The preservation of the United States preeminent position in aeronautics and space through research and technology development related to associated manufacturing processes.”[5]

      • dogstar29 says:
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        There are few things more important to advancement of both rocket and aircraft design than cost, particularly operational cost. If the cost is too high there are no customers and the design fails. Cost was critical to NACA, and cost is critical to all future space and aviation development. Cost was ignored during Apollo but ultimately cost ended Apollo and Constellation, and will probably end SLS/Orion. So yes, cost is in the NASA charter, even if it is implied, and everyone, top, bottom, or in the middle, should recognize it.

        • Hug Doug ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ says:
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          implied, and should: key words.

          the Shuttle cost approximately 500 million per launch, ignoring R&D costs, cost to build them, construct and maintain the launch pads, facilities, etc. add those costs in and it’s closer to 1.5 billion per launch.

          it was tremendously expensive, and had very few commercial customers. it still launched several times per year for 30 years, doing government / NASA launches.

          so the reality is: looking to save money is not explicitly their goal, so they don’t.

  2. Ben Russell-Gough says:
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    Someone said that it was about time for the US to develop its’ own large hydrocarbon engine. They then immediately went on to dismiss SpaceX’s contribution as irrelevant. Just worth remembering in the light of this article.

    • Thomas says:
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      The raptor engine is a scale up of IPD (assuming he’s going to build a 600,000 lb-thrust, not 250,000 lb-thrust like IPD), but running methane rather than hydrogen for fuel. Its a full-flow staged combustion device. Yes, the government paid lots of money into this design, the IPD design. Due to the open source of IPD, and SpaceX hiring folks who worked on the IPD design (similar to the Space X strategy of hiring folks who worked on the TR-106 & FASTRAC, re-branded Merlin) SpaceX is attempting to speed up the design cycle.

      Keep in mind also that SpaceX is setting their own design requirements. Other suppliers have their requirements set by NASA. These are two very different worlds, two very different costs. Both are realistic, but its important to look at them in the proper frame of reference.

      • DTARS says:
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        How SMART of him to realize that you don’t need reinvent the wheel to make us a multi planet Species.

        • Thomas says:
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          No argument there. But back to Mr. Russell-Gough’s comment, SpaceX isnt developing a new engine, they’re tweaking this or that. They’re not contributing to the engine design theory like J2X and other recent engine programs.

          As you’ve stated he’s taking what the government already has paid for, and using it to go to Mars.

          Totally cool with that, but I think we’re talking two different topics: one is SpaceX’s contribution to rocket engine propulsion, the other is about making us a multi-planet species.

          • Tombomb123 says:
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            “SpaceX’s contribution to rocket engine propulsion” So your telling us that if this Raptor the most powerful methane rocket engine was build it would not advance rocket engine technology.
            Well you just don’t know that, because you don’t know if there’s any problem’s with scaling up a methane rocket engine to that size because “it hasn’t been done before”
            Lindbergh didn’t have the most advanced engine he had the plane that got the job done.

          • Thomas says:
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            I’m saying if tax dollars are used to fund the most powerful methane rocket, the data, literature and research will be closed-source, unlike the development for the last 50 years by PW, Rocketdyne, Aero-jet, NG and others.

            The big assumption we’ve both made is that it will be a scaled-up version of IPD, an assumption no-one has been able to confirm or deny.

            I fully expect there to be problems if they do scale-up. You and I will pay for it, and that data will be locked up b SpaceX, so that when the next company tries to do the same, you and I will pay for it again.

          • dogstar29 says:
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            How did J2X contribute to engine design? Where is an existing lox-methane engine with anything close tot he performance of the Raptor? A comparable thrust and Isp? Oh, there’s the RD-180. For $1B in tax dollars we’ll build a copy of it.

          • Thomas says:
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            One example is in turbine design. Significant work was put into understanding the HCF of the turbine, anchoring it back to CFD analysis, and then redesigning it. There are many more. Do a google search for J2X analysis. If you can get access to the NASA technical papers there has been significant work done that can be shared (ITAR controlled, as always).

            For the Raptor, lets break down the design.

            For the 250,000lb-thrust raptor it can be an exact copy of IPD. All open source. Methane and H2 can be swapped and run interchangeably when flow-paths are adjusted for the different fuel densities. The LOX pump stays exactly the same.

            For a 600,000lb-thrust raptor, pumps can be scaled up from IPD. This is how the US and the Russians do it. Combustion stability issues can be resolved a few ways. One way is by having three combustion chambers on one pump, replicating the same injector/acoustic chamber design from IPD and requires minimal investment; smart way to go. Combustion stability for a single bigger injector/nozzle would require more money, something that doesnt fit into SpaceX’s strategy. The TR-106 (650,000 lb-thrust) is an alternative but its not full-flow staged combustion.

            For a 1,000,000lb-thrust raptor, either a scale-up of the pump from IPD and 4 barrel chamber similar to the RD-170 would be the quickest solution. A scale up of TR-106 would work as well, but would require more work/money.

        • DTARS says:
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          Thomas after reading an article a month or two ago which said hydrogen fuel embrittles engine parts and rp-1 cokes engine parts it seems obvious to me that methane is the fuel of choose for rockets at this time. Shouldn’t fuel depots near earth and moon be methane too?? Musk has chosen methane for mars. But seems to me it should be the fuel of choice to build the inner solarsystem highway on.

          As to your point, we are talking about different things I agree. For fifty years now I have dreamed of us living in space and on other planets and finally someone is putting together a plan and executing it and all the better if he uses the research my tax dollars have already paid for.

          • Thomas says:
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            As for hydrogen embrittlement, there are alloys that are acceptable, and alloys to be avoided. Many alloys do no be come embrittled by hydrogen and are thus used on the hydrogen side of the pump. Alloy selection also depends on the life cycle of the pump. Do you design for 5-7 lives or go to a 50 life cycle design for re-usability.

            Please note that methane can also cause embrittlement and is an issue in the oil industry today. It is not as well characterized and could be a science project all on its own. I am not saying it cannot be overcome, however, many of the same design guidelines for alloy selection needed to avoid hydrogen embrittlement also apply for methane.

            RP coking is an interesting topic. The coking temperature of the fuel is design parameter of the engine cycle. The regen-cooled combustion chamber must be kept at or below a certain temperature to avoid coke formation along the regen-cooled channels. Now, RP-2 has come on the market, doubling the coking temperature, from ~550F now to ~1100F. This allows for a higher efficiency combustion cycle. As for coking within the combustion pathways, ORSC cycles ‘clean’ themselves they run at much higher combustion pressures and higher temperatures, and thus form different exhaust constituents.

            The one benefit of the tax dollars we’ve all paid towards rocket engine research for the past 50 years is that it has been, in most cases, has been open source. SpaceX has leveraged this and should be applauded. Now the research that SpaceX is doing is closed-source, taking tax dollars, and keeping the data behind closed doors. That’s my personal gripe.

        • DTARS says:
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          Thomas

          So your saying that the J2X was more advanced research?? Should it have cost 3.3 billion?? Is that a fair price? Or did I get ripped off??

          • Thomas says:
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            Yes, I’m saying J2X was more than just an engine development program. If the program was simply to update the J2, it would have been significantly cheaper. When faced with NASA as the ‘customer’, NASA has continual requirements churn and new process development. To the point, the program was saddled with the charter to push the envelope in analytical tool development. If you do a google search on J2X analysis, there are volumes of technical reports. These reports cost money, and to be comprehensive, a lot more work needed to be performed, above and beyond what was needed just for the engine development.

            To put it simply, J2X became a training program for the US’s next generation of rocket engine ‘scientists’, designers, and developed a catalog of design and analysis tools to expedite the engine design cycle time. Note these tools are open-source to industry so everybody can benefit. They did fundamental rocket science development to avoid the historical design it-build it-test it-redesign, like in the ’50’s and ’60’s. Laying the foundation cost money, but the cost benefit for the future is there.

            Is it a rip-off? It was expensive, no doubt. Compared to what is happening in Russia where their core rocket design capability is dying off and not being replace, maybe it was worth it?

            SpaceX is surely benefiting from it, as is Blue Origin and everybody else domestically.

      • Paul451 says:
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        The raptor engine is a scale up of IPD (assuming he’s going to build a 600,000 lb-thrust, not 250,000 lb-thrust like IPD), but running methane rather than hydrogen for fuel.

        So, completely different fuel and nearly triple the thrust, but it’s [handwave] basically the same rocket.

        Meanwhile, the mothballed J-2X upgrade was “contributing to engine design theory”.

        And let me guess: F9R is [handwave] basically DC-X. And Dragon is [handwave] basically Gemini. And SpaceX is [handwave] basically just repeating what “we” already did in the ’60s. Basically.

        Keep in mind also that SpaceX is setting their own design requirements. Other suppliers have their requirements set by NASA.

        Nonsense. There’s nothing to prevent any other player from developing any other hardware with the profits from their government contracts. LM or Boeing individually could have paid for the entire SpaceX first decade costs from their last year’s declared profits.

        The problem is that other companies “won’t get out of bed” without a government contract.

        Due to the open source of IPD, and SpaceX hiring folks who worked on the IPD design (similar to the Space X strategy of hiring folks who worked on the TR-106 & FASTRAC, re-branded Merlin [etc]

        I never understand why people think these arguments somehow diminish what SpaceX has achieved. “They only took ideas and technology that were available to everyone else in the industry, but which no-one else in the industry bothered to use because no-one paid them up-front. Therefore, SpaceX is nuttin’ special.” Shouldn’t this be a source of shame for the entire rest of the industry? “We had every single thing they had, including vastly more capital, but instead of doing this a decade ago, we actually pretty much gave up on the entire commercial launch market to foreign launchers.”

        Musk: Okay, sure, I was walking along and I saw billions of dollars lying on the ground, and I thought, sure, I could bend down and pick that up. So I bent down and picked it up. Now I have billions of dollars!

        Industry Apologists: Yeah, we saw that years ago. We were paid to do an identifying study, but funding for the follow up “pick up” phase was cancelled, so…

        Musk: And, like, behind the first billions of dollars there was even more billions of dollars!

        Industry Apologists: You were only able to pick those up because you weren’t constrained by government requi…

        Musk: In fact it just keeps going and going, like some kind of billions of dollars mine!

        Industry Apologists: Yeah, we theorised about billions of dollars mines decades ago in a study for the Air Force. You even hired some of the guys who did the study. It’s no surprise that you found a billions of dollar mine when you were just following their instructions. I mean, you contributed nothing to the field of billions of dollars mining…

        Musk: Woo! Bill-yuns! Bill-yuns! Bill-yuns! I’m goin’ to Disneyland! Mars Disneyland!

        but its important to look at them in the proper frame of reference.

        • DTARS says:
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          🙂

        • Thomas says:
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          The problem is that other companies “won’t get out of bed” without a government contract.

          This is very true. LM and Boeing are public traded companies that have to show a stagey to make money. Boeing tried that with the Delta IV and it didnt make money. SpaceX is trying it, but they’re not making money, currently. Its not’s Elon’s business plan to do so, his plan is to go to Mars. Two completely different objectives, different operating environments.

          Once SpaceX launches a couple of government payloads we’ll see where his costs go for the medium size Atlas V comparison. SpaceX should be able to beat the Delta IV heavy on cost no problem. Then again, the Delta IV heavy is lifting the same payload as the Titan IV, but half the cost of the Titan IV was charging a mere 10 years ago.

          Quite the contrary to your comments, SpaceX is something special. They’ve taken government funded technologies, and taken additional government funds, and provided the government with a lower cost launcher. They’re doing it under different requirements (not EELV requirements), and are able to keep their costs down by launch rates and using existing technologies. They should be commended for that.

          My comments are related to rocket engine design and that under the veil of existing technologies they’re claiming its all their own.

          An analogy: take the F-1 rocket engine, and change the pre-burner duct to dump overboard rather than into the nozzle. You’ve only tweaked it ever so slightly, but you’ve renamed it to “Wizard” engine. People throw accolades that you’ve developed a new engine at a fraction of the cost. We’ll maybe rightfully so but you’ve only done a fraction of the design. This is where misleading the public hurts the industry as a whole. Give credit where credit is due, but that goes both ways.

          • hikingmike says:
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            Musk does give NASA plenty of credit. Does SpaceX says these engines are all their own?

            Can you elaborate on your analogy and compare the actual engines in question? Merlin/FASTRAC and Raptor/IPD? Just curious. I suspect it wasn’t tweaked only the small amount as in your analogy, which means that analogy is just a strawman. And where do you draw the line on changes to an engine before a company can say the engine is all their own? Or even just rename it?

        • hikingmike says:
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          Awesome, funniest thing I saw today, thanks

        • doc3osh says:
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          Paul451– Spectacular. Thank you for this!

  3. James Lundblad says:
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    Why hasn’t anyone done Methane before? Natural Gas is relatively cheap now.

    • Terry Stetler says:
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      Russia has been working on methane engines for a decade (RD-0162/0164 etc), and the US started with the Integrated Powerhead Demonstrator but never followed through. XCOR has the XR-5M15 7,500 lbf methane engine they developed with ATK.

    • Hug Doug ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ says:
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      it has been done, but never at this scale.

      Methane is a compromise fuel. it doesn’t have the ISP of Hydrogen, or the energy density of RP-1

      but it’s a nice balance between the two.

    • Dewey Vanderhoff says:
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      Musk is crazy like a fox when it comes to methane.

      First , recall how important ” reusability” is to him as far as engines and rocket components go. Second, he want to go to Mars, so engines with lots of redundancy and shelf life and plenty operating cycles make sens. Third, and most important, methane can be manufactured on Mars from CO2 and water ice. You can bet one of the first SpaceX vehicles to land on Mars will have a little methane factory in it….

      THAT is the why of a SpaceX methane engine…

      Oh by the way , the solar system has a lot of methane sources.. .

    • Jeff Smith says:
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      The US Air Force has always wanted to use what they already had lying around.
      Back when the AF still had gas powered airplanes, they wanted to use gasoline (AvGas in various forms). But right as rocketry was ramping up, they wanted to change to jet fuel (kerosene) because now they were buying lots of jets. They soon realized that normal jet fuel (like Jet-A today) have too many volatiles that make pumping it hard (turbopumps HATE high vapor pressure and if you get a phase change, it’ll be a bad day). So instead they turned that jet fuel into a low vapor pressure variety that could be more easily pumped like LOX – and thus RP-1 was born!
      Ever since, RP-1 has been “good enough” for military (and therefore civilian) activities. Methane has benefits, but it adds a second cryogen to the LOX you are already using. Combine “good enough” performance with easy handling characteristics and organizational interia and voila: no changes allowed.
      On the other hand, if launching something more than spy satellites to LEO is your final goal… something like methane can make a LOT of sense. I like methane, and if you are going to use a single propellant combo to keep costs down, it makes even MORE sense to switch to LOX/CH4 rather than LOX/RP1.

    • Thomas says:
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      Methane has always been ‘second’ best when it came to overall vehicle design. The extra ISP of a methane/LOX engine for a first stage engine doesnt trade favorably against the mass penalty you carry for additional vehicle weight. Methane density drives the vehicle bigger, bigger storage specifically. So, at the end of the design trade, you have a higher performing engine for ISP, equivalent thrust to an RP, but you have to move a bigger vehicle because of the lower density of methane vs RP.

      ISP gains are most favorable for upper stages, where tank sizes arent a big penalty as the gravity influence is minimal. This is why having a H2/LOX upper stage makes the most sense from a vehicle system perspective because you want the highest efficiency for the fuel you bring along. Here, methane/LOX is much lower performing in ISP than H2/LOX, requiring more fuel to be brought along.

      Methane/LOX does make sense for deep space big engines. Historically this has been filled by hypergolic engines due to simplicity and at the time, low cost (propellant costs are extremely high these days). But for any mission going beyond the moon, Methane/LOX trades the best for chemical rocket propulsion.

      • dogstar29 says:
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        It probably is very resistant to coking while allowing a fuel-rich preburner turbine, thus avoiding the erosion problem of the LOX-rich RD-180 design. This would be quite useful for reusable systems, and when you really want to use the same fuel in both stages to lower cost it is a reasonable choice.

        • Thomas says:
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          Coking is a design problem for the main combustion chamber regen-cooled flow passages when RP is the fuel source. An RP/LOX engine will not coke when properly designed. If methane LNG is used for fuel to cool the regen-cooled chamber (assuming its not an ablative chamber), coking will be a design problem as well, however, when properly designed the chamber wont coke.

          Neither fuel source will coke, even after shut-down. During flight as the system approaches MECO, the engines throttle down, and as a result cooling the chambers sufficiently. If coking were a problem inherent in RP engines, nobody could fire multiple times on the ground during qual/demo testing.

          I guess I’m confused at the source of concern of coking in general. Coking simply limits the temperature the combustion chamber can see.

  4. dogstar29 says:
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    NASA could provide SpaceX and PWR with seed funds to bring their designs (Raptor and US-built RD-180) to operational status.

    • Marc Boucher says:
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      I don’t see a need for NASA to pay for Raptor development. If successfully developed, and I don’t see why they won’t succeed, NASA would become a customer potentially.

      • DTARS says:
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        AGREE!!!

        NASA should be the Anchor customer when possible. Don’t turn Spacex into another piglet.

        • dogstar29 says:
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          NASA should be a partner, as in a Space Act Agreement, to facilitate and accelerate development. The goal is for SpaceX to get its own commercial customers, not for NASA to be the only or biggest customer. Under the same program a second SAA could encourage PWR to build a US version of the RD-180.

          • Hug Doug ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ says:
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            NASA is already facilitating its development (they’re testing at Stennis, after all) and since NASA didn’t ask for the engine in the first place, there’s no urgency to develop it, so they have no need to accelerate development, either.

          • dogstar29 says:
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            It could provide a rapid route to a cost-effective HLV. Evidence of a more practical solution than SLS could facilitate substantial cost savings. It would also provide a domestic engine in the RD-180 class.

          • Hug Doug ✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ says:
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            it could. that’s what SpaceX wants to do regardless of what NASA wants. again, NASA hasn’t asked for a super duper rocket engine or a super heavy lift vehicle. SpaceX is doing this on their own.

        • Thomas says:
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          The Air Force already paid for the development. Raptor is IPD, full-flow staged combustion. SpaceX could simply run IPD at the 250,000 lb-thrust with minor changes. Scaling up to 600,000 is a challenge but not insurmountable.

          I hate to bring it up, but SpaceX has yet to develop a new engine. TR-107 and Merlin are very close to one another. Same design team, same engine architecture, same pumps, same injector element sizing. This is why NG sued SpaceX, and SpaceX settled out of court.

          My hats off to SpaceX though, using what the tax-payers have already paid for, then getting additional tax payer funds to make it into something they want.

          The knocks against J2X are somewhat valid. Note that it became a science project for many universities in developing analytical codes for combustion stability, code predictions, etc so while they did get an engine in the end, the rocket community got a lot more than just an engine. Is it worth the extra cost? Thats up for us to debate.

          • DTARS says:
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            When did Spacex get additional taxpayer funds to develop Merlin??

          • Thomas says:
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            Specifically the 278M from NASA in 2006 to develop a new booster, in this case to develop the Falcon 9 launch vehicle. Engines are an integral part of a launch vehicle, which included a completely revamped Merlin with a regen-cooled nozzle, boosting engine performance. From this funding came the 1C, and initial funding for the 1D, both which have been used on the Falcon 9. Additional funding for the 1D came/will come from the CRS contract. The original Merlin (1A and 1B) design is simply the FASTRAC (government funded) engine with uprated turbopump turbine/impellers and higher speed, designed and built by Barber-Nicols.

          • dogstar29 says:
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            Will someone please explain why there is _any_ commonality between IPD and Raptor other than maybe staged combustion?

            http://www.astronautix.com/

          • Thomas says:
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            An external reference that can be shared and should be considered: http://www.nasaspaceflight….

            As actual component hardware makes it to the stand and external images become available, it will become apparent that Raptor either is IPD, or is a morph of IPD. Not saying good or bad, just trying to show the lineage.

            Finding out the true thrust of the engine will be important in this discussion as well.

    • William Ogilvie says:
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      Anytime NASA funds external R&D they either own the ip outright or have an unrestricted licence to use it. And maybe Spacex doesn’t need or want taxpayer’s dollars for R&D.

  5. matthew says:
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    when will space x start the falcon x project?