![]() ![]() Credit: ULA/Blue Originīezos said ULA has committed a "very significant dollar amount investment" to complete development of the BE-4 engine, which Blue Origin has so far funded internally and intends to use on its own space launcher. It needs to be methodical and deliberate, so the reason we can accelerate the timeframe of the BE-4 is because we're already three years into the process."Ī founder Jeff Bezos discusses Blue Origin's partnership with United Launch Alliance in a briefing with reporters Wednesday. "There is no way to rush a rocket development process," Bezos said. It's (fueled by) liquefied natural gas, it's reusable and it's built, tested, designed and engineered 100 percent in the United States."īruno said the engine could be integrated on a ULA launcher within about four years, in half the time other experts projected. "Cost to space is a very important factor, so basically cost and reliability are the two driving factors. "It's 550,000 pounds of thrust, it has a very low recurring cost and low life cycle cost," Bezos said. ![]() Also, they have this really innovative technology that's going to allow us to modernize, increase performance and lower our recurring costs."īlue Origin has already completed three years of development on the BE-4 engine. "We selected Blue for a couple of reasons," said Tory Bruno, ULA's president and CEO. ULA's selection of Blue Origin's Blue Engine-4, or BE-4, left out the company's primary engine vendor, Aerojet Rocketdyne, which builds powerplants for the Atlas and Delta upper stages, plus the hydrogen-fueled RS-68 engine at the bottom of ULA's Delta 4 rocket. and Lockheed Martin Corp., United Launch Alliance announced a review of new rocket engine concepts in June. The engines that you remember built in the '50s, '60s and '70s were remarkable pieces of hardware, but we have tools and capabilities, software simulations, computational horsepower that the builders of those great engines could have only dreamed about."įormed in 2006 as a 50-50 joint venture by Boeing Co. "The great engines of the past were truly remarkable machines in their own right. "I think it's pretty clear it's time for a 21st century booster engine," Bezos told reporters at the National Press Club in Washington. national security satellites into space, and ULA's chief executive said Wednesday the choice of Blue Origin as a new engine provider is part of a potential overhaul of the company's Atlas and Delta rocket fleet used to send up spacecraft for the Pentagon, NASA and commercial customers. The arrangement comes after building concerns over ULA's reliance on Russian propulsion to loft U.S. United Launch Alliance announced Wednesday it is teaming with Blue Origin, a secretive space company led by founder Jeff Bezos, to develop a new U.S.-made rocket engine that could replace the Russian engine used to power Atlas 5 first stage boosters.Ī model of the BE-4 engine presented Wednesday at the National Press Club in Washington. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |