Aerojet Rocketdyne is an American manufacturer of rocket,

hypersonic In aerodynamics, a hypersonic speed is one that exceeds 5 times the speed of sound, often stated as starting at speeds of Mach 5 and above. The precise Mach number at which a craft can be said to be flying at hypersonic speed varies, since in ...

, and electric propulsive systems for space, defense, civil and commercial applications. Headquartered in

Sacramento, California ) , image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg , mapsize = 250x200px , map_caption = Location within Sacramento C ...

, the company is owned by

Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings, Inc. is a holding company of Aerojet Rocketdyne, an American manufacturer of rocket, hypersonic, and electric propulsive systems for space, defense, civil and commercial applications. Aerojet traces its origins to the ...

. Aerojet Rocketdyne was formed in 2013 when

Aerojet Aerojet was an American rocket and missile propulsion manufacturer based primarily in Rancho Cordova, California, with divisions in Redmond, Washington, Orange and Gainesville in Virginia, and Camden, Arkansas. Aerojet was owned by GenCorp. ...

(then owned by

GenCorp Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings, Inc. is a holding company of Aerojet Rocketdyne, an American manufacturer of rocket, hypersonic, and electric propulsive systems for space, defense, civil and commercial applications. Aerojet traces its origins to the ...

) and

Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne (PWR) was an American company that designed and produced rocket engines that use liquid rocket propellants, liquid propellants. It was a division of Pratt & Whitney, a fully owned subsidiary of United Technologies Corpo ...

were merged, following the latter's acquisition by GenCorp from

Pratt & Whitney Pratt & Whitney is an American aerospace manufacturer with global service operations. It is a subsidiary of Raytheon Technologies. Pratt & Whitney's aircraft engines are widely used in both civil aviation (especially airlines) and military aviat ...

. On April 27, 2015, the name of the holding company, GenCorp, was changed from ''GenCorp, Inc.'' to ''Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings, Inc''.

Lockheed Martin The Lockheed Martin Corporation is an American aerospace, arms, defense, information security, and technology corporation with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995. It ...

announced plans to take over Aerojet Rocketdyne on December 20, 2020 as part of a $4.4 billion acquisition; however this was abandoned by Lockheed on February 13, 2022 after opposition from

Raytheon Raytheon Technologies Corporation is an American multinational aerospace and defense conglomerate headquartered in Arlington, Virginia. It is one of the largest aerospace and defense manufacturers in the world by revenue and market capitaliza ...

led the FTC to move to block the acquisition.

Products

Pratt Whitney Rocketdyne space shuttle main engines

Current engines

RS-25 The Aerojet Rocketdyne RS-25, also known as the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME), is a liquid-fuel cryogenic rocket engine that was used on NASA's Space Shuttle and is currently used on the Space Launch System (SLS). Designed and manufactu ...

(

LH2 Liquid hydrogen (LH2 or LH2) is the liquid state of the element hydrogen. Hydrogen is found naturally in the molecular H2 form. To exist as a liquid, H2 must be cooled below its critical point of 33 K. However, for it to be in a fully liq ...

LOX Liquid oxygen—abbreviated LOx, LOX or Lox in the aerospace, submarine and gas industries—is the liquid form of molecular oxygen. It was used as the oxidizer in the first liquid-fueled rocket invented in 1926 by Robert H. Goddard, an appli ...

) – Previously known as the Space Shuttle main engine (SSME), it was the reusable main engine developed by

Rocketdyne Rocketdyne was an American rocket engine design and production company headquartered in Canoga Park, California, Canoga Park, in the western San Fernando Valley of suburban Los Angeles, California, Los Angeles, in southern California. The Rocke ...

for the now-retired

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program na ...

. Remaining RS-25D engines are planned for use on early

Space Launch System The Space Launch System (SLS) is an American super heavy-lift expendable launch vehicle developed by NASA. As of 2022, SLS has the highest payload capacity of any rocket in operational service, as well as the greatest liftoff thrust of any r ...

rocket launches after which an expendable version, RS-25E will be developed for follow-on SLS launches. *

RL10 The RL10 is a liquid-fuel cryogenic rocket engine built in the United States by Aerojet Rocketdyne that burns cryogenic liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen propellants. Modern versions produce up to of thrust per engine in vacuum. Three RL10 ve ...

(LH2/LOX) – Developed by

and currently used on both the

upper stage A multistage rocket or step rocket is a launch vehicle that uses two or more rocket ''stages'', each of which contains its own engines and propellant. A ''tandem'' or ''serial'' stage is mounted on top of another stage; a ''parallel'' stage is ...

of the

Delta IV Delta IV is a group of five expendable launch systems in the Delta (rocket family), Delta rocket family introduced in the early 2000s. Originally designed by Boeing's Defense, Space and Security division for the National Security Space Launch, ...

rocket as well as the

Centaur A centaur ( ; grc, κένταυρος, kéntauros; ), or occasionally hippocentaur, is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse. Centaurs are thought of in many Greek myths as being ...

upper stage for the

Atlas V Atlas V is an expendable launch system and the fifth major version in the Atlas (rocket family), Atlas launch vehicle family. It was originally designed by Lockheed Martin, now being operated by United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture be ...

. It is also currently used on the Space Launch System on the Interim Cyrogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS) and will be used on the

Exploration Upper Stage The Exploration Upper Stage (EUS) is being developed as a large second stage for Block 1B and Block 2 of the Space Launch System (SLS), succeeding Block 1's Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage. It will be powered by four RL10C-3 engines burning ...

(EUS) in the future. Formerly used on the Centaur upper stage for Titan, the

Saturn I The Saturn I was a rocket designed as the United States' first medium lift launch vehicle for up to low Earth orbit payloads.Terminology has changed since the 1960s; back then, 20,000 pounds was considered "heavy lift". The rocket's first stag ...

, and on the vertical-landing

McDonnell Douglas DC-X The DC-X, short for Delta Clipper or Delta Clipper Experimental, was an uncrewed prototype of a reusable single-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle built by McDonnell Douglas in conjunction with the United States Department of Defense's Strategic ...

"Delta Clipper". It was intended to serve as the main propulsion engine for the proposed

Altair Altair is the brightest star in the constellation of Aquila and the twelfth-brightest star in the night sky. It has the Bayer designation Alpha Aquilae, which is Latinised from α Aquilae and abbreviated Alpha Aql ...

lunar lander. *

RS-68 The Aerojet Rocketdyne RS-68 (Rocket System 68) is a liquid-fuel rocket engine that uses liquid hydrogen (LH2) and liquid oxygen (LOX) as propellants in a gas-generator power cycle. It is the largest hydrogen-fueled rocket engine ever flown. I ...

(LH2/LOX) – First stage engine for the Delta IV, designed as a simplified version of the RS-25 due to its expendable usage. It is the largest hydrogen-fueled rocket engine ever flown. * MR103G — 0.2 lb

Hydrazine Hydrazine is an inorganic compound with the chemical formula . It is a simple pnictogen hydride, and is a colourless flammable liquid with an ammonia-like odour. Hydrazine is highly toxic unless handled in solution as, for example, hydrazine ...

monopropellant Monopropellants are propellants consisting of chemicals that release energy through exothermic chemical decomposition. The molecular bond energy of the monopropellant is released usually through use of a catalyst. This can be contrasted with biprop ...

thruster * MR111g — 1 lb Hydrazine monopropellant thruster * MR106L — 5-7 lb Hydrazine monopropellant thruster * MR107M — 45 lb Hydrazine monopropellant thruster * Blue Origin CCE (

solid rocket motor A solid-propellant rocket or solid rocket is a rocket with a rocket engine that uses solid propellants (fuel/oxidizer). The earliest rockets were solid-fuel rockets powered by gunpowder; they were used in warfare by the Arabs, Chinese, Persia ...

or SRM) — the

Blue Origin Blue Origin, LLC is an American private spaceflight, privately funded aerospace manufacturer and sub-orbital spaceflight services company headquartered in Kent, Washington. Founded in 2000 by Jeff Bezos, the founder and executive chairman of Am ...

New Shepard New Shepard is a fully reusable suborbital launch vehicle developed by Blue Origin for space tourism. The vehicle is named after Alan Shepard, the first American astronaut in space. The vehicle is capable of vertical takeoff and vertical land ...

Crew Capsule Escape Solid Rocket Motor is built by Aerojet Rocketdyne.

Former production engines and others

Rocketdyne F-1 The F-1, commonly known as Rocketdyne F1, was a rocket engine developed by Rocketdyne. This engine uses a gas-generator cycle developed in the United States in the late 1950s and was used in the Saturn V rocket in the 1960s and early 1970s. Five ...

(RP-1/LOX) The main engine of the

Saturn V Saturn V is a retired American super heavy-lift launch vehicle developed by NASA under the Apollo program for human exploration of the Moon. The rocket was human-rated, with multistage rocket, three stages, and powered with liquid-propellant r ...

rocket of the Apollo Space Program. The most powerful single combustion chamber liquid-propellant rocket engine ever developed. *

Rocketdyne J-2 The J-2 is a liquid-fuel cryogenic rocket engine used on NASA's Saturn IB and Saturn V launch vehicles. Built in the U.S. by Rocketdyne, the J-2 burned cryogenic liquid hydrogen (LH2) and liquid oxygen (LOX) propellants, with each engine producin ...

(LH2/LOX) Used on upper stage of

Saturn IB The Saturn IB (also known as the uprated Saturn I) was an American launch vehicle commissioned by the NASA, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the Apollo program. It uprated the Saturn I by replacing the S-IV second stage (, ...

and second and upper stages of

. * SJ61 (

JP-7 Turbine Fuel Low Volatility JP-7, commonly known as JP-7 (referred to as Jet Propellant 7 prior to MIL-DTL-38219) is a specialized type of jet fuel developed in 1955 for the United States Air Force (USAF) for use in its supersonic military aircr ...

/ingested air) A dual-mode

ramjet A ramjet, or athodyd (aero thermodynamic duct), is a form of airbreathing jet engine that uses the forward motion of the engine to produce thrust. Since it produces no thrust when stationary (no ram air) ramjet-powered vehicles require an ass ...

scramjet A scramjet (supersonic combustion ramjet) is a variant of a ramjet airbreathing jet engine in which combustion takes place in supersonic airflow. As in ramjets, a scramjet relies on high vehicle speed to compress the incoming air forcefully ...

engine flown on the

Boeing X-51 The Boeing X-51 Waverider is an unmanned research scramjet experimental aircraft for hypersonic flight at and an altitude of . The aircraft was designated X-51 in 2005. It completed its first powered hypersonic flight on 26 May 2010. After t ...

hypersonic demonstration vehicle. *

AJ10 The AJ10 is a hypergolic rocket engine manufactured by Aerojet Rocketdyne (previously Aerojet). It has been used to propel the upper stages of several launch vehicles, including the Delta II and Titan III. Variants were and are used as the servic ...

(

Aerozine 50 __NOTOC__ Aerozine 50 is a 50:50 mix by weight of hydrazine and unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (UDMH), originally developed in the late 1950s by Aerojet General Corporation as a storable, high-energy, hypergolic fuel for the Titan II ICBM rocket e ...

/ N₂O₄) Second stage engine for the

Delta II Delta II was an expendable launch system, originally designed and built by McDonnell Douglas. Delta II was part of the Delta rocket family and entered service in 1989. Delta II vehicles included the Delta 6000, and the two later Delta 7000 va ...

, used as the

Orbital Maneuvering System In spaceflight, an orbital maneuver (otherwise known as a burn) is the use of propulsion systems to change the orbit of a spacecraft. For spacecraft far from Earth (for example those in orbits around the Sun) an orbital maneuver is called a ' ...

(OMS) engine for the Space Shuttle, and the main engine for the European

Orion Service Module The European Service Module (ESM) is the service module component of the Orion spacecraft, serving as its primary power and propulsion component until it is discarded at the end of each mission. In January 2013, NASA announced that the European ...

. *

AR1 The Aerojet Rocketdyne AR1 is a thrust RP-1/LOX oxidizer-rich staged combustion cycle rocket engine project. The engine was conceived in 2014, and received US government funding to build a prototype engine in 2016. By 2018, the USAF had com ...

(RP-1/LOX) A proposed thrust

RP-1 RP-1 (alternatively, Rocket Propellant-1 or Refined Petroleum-1) is a highly refined form of kerosene outwardly similar to jet fuel, used as rocket fuel. RP-1 provides a lower specific impulse than liquid hydrogen (LH2), but is cheaper, is st ...

oxidizer-rich staged combustion cycle engine. *

Rocketdyne H-1 The Rocketdyne H-1 was a thrust liquid-propellant rocket engine burning LOX and RP-1. The H-1 was developed for use in the S-I and S-IB first stages of the Saturn I and Saturn IB rockets, respectively, where it was used in clusters of eight e ...

(RP-1/LOX) A first stage engine flown on the

and

launch vehicles. *

RS-27 The RS-27 was a liquid-propellant rocket engine developed in 1974 by Rocketdyne to replace the aging MB-3 in the Delta. Incorporating components of the venerable MB-3 and the H-1 designs, the RS-27 was a modernized version of the basic design ...

(RP-1/LOX) A first stage engine flown on the

Delta 2000 The Delta 2000 series was an American expendable launch system which was used to conduct forty-four orbital launches between 1974 and 1981. It was a member of the Delta family of rockets. Several variants existed, which were differentiated by a ...

launch vehicle *

RS-27A The RS-27A is a liquid-fuel rocket engine developed in 1980s by Rocketdyne for use on the first stage of the Delta II and Delta III launch vehicles. It provides of thrust burning RP-1 and LOX in a gas-generator cycle. The engine is a modified v ...

(RP-1/LOX) A first stage engine flown on the

and

Delta III Delta III was an expendable launch vehicle made by Boeing. The vehicle was developed from the highly-successful Delta II to help meet the launch demand of larger satellites. The first Delta III launch was on August 26, 1998. Of its three flights ...

J-2X The J-2X is a liquid-fueled cryogenic rocket engine that was planned for use on the Ares rockets of NASA's Constellation program, and later the Space Launch System. Built in the United States by Aerojet Rocketdyne (formerly, Pratt & Whitney Rocket ...

(LH2/LOX) An engine that was originally being developed for the

Ares I Ares I was the crew launch vehicle that was being developed by NASA as part of the Constellation program. The name "Ares" refers to the Greek deity Ares, who is identified with the Roman god Mars. Ares I was originally known as the "Crew Launch ...

's upper stage before the cancellation of the

Constellation program The Constellation program (abbreviated CxP) was a crewed spaceflight program developed by NASA, the space agency of the United States, from 2005 to 2009. The major goals of the program were "completion of the International Space Station" and a " ...

. The engine was considered for the

's Exploration Upper Stage before being replaced with a cluster of four RL10s. It is based on the

. * Baby Bantam (

kerosene Kerosene, paraffin, or lamp oil is a combustible hydrocarbon liquid which is derived from petroleum. It is widely used as a fuel in aviation as well as households. Its name derives from el, κηρός (''keros'') meaning "wax", and was regi ...

) An thrust engine. In June 2014, Aerojet Rocketdyne announced that they had "manufactured and successfully tested an engine which had been entirely

3D printed 3D printing or additive manufacturing is the construction of a three-dimensional object from a CAD model or a digital 3D model. It can be done in a variety of processes in which material is deposited, joined or solidified under computer co ...

." *

AJ-26 The NK-33 and NK-43 are rocket engines designed and built in the late 1960s and early 1970s by the Kuznetsov Design Bureau. The NK designation is derived from the initials of chief designer Nikolay Kuznetsov. The NK-33 was among the most powerfu ...

(

/LOX) Rebranded and modified

NK-33 The NK-33 and NK-43 are rocket engines designed and built in the late 1960s and early 1970s by the Kuznetsov Design Bureau. The NK designation is derived from the initials of chief designer Nikolay Kuznetsov. The NK-33 was among the most powerf ...

engines imported from

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. Used as first stage engine for the

Antares Antares is the brightest star in the constellation of Scorpius. It has the Bayer designation α Scorpii, which is Latinised to Alpha Scorpii. Often referred to as "the heart of the scorpion", Antares is flanked by σ Scorpii and τ S ...

before being replaced by the RD-181. * AJ-60A (Solid -

HTPB Hydroxyl-terminated polybutadiene (HTPB) is an oligomer of butadiene terminated at each end with a hydroxyl functional group. It reacts with isocyanates to form polyurethane polymers. HTPB is a translucent liquid with a color similar to wax paper ...

) A solid rocket motor formerly used for the Atlas V launch vehicle, until being replaced by the Northrop Grumman GEM-63 in 2021 *AR-22 (Hydrogen/LOX) An engine in development from 2017-2020 for the XS-1 spacecraft, also known as the Phantom Express. The engine is based on the

and utilizing parts remaining in Aerojet Rocketdyne and NASA inventories from earlier versions of the RS-25. Two of the engines would have been built for the spaceplane. Boeing pulled out of the project in January 2020, effectively ending it.

In development

X3 Ion Thruster

On 13 October 2017, it was reported that Aerojet Rocketdyne completed a keystone demonstration on a new X3

ion thruster An ion thruster, ion drive, or ion engine is a form of electric propulsion used for spacecraft propulsion. It creates thrust by accelerating ions using electricity. An ion thruster ionizes a neutral gas by extracting some electrons out of a ...

, which is a central part of the XR-100 system for the

NextSTEP NeXTSTEP is a discontinued object-oriented, multitasking operating system based on the Mach kernel and the UNIX-derived BSD. It was developed by NeXT Computer in the late 1980s and early 1990s and was initially used for its range of proprieta ...

program. The X3 ion thruster was designed by the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

PEPL Thrusters: X3
University of Michigan. 2017. and is being developed in partnership with the University of Michigan, NASA, and the Air Force. The X3 is a

Hall-effect thruster In spacecraft propulsion, a Hall-effect thruster (HET) is a type of ion thruster in which the propellant is accelerated by an electric field. Hall-effect thrusters (based on the discovery by Edwin Hall) are sometimes referred to as Hall thruster ...

operating at over 100 kW of power. During the demonstration, it broke records for the maximum power output, thrust and operating current achieved by a Hall thruster to date. It operated at a range of power from 5 kW to 102 kW, with electrical current of up to 260 amperes. It generated 5.4 Newtons of thrust, "which is the highest level of thrust achieved by any plasma thruster to date." A novelty in its design is that it incorporates three

plasma Plasma or plasm may refer to: Science * Plasma (physics), one of the four fundamental states of matter * Plasma (mineral), a green translucent silica mineral * Quark–gluon plasma, a state of matter in quantum chromodynamics Biology * Blood pla ...

channels, each a few centimeters deep, nested around one another in concentric rings. The system is and almost one meter in diameter.

Other notable products

Multi-mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator

Aerojet Rocketdyne is the prime contractor to the

US Department of Energy The United States Department of Energy (DOE) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government that oversees U.S. national energy policy and manages the research and development of nuclear power and nuclear weapons in the United State ...

for the

Multi-mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator The multi-mission radioisotope thermoelectric generator (MMRTG) is a type of radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG) developed for NASA space missions such as the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), under the jurisdiction of the United States Depar ...

. The first flight MMRTG is currently powering the Mars

Curiosity Rover ''Curiosity'' is a car-sized Mars rover designed to explore the Gale crater on Mars as part of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission. ''Curiosity'' was launched from Cape Canaveral (CCAFS) on November 26, 2011, at 15:02:00 UTC and lan ...

, and a second flight unit powers the

Perseverance Rover ''Perseverance'', nicknamed ''Percy'', is a car-sized Mars rover designed to explore the Jezero crater on Mars as part of NASA's Mars 2020 mission. It was manufactured by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and launched on July 30, 2020, at 11:50 ...

References

External links

Aerojet Rocketdyne official site

Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings site
{{Authority control Rocketdyne Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings Aerospace companies of the United States Defense companies of the United States Manufacturing companies based in California Technology companies based in Greater Los Angeles Companies based in Sacramento, California Canoga Park, Los Angeles American companies established in 2013 Manufacturing companies established in 2013 Technology companies established in 2013 2013 establishments in California

Products

Current engines

Former production engines and others

In development

X3 Ion Thruster

Other notable products

Multi-mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator

See also

References

External links