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The Blue Engine 4 or BE-4 is an oxygen-rich liquefied-methane-fueled staged-combustion
rocket engine A rocket engine uses stored rocket propellants as the reaction mass for forming a high-speed propulsive jet of fluid, usually high-temperature gas. Rocket engines are reaction engines, producing thrust by ejecting mass rearward, in accorda ...
under development by Blue Origin. The BE-4 is being developed with private and public funding. The engine has been designed to produce of thrust at sea level. It was initially planned for the engine to be used exclusively on a Blue Origin proprietary launch vehicle
New Glenn New Glenn is a heavy-lift orbital launch vehicle in development by Blue Origin. Named after NASA astronaut John Glenn, design work on the vehicle began in 2012. Illustrations of the vehicle, and the high-level specifications, were initial ...
, the company's first orbital rocket. However, it was announced in 2014 that the engine would also be used on the
United Launch Alliance United Launch Alliance (ULA), legally United Launch Alliance, LLC, is an American spacecraft launch service provider that manufactures and operates a number of rocket vehicles that are capable of launching spacecraft into orbits around Earth, ...
(ULA)
Vulcan Centaur Vulcan Centaur is a two-stage-to-orbit, heavy-lift launch vehicle that is under development by the United Launch Alliance (ULA) since 2014 with an initial flight expected in early 2023. It is principally designed to meet launch demands for th ...
launch vehicle, the successor to the
Atlas V Atlas V is an expendable launch system and the fifth major version in the Atlas launch vehicle family. It was originally designed by Lockheed Martin, now being operated by United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture between Lockheed Mart ...
launch vehicle. Final engine selection by ULA happened in September 2018. Although previously planned to fly as early as 2019, the first
flight test Flight testing is a branch of aeronautical engineering that develops specialist equipment required for testing aircraft behaviour and systems. Instrumentation systems are developed using proprietary transducers and data acquisition systems. D ...
of the new engine is now expected no earlier than 2023 on the Vulcan rocket. The engine is running three years behind , and Blue Origin has experienced a number of problems, both technical and managerial, with the engine development program, leaving the engine still not yet flight-qualified.
Pathfinder Pathfinder may refer to: Businesses * Pathfinder Energy Services, a division of Smith International * Pathfinder Press, a publisher of socialist literature Computing and information science * Path Finder, a Macintosh file browser * Pathfinder ( ...
engines are currently undergoing testing at ULA facilities, and the first two flight engines were delivered to ULA for integration with the Vulcan Centaur rocket on October 31st, 2022.


History

Following Aerojet's acquisition of Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne in 2012, Blue Origin president
Rob Meyerson Robert E. "Rob" Meyerson is an American aerospace engineer and executive known for his role in the development of reusable rocket launch systems. Meyerson is the founder of Delalune Space, a management consulting firm providing advisory services ...
saw an opportunity to fill a gap in the defense industrial base. Blue Origin publicly entered the liquid rocket engine business by partnering with ULA on the development of the BE-4, and working with other companies. Meyerson announced the selection of Huntsville, AL as the location of Blue Origin's rocket production factory in June 2017. Blue Origin began work on the BE-4 in 2011, although no public announcement was made until September 2014. This was their first engine to combust
liquid oxygen 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 app ...
and
liquified natural gas Liquefied natural gas (LNG) is natural gas (predominantly methane, CH4, with some mixture of ethane, C2H6) that has been cooled down to liquid form for ease and safety of non-pressurized storage or transport. It takes up about 1/600th the volu ...
propellants A propellant (or propellent) is a mass that is expelled or expanded in such a way as to create a thrust or other motive force in accordance with Newton's third law of motion, and "propel" a vehicle, projectile, or fluid payload. In vehicles, the e ...
. In September 2014—in a choice labeled "a stunner" by
SpaceNews ''SpaceNews'' is a print and digital publication that covers business and political news in the space and satellite industry. ''SpaceNews'' provides news, commentary and analysis to an audience of government officials, politicians and executives ...
—the large launch vehicle manufacturer and launch service provider
United Launch Alliance United Launch Alliance (ULA), legally United Launch Alliance, LLC, is an American spacecraft launch service provider that manufactures and operates a number of rocket vehicles that are capable of launching spacecraft into orbits around Earth, ...
selected the BE-4 as the main engine for a new primary launch vehicle. Blue Origin said the "BE-4 would be 'ready for flight' by 2017." By April 2015, two parallel development programs were under way. One program was testing full-scale versions of the BE-4 powerpack, which are the set of valves and turbopumps that provide the proper fuel/oxidizer mix to the
injector An injector is a system of ducting and nozzles used to direct the flow of a high-pressure fluid in such a way that a lower pressure fluid is entrained in the jet and carried through a duct to a region of higher pressure. It is a fluid-dynamic ...
s and combustion chamber. The second program was testing subscale versions of the engine's injectors. The company planned to begin full-scale engine testing in late 2016 and expected to complete development of the engine in 2017. By September 2015, Blue Origin had completed more than 100 development tests of several elements of the BE-4, including the
preburner The staged combustion cycle (sometimes known as topping cycle, preburner cycle, or closed cycle) is a power cycle of a bipropellant rocket engine. In the staged combustion cycle, propellant flows through multiple combustion chambers, and is th ...
and a " regeneratively-cooled thrust chamber using multiple full-scale injector elements". The tests were used to confirm the theoretical model predictions of "injector performance,
heat transfer Heat transfer is a discipline of thermal engineering that concerns the generation, use, conversion, and exchange of thermal energy (heat) between physical systems. Heat transfer is classified into various mechanisms, such as thermal conduction, ...
, and
combustion stability A liquid-propellant rocket or liquid rocket utilizes a rocket engine that uses liquid propellants. Liquids are desirable because they have a reasonably high density and high specific impulse (''I''sp). This allows the volume of the propellant ta ...
", and data collected was being used to refine the engine design. There was an explosion on the test stand during 2015 during powerpack testing. Blue Origin built two larger and redundant test stands to follow, capable of testing the full thrust of the BE-4. In January 2016, Blue Origin announced that they intended to begin testing full engines of the BE-4 on ground test stands prior to the end of 2016. Following a factory tour in March 2016, journalist Eric Berger noted that a large part of "Blue Origin's factory has been given over to development of the Blue Engine-4". Initially, both first-stage and second-stage versions of the engine were planned. The second stage of the initial New Glenn design was to have shared the same stage diameter as the first stage and use a single vacuum-optimized BE-4, the BE-4U. In the event, they backed away from this plan. The first engine was fully assembled in March 2017. Also in March, United Launch Alliance indicated that the economic risk of the Blue Origin engine selection option had been retired, but that the technical risk on the project would remain until a series of engine firing tests were completed later in 2017. A test anomaly occurred on 13 May 2017 and Blue Origin reported that they lost a set of powerpack hardware. In June 2017, Blue Origin announced that they would build a new facility in
Huntsville, Alabama Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in ...
to manufacture the large BE-4 cryogenic
rocket engine A rocket engine uses stored rocket propellants as the reaction mass for forming a high-speed propulsive jet of fluid, usually high-temperature gas. Rocket engines are reaction engines, producing thrust by ejecting mass rearward, in accorda ...
. The BE-4 was first test fired, at 50% thrust for 3 seconds, in October 2017. By March 2018, the BE-4 engine had been tested at 65% of design thrust for 114 seconds with a goal expressed in May to achieve 70% of design thrust in the next several months. By September 2018, multiple hundreds of seconds of engine testing had been completed, including one test of over 200 seconds duration. In October 2018, Blue Origin President Bob Smith announced that the first launch of the New Glenn had been moved back to 2021, and in 2021 an additional slip to late 2022 was announced. This caused the first flight test of the BE-4 to be scheduled for the initial Vulcan Centaur launch rather than on New Glenn. By February 2019, the BE-4 had acquired a total of 1800 seconds of hot fire testing on ground test stands, but had yet to be tested above pounds of thrust, about 73 percent of the engine's rated thrust of . By August 2019, BE-4 was undergoing full power engine tests. In July 2020, the first
pathfinder Pathfinder may refer to: Businesses * Pathfinder Energy Services, a division of Smith International * Pathfinder Press, a publisher of socialist literature Computing and information science * Path Finder, a Macintosh file browser * Pathfinder ( ...
BE-4 was delivered to United Launch Alliance for integration testing with Vulcan Centaur. In August 2020, ULA CEO
Tory Bruno Tory Bruno (born November 3, 1961 as Salvatore Thomas Bruno) is an American aerospace engineer and executive. He has been the CEO of United Launch Alliance (ULA) since August 2014. Before ULA, he worked at Lockheed Martin, where he made the trans ...
stated that the second test BE-4 would be delivered soon, followed quickly by the first flight-qualified ones. He noted an ongoing issue with the BE-4's turbopumps. At the time, Blue Origin was still troubleshooting the 75,000-horsepower pumps that bring fuel to the BE-4's main combustion chamber, Bruno said, adding that he was confident the issues would be resolved soon. In October, Bruno stated that the issue was resolved and that the engine was moved into production. In the event, it was not, and would not be until 2022. By August 2021, it had become clear, even publicly, that the BE-4 engine program was in trouble. Delays had been accruing in the program for four years, including
turbopump A turbopump is a propellant pump with two main components: a rotodynamic pump and a driving gas turbine, usually both mounted on the same shaft, or sometimes geared together. They were initially developed in Germany in the early 1940s. The purpo ...
problems,
combustion instability Combustion instabilities are physical phenomena occurring in a reacting flow (e.g., a flame) in which some perturbations, even very small ones, grow and then become large enough to alter the features of the flow in some particular way. In many pr ...
, overheating, and shorter-than-planned engine life. In addition, company management issues had left insufficient hardware to build development engines, leading to extended periods where no testing could be done, as well as issues related to company CEO Bob Smith and Jeff Bezos' distractions. Blue Origin had difficulty getting the engines to run successfully at full power for a full-duration burn. The company made the "risky decision" in August 2021 to ship the flight engines—which were not then fully assembled—to their customer, ULA, before they had completed full qualification testing, meaning formal delivery would occur in early 2022 rather than the earlier promised dates. According to long-time space reporter Eric Berger of Ars Technica, the relationship with ULA has deteriorated, in part because Blue tried to renegotiate for a higher price in 2017 than had been agreed to in 2014. On October 31st, 2022, a Twitter post by the official Blue Origin account announced that the first two BE-4 engines had been delivered to ULA and were in the process of being integrated on a Vulcan rocket. In a later tweet, ULA CEO Tory Bruno said that one of the engines had already been installed on the booster, and that the other would be joining it momentarily.


Applications

By 2017, the BE-4 was being considered for use on two
launch vehicle A launch vehicle or carrier rocket is a rocket designed to carry a payload ( spacecraft or satellites) from the Earth's surface to outer space. Most launch vehicles operate from a launch pads, supported by a launch control center and ...
s then under development. Prior to this, a modified derivative of the BE-4 was also being considered for the experimental XS-1
spaceplane A spaceplane is a vehicle that can fly and glide like an aircraft in Earth's atmosphere and maneuver like a spacecraft in outer space. To do so, spaceplanes must incorporate features of both aircraft and spacecraft. Orbital spaceplanes te ...
for a
US military The United States Armed Forces are the Military, military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six Military branch, service branches: the United States Army, Army, United States Marine Corps, Marine Corps, United States N ...
project, but was not selected. By 2018, it was the selected engine for both the Blue Origin New Glenn and the ULA Vulcan launch vehicles.


Vulcan

In late 2014, Blue Origin signed an agreement with
United Launch Alliance United Launch Alliance (ULA), legally United Launch Alliance, LLC, is an American spacecraft launch service provider that manufactures and operates a number of rocket vehicles that are capable of launching spacecraft into orbits around Earth, ...
to co-develop the BE-4 engine and to commit to use the new engine on the
Vulcan Vulcan may refer to: Mythology * Vulcan (mythology), the god of fire, volcanoes, metalworking, and the forge in Roman mythology Arts, entertainment and media Film and television * Vulcan (''Star Trek''), name of a fictional race and their home p ...
launch vehicle, a
successor Successor may refer to: * An entity that comes after another (see Succession (disambiguation)) Film and TV * ''The Successor'' (film), a 1996 film including Laura Girling * ''The Successor'' (TV program), a 2007 Israeli television program Musi ...
to the
Atlas V Atlas V is an expendable launch system and the fifth major version in the Atlas launch vehicle family. It was originally designed by Lockheed Martin, now being operated by United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture between Lockheed Mart ...
, which would replace the Russian-made
RD-180 The RD-180 ( rus, РД-180, Ракетный Двигатель-180, Raketnyy Dvigatel-180) is a rocket engine designed and built in Russia. It features a dual combustion chamber, dual- nozzle design and is fueled by a RP-1/ LOX mixture. The RD ...
engine. Vulcan will use two of the BE-4 engines on each first stage. The engine development program began in 2011. The ULA partnership announcement came after months of uncertainty about the future of the Russian
RD-180 The RD-180 ( rus, РД-180, Ракетный Двигатель-180, Raketnyy Dvigatel-180) is a rocket engine designed and built in Russia. It features a dual combustion chamber, dual- nozzle design and is fueled by a RP-1/ LOX mixture. The RD ...
engine that has been used in the ULA
Atlas V Atlas V is an expendable launch system and the fifth major version in the Atlas launch vehicle family. It was originally designed by Lockheed Martin, now being operated by United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture between Lockheed Mart ...
rocket for over a decade. Geopolitical concerns had come about that created serious concerns about the reliability and consistency of the supply chain for the procurement of the Russian engine. Initially, ULA expected the first flight of the new launch vehicle no earlier than 2019 but by 2018, that target had moved out to 2021. Since early 2015, the BE-4 had been in competition with the
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 ...
engine for the Atlas V RD-180 replacement program. While the BE-4 is a liquified natural gas engine, the AR1, like the RD-180, is
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 ...
-fueled. In February 2016, the
US Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Sig ...
issued a contract that provides partial development funding of up to to ULA in order to support use of the Blue BE-4 engine on the ULA
Vulcan Vulcan may refer to: Mythology * Vulcan (mythology), the god of fire, volcanoes, metalworking, and the forge in Roman mythology Arts, entertainment and media Film and television * Vulcan (''Star Trek''), name of a fictional race and their home p ...
launch vehicle. Initially, only was to be disbursed by the government with additional to be spent by a ULA subsidiary on Vulcan BE-4 development. Although was the original USAF contract amount to
Aerojet Rocketdyne Aerojet Rocketdyne is an American manufacturer of rocket, hypersonic, and electric propulsive systems for space, defense, civil and commercial applications. Headquartered in Sacramento, California, the company is owned by Aerojet Rocketdyne Hold ...
(AR) to advance development of the AR1 engine as an alternative for powering the Vulcan rocket, by June 2018, the USAF had renegotiated the agreement with AR and decreased the Air Force contribution—5/6ths of the total cost—to . ARR put no additional private funds into the engine development effort after early 2018. Bezos noted in 2016 that the Vulcan launch vehicle is being designed around the BE-4 engine; ULA switching to the AR1 would require significant delays and money on the part of ULA. This point had also been made by ULA executives, who clarified that the BE-4 is likely to cost 40% less than the AR1, as well as benefit from Bezos capacity to "make split-second investment decisions on behalf of BE-4, and has already demonstrated his determination to see it through. hereas theAR1, in contrast, depends mainly on U.S. government backing, meaning Aerojet Rocketdyne has many phone numbers to dial to win support".


New Glenn

The engine is to be used on the Blue Origin large orbital
launch vehicle A launch vehicle or carrier rocket is a rocket designed to carry a payload ( spacecraft or satellites) from the Earth's surface to outer space. Most launch vehicles operate from a launch pads, supported by a launch control center and ...
New Glenn New Glenn is a heavy-lift orbital launch vehicle in development by Blue Origin. Named after NASA astronaut John Glenn, design work on the vehicle began in 2012. Illustrations of the vehicle, and the high-level specifications, were initial ...
, a -diameter two-stage orbital
launch vehicle A launch vehicle or carrier rocket is a rocket designed to carry a payload ( spacecraft or satellites) from the Earth's surface to outer space. Most launch vehicles operate from a launch pads, supported by a launch control center and ...
with an optional third stage and a reusable first stage. The first flight and orbital test is planned for no earlier than late 2022, although the company had earlier expected the BE-4 might be tested on a rocket flight as early as 2020. The first stage will be powered by seven BE-4 engines and will be reusable, landing vertically. The second stage of New Glenn will share the same diameter and use two
BE-3 The BE-3 (''Blue Engine 3'') is a LH2/ LOX rocket engine developed by Blue Origin. The engine began development in the early 2010s, and completed acceptance testing in early 2015. The engine is being used on the New Shepard suborbital rocket, ...
vacuum-optimized
hydrolox The highest specific impulse chemical rockets use liquid propellants (liquid-propellant rockets). They can consist of a single chemical (a monopropellant) or a mix of two chemicals, called bipropellants. Bipropellants can further be divided into ...
engines. The second stage will be
expendable ''Expendable'' is a science fiction novel by the Canadian author James Alan Gardner, published in 1997 by HarperCollins Publishers under its various imprints.Avon Books; HarperCollins Canada; SFBC/AvoNova. Paperback edition 1997, Eos Books. It i ...
.


XS-1

Boeing The Boeing Company () is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, telecommunications equipment, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and p ...
secured a contract to design and build the
DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Ad ...
XS-1 reusable
spaceplane A spaceplane is a vehicle that can fly and glide like an aircraft in Earth's atmosphere and maneuver like a spacecraft in outer space. To do so, spaceplanes must incorporate features of both aircraft and spacecraft. Orbital spaceplanes te ...
in 2014. The XS-1 was to accelerate to
hypersonic speed 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 ind ...
at the edge of the Earth's atmosphere to enable its payload to reach orbit. In 2015, it was believed a modified derivative of the BE-4 engine was to power the craft. In 2017, the contract award selected the
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 ...
-derived
Aerojet Rocketdyne Aerojet Rocketdyne is an American manufacturer of rocket, hypersonic, and electric propulsive systems for space, defense, civil and commercial applications. Headquartered in Sacramento, California, the company is owned by Aerojet Rocketdyne Hold ...
AR-22 engine instead. The XS-1 was cancelled in 2020.


Availability and use

Blue Origin has indicated that they intend to make the engine commercially available, once development is complete, to companies beyond ULA, and also plans to utilize the engine in Blue Origin's own new orbital launch vehicle. As of March 2016,
Orbital ATK Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems (NGIS) was a sector (business segment) of Northrop Grumman from 2018 through 2019. It was formed from Orbital ATK Inc. a company which resulted from the merger of Orbital Sciences Corporation and parts of Alli ...
was also evaluating Blue engines for its launch vehicles. The BE-4 uses
liquified natural gas Liquefied natural gas (LNG) is natural gas (predominantly methane, CH4, with some mixture of ethane, C2H6) that has been cooled down to liquid form for ease and safety of non-pressurized storage or transport. It takes up about 1/600th the volu ...
rather than more commonly used rocket fuels such as
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 ...
. This approach allows for
autogenous pressurization Autogenous pressurization is the use of self-generated gaseous propellant to pressurize liquid propellant in rockets. Traditional liquid-propellant rockets have been most often pressurized with other gases, such as helium, which necessitates ca ...
, which is the use of gasified propellant to pressurize liquid propellant. This is beneficial because it eliminates the need for pressurization systems that require the storage of a pressurizing gas, such as helium. Although all early BE-4 components and full engines to support the test program were built at Blue's headquarters location in Kent, Washington, production of the BE-4 will be in Huntsville, Alabama. Testing and support of the reusable BE-4s will occur at the company's orbital launch facility at Exploration Park in
Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
, where Blue Origin is investing more than in facilities and improvements.


Technical specifications

The BE-4 is a staged-combustion engine, with a single oxygen-rich
preburner The staged combustion cycle (sometimes known as topping cycle, preburner cycle, or closed cycle) is a power cycle of a bipropellant rocket engine. In the staged combustion cycle, propellant flows through multiple combustion chambers, and is th ...
, and a single turbine driving both the fuel and oxygen pumps. The cycle is similar to the kerosene-fueled
RD-180 The RD-180 ( rus, РД-180, Ракетный Двигатель-180, Raketnyy Dvigatel-180) is a rocket engine designed and built in Russia. It features a dual combustion chamber, dual- nozzle design and is fueled by a RP-1/ LOX mixture. The RD ...
currently used on the
Atlas V Atlas V is an expendable launch system and the fifth major version in the Atlas launch vehicle family. It was originally designed by Lockheed Martin, now being operated by United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture between Lockheed Mart ...
, although it uses only a single combustion chamber and nozzle. The BE-4 is designed for long life and high reliability, partially by aiming the engine to be a "medium-performing version of a high-performance architecture".
Hydrostatic bearing Fluid bearings are bearings in which the load is supported by a thin layer of rapidly moving pressurized liquid or gas between the bearing surfaces. Since there is no contact between the moving parts, there is no sliding friction, allowing flu ...
s are used in the
turbopump A turbopump is a propellant pump with two main components: a rotodynamic pump and a driving gas turbine, usually both mounted on the same shaft, or sometimes geared together. They were initially developed in Germany in the early 1940s. The purpo ...
s rather than the more typical ball and
roller bearing In mechanical engineering, a rolling-element bearing, also known as a rolling bearing, is a bearing which carries a load by placing rolling elements (such as balls or rollers) between two concentric, grooved rings called races. The relative m ...
s specifically to increase reliability and service life. * Thrust (sea level): at full power * Chamber pressure: , substantially lower than the of the RD-180 engine that ULA wants to replace * Designed for reusability — up to 100 flights and landings * Relightable in-flight via head-pressure start of the turbine during coast * Deep throttling capability to 40% power or lower


See also

*
BE-3 The BE-3 (''Blue Engine 3'') is a LH2/ LOX rocket engine developed by Blue Origin. The engine began development in the early 2010s, and completed acceptance testing in early 2015. The engine is being used on the New Shepard suborbital rocket, ...
– hydrogen-fueled engine currently in operation by Blue Origin *
Raptor Raptor or RAPTOR may refer to: Animals The word "raptor" refers to several groups of bird-like dinosaurs which primarily capture and subdue/kill prey with their talons. * Raptor (bird) or bird of prey, a bird that primarily hunts and feeds on ...
– methane-fueled engine developed by SpaceX * Merlin – kerosene-fueled operational engine by SpaceX *
RD-180 The RD-180 ( rus, РД-180, Ракетный Двигатель-180, Raketnyy Dvigatel-180) is a rocket engine designed and built in Russia. It features a dual combustion chamber, dual- nozzle design and is fueled by a RP-1/ LOX mixture. The RD ...
– modern Russian kerosene-fueled engine of comparable size * Comparison of orbital rocket engines


References


External links


ULA February 2016 statement following US Air Force partial-funding of BE-4 development
* * * {{Blue Origin Blue Origin rocket engines Rocket engines using methane propellant Rocket engines using the staged combustion cycle Rocket engines of the United States