15
votes
SpaceX’s new Raptor rocket engine is a methane fueled full flow staged combustion cycle engine
Link information
This data is scraped automatically and may be incorrect.
- Title
- Is SpaceX's Raptor engine the king of rocket engines? - Everyday Astronaut
- Published
- May 25 2019
- Word count
- 8053 words
Can anyone figure what the disadvantages of full flow staged combustion might be over regular partial(?) flow?
All I've got is larger/heavier turbo pumps.
It's harder to pull off. It's hard to come up with an alloy that can withstand the hot oxygen on the oxygen rich side. To quote Elon Musk "Almost any metal turns into a flare in those conditions." The fuel rich side restricts what kinds of fuels you can use. You can't use RP-1, the refined kerosene that a lot of rockets use, because it cokes up and clogs the engine.
I think that applies to all staged combustion engines that burn oxygen rich. Something something secret soviet alloy
Staged combustion has been flown before, although never full flow staged combustion as far as I'm aware. Which is what's unusual about the raptor.
Here's a much better article minus the blogspam and site owner's self-promotion.
This isn't just a rehash of the wikipedia article. There is a lot of good explanation and information that isn't in the wikipedia article. This article and accompanying video represent months of work by the author. He's entitled to a little self promotion on his own site for that work.