![]() ![]() By September 2018, multiple hundreds of seconds of engine testing had been completed, including one test of over 200 seconds duration. 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. The BE-4 was first test fired, at 50% thrust for 3 seconds, in October 2017. In June 2017, Blue Origin announced that they would build a new facility in Huntsville, Alabama to manufacture the large BE-4 cryogenic rocket engine. A test anomaly occurred on and Blue Origin reported that they lost a set of powerpack hardware. 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. The first engine was fully assembled in March 2017. In the event, they backed away from this plan. 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. Initially, both first-stage and second-stage versions of the engine were planned. 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". 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. Blue Origin built two larger and redundant test stands to follow, capable of testing the full thrust of the BE-4. There was an explosion on the test stand during 2015 during powerpack testing. The tests were used to confirm the theoretical model predictions of "injector performance, heat transfer, and combustion stability", and data collected was being used to refine the engine design. īy September 2015, Blue Origin had completed more than 100 development tests of several elements of the BE-4, including the preburner and a " regeneratively-cooled thrust chamber using multiple full-scale injector elements". The company planned to begin full-scale engine testing in late 2016 and expected to complete development of the engine in 2017. ![]() The second program was testing subscale versions of the engine's injectors. 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 injectors and combustion chamber. Blue Origin said the "BE-4 would be 'ready for flight' by 2017." īy April 2015, two parallel development programs were under way. In September 2014-in a choice labeled "a stunner" by SpaceNews -the large launch vehicle manufacturer and launch service provider United Launch Alliance selected the BE-4 as the main engine for a new primary launch vehicle. This was their first engine to combust liquid oxygen and liquified natural gas propellants. īlue Origin began work on the BE-4 in 2011, although no public announcement was made until September 2014. Meyerson announced the selection of Huntsville, AL as the location of Blue Origin's rocket production factory in June 2017. 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. History įollowing Aerojet's acquisition of Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne in 2012, Blue Origin president Rob Meyerson saw an opportunity to fill a gap in the defense industrial base. 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. The engine is running three years behind as of August 2022, 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. Īlthough previously planned to fly as early as 2019, the first flight test of the new engine is now expected no earlier than 2023 on the Vulcan rocket. Final engine selection by ULA happened in September 2018. However, it was announced in 2014 that the engine would also be used on the United Launch Alliance (ULA) Vulcan Centaur launch vehicle, the successor to the Atlas V launch vehicle. It was initially planned for the engine to be used exclusively on a Blue Origin proprietary launch vehicle New Glenn, the company's first orbital rocket. The engine has been designed to produce 2.4 meganewtons (550,000 lbf) of thrust at sea level. ![]() The BE-4 is being developed with private and public funding. The Blue Engine 4 or BE-4 is an oxygen-rich liquefied-methane-fueled staged-combustion rocket engine under development by Blue Origin. ![]()
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