Blue Origin BE-4 just SHOCKED NASA! But realized SpaceX Raptor is...Musk laugh!

when mentioning the name blue origin we immediately think of their slow progress and delays in rocket production the new Glenn rocket has undergone over a decade of develop without any flights and the be4 rocket engine has repeatedly been criticized for blue Origins late deliveries to their Ula customers however now faced with a superior development situation of competitors in the industry especially SpaceX blue origin can no longer sit still for the first time in 24 years their be4 engine has flown on the first flight of the Vulcan rocket shaking up the entire space industry and yet they also revealed the huge things they did to the be4 engine to prepare for the fierce space War of the future to the point that NASA scientists were shocked so what exactly did blue origin just do with that be4 engine and how will blue origin use its Ace in the Hole to compete with SpaceX is the be4 engine as reliable as we think it is let's find out in today's episode of alphatech with the success of the Vulcan rocket the be4 engine sub sub quently emerged as a key factor in helping blue origin return to the space RS following a spectacular public demonstration of creating a relatively clean mock Diamond exhaust strein the be4 engine continued to be a hot topic of discussion when blue origin released a video of a hot fire test with the be4 engine at the historic test stand 4670 in Huntsville where their engine factories located a loud roar echoed as the be4 engine emitted a powerful and pristine blue exhaust confirmed by the company to achieved 550 ,000 lbs of thrust as well as being their most powerful engine yet this engine test at the location attracted the attention of many nearby residents not only due to the deafening sound of the be4 but also CU blue origin's testing site is the former Saturn 5 test stand long unused blue origin has established a base tier a Canin to a declaration of a future that'll leave a historic Mark following in the footsteps of the Saturn 5 they've been renovating 4670 since April 2019 when they first entered into an agreement with NASA to use to test in at the Marshall space flight center to test the be4 and be3 U the site will be focusing on qualification testing of flight engines rather than development testing which will remain at their XEX testing site in Texas as the production of engines ramp up we can expect to see an increase in testing this serves as a convenient supplement given the proximity to engine manufacturing facilities consequently it'll streamline the certification process for engines ultimately Expediting their production looking at current and future forecast for be4 demand the company will sooner require a substantial number of engines blue origin plans to produce up to 50 be4 engines per year to support both their internal new Glen program and ula's Vulcan Centaur program both vehicles require engines in their initial stages seven for new Glenn and two for Vulcan however there are some differences in design between the be Forest flying on Vulcan and those assigned a new Glenn for one although the 7B E4 engines on New Glen are designed to be reusable in initial flights boosters may fail to land resulting in Lost Hardware additionally even in successful launches multiple boosters may be required each needing an additional seven engines Ula ultimately aims to make its Vulcan rocket partially reusable but at least for the next few years the beon Vulcan will be single use therefore blue Origins production and testing capabilities for Rockets will not stop at the old number it can be said that the Rabid acceleration for the be4 engine demonstrates blue origin's desire to make significant strides this year as evidenced by recent movements in the development of the new Glenn rocket prototype on January 11th blue origin released the first images of the initial phase of the new Glenn rocket images of phase two with two b3u engines followed shortly thereafter on January 22nd these two stages were officially installed for the first time after years of anticipation marking one of the most significant milestones in blue origin's history not content to stand still blue origin wrapped up three tanking tests on new Glen's first stage in the first week of March promising that rest assured there's much more to come while this progress in New Glen is fascinating it only heightens our curiosity about the be4 engine something that did not appear in those prototype reveals perhaps this testing process is unnecessary for installing the be4 because the rocket Hardware is not used for flight it could also be that blue origin's so confident in its abilities that it's preparing for mass production to open up a Level Playing Field with spacex's raptor engine although blue origin was established earlier everyone understands that blue Origins achievements are far behind spacex's besides rockets that have never restored by boo previous engines like the be3 clearly cannot compete with SpaceX engines like Merlin Raptor that's why the be4 is like their life boat the be4 is a large engine producing 5 and 50,000 lbs of thrust and is designed to be highly throttleable which is necessary for soft Landing of recoverable boosters the engine Burns liquefied natural gas instead of the traditional rocket great kerosene a choice made for clean burning characteristics at low throttle settings but also to harness the boiler of LNG and propellant tanks to enable pressurization without external helium systems like the SpaceX Raptor the be4 is a stage combustion design meaning a small portion of fuel on oxidizer are diverted to a pre-b burner where combustion gases are used to power the engine turboprops pre-b burner fuel ratios are typically oxygen or fuel rich and the combustion gases are ported to the main engine combustion chamber creating a Clos cycle closed Cycle Systems are more efficient than older designs which dump combustion gases overboard or used independent Power Systems to drive the pumps this simplifies the process of reusing engines compared to hydrocarbon fuels in the case of new Glenn this is extremely important the combination of engine propulsion and efficiency is aimed at reusability the goal is for New Glen to land in the refurbishment process to be relatively simple and quick but does blue origin have the capability to achieve this goal are their engine products always stable even though we've witnessed them in action what blue origin's doing is indeed very positive for their be4 engine however doubts still linger because their be4 engines undergone a development process that was not as expected in the past there were some issues with be4 engines progress in delivery to Ula in August 2020 Tory Bruno announced that the second be4 test to be delivered soon followed by the first flight qualified he noted an ongoing issue with the be Force Turbo pumps at the time FL origin was still addressing the matter concerning the 75 ,000 horsepower pumps responsible for delivering fuel to the be 4's main combustion chamber subsequently according to Bruno's disclosures blue origin addressed these issues and enabled the engine to enter production by the end of 2020 in early 2023 we also witnessed the successful performance of the be4 excelling in a static fire test for the Vulcan however the good times were shortlived as on June 30th 2023 a be4 engine exploded just 10 seconds into testing resulting in damage to the test stand this particular engine was intended for use in the second Vulcan flight since the incident the company has not provided much information with most updates come from to Bruno Bruno clarified that every engine component including electrical boxes and composite overwrap pressure vessel under goes an acceptant test as they come off the production line to verify their workmanship the one-time qualification process ensures that the be4 engines meet the design criteria he mentioned that be4 is on certificate 1 had passed an acceptance test ATP as had been many others this Engine That Failed ATP suggests that the issue was indeed caused by poor workmanship and should not affect engines that have already passed these tests and been installed on Vulcans these kind of failures were relatively common at the beginning of a production run but became rare as automated shutdown systems became finally tuned in general there are still many issues that blue origin probably needs to fly more be4 engines to understand hopefully this time blue origin can achieve what they've been striving for over the past decade with a powerful be4 engine hopefully blue origins new CEO Dave limp delivers on his words he said I'm very confident there's going to be a launch this year we're going to show a lot of progress this year I think people are going to see how fast we can move so what do you think about the capabilities of the be4 engine please let us know in the comment section down below what you're thinking that's all for today's episode thanks so much for watching and see you next time

Channel: ALPHA TECH

Views: 42,056

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Id: q6ubo3giRFs

Length: 8min 30sec (510 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 29 2024