SpaceX is waiting for government approval for the next test flight of Starship. This is currently the largest rocket in the world. It is completely different from SpaceX’s main rocket Falcon 9. Starship uses Raptor engines to generate hundreds of rockets. Thousands of pounds of thrust.
The pause in orbital test flights of Starship has given SpaceX an opportunity to accelerate Raptor engine production, of which the company has built nearly 400 units.
Raptor engine production has been one of the key pain points for the Starship program, at least in the early stages of SpaceX’s testing campaign. This engine is much more powerful than the Merlin engine that powers the Falcon 9 rocket, and it also redirects all exhaust gases into the combustion chamber to increase fuel efficiency and power output, which requires high-durability parts and new Manufacturing process.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk acknowledged these issues in a detailed speech in 2020, saying the first Starship test would use fewer engines. A year later in 2021, SpaceX was producing a Raptor engine every two days, indicating that the company could produce 176 engines per year in a best-case scenario, assuming production lines were running around the clock. In 2022, the company doubled that rate again.
Now, according to an image shared by NASA Associate Administrator Pam Melroy, SpaceX may have built as many as 398 Raptor rocket engines.
Melroy’s photo shows her standing in front of a fully assembled Raptor engine. There is an engine with a serial number of 398 written on it in the upper left corner, which can be seen on its nozzle. SpaceX’s latest Starship engines are Raptor 2 engines, which according to CEO Elon Musk reduce a lot of complexity than Raptor 1.
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