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10/2000 Page 2
RD-170 FAMILY
The RD-170 liquid oxy-
gen/kerosene rocket engine was de-
signed in 1974-1986 at NPO Ener-
gomash by a team led by Chief De-
signer V.P.Radovsky for the side
engine units (first stage) of the
URKTS Energiya-Buran Heavy
Multipurpose Space Rocket Trans-
portation System. Until today, the
RD-170 remains the world’s most
powerful and quite promising engine
design.
RD-170 is a four-chamber, re-
coverable liquid-propellant rocket
engine with the fuel turbopump-feed
system. The design provides for
high-pressure afterburning of the ex-
haust turbine gas in the main com-
bustion chambers. The ignition of
fuel components is ensured by self-
igniting starting fuel. RD-170
The engine’s fuel system in-
cludes the Main Turbopump Unit
(MTU) incorporating a single-stage active ax- lenging task. To ensure controllable throttling
ial-flow turbine co-shafted with rotors of the to full thrust and cut-off smoothness, it is vital
oxidizer and the fuel pumps. The turbopump that consumption of propellants is adequately
assembly also includes two screw boost regulated by means of powerful electro-
pumps: the oxidizer pump driven by the gas hydraulic devices.
turbine, and the fuel pump driven by the hy- The described engine went through full-
draulic turbine. The pneumatic control system scale development, bench trials and flight tests.
includes: pressure helium bottles, solenoid- Ground test-firing of the engine was conducted
operated electro-pneumatic valves and system on a fully built-up unit.
piping. As development works continued on the
According to Mr. Feliks Chelkis, Chief RD-170 engine, the designers encountered fire
and Lead Designer of the RD-170 rocket en- accidents in the engine’s hot gas-flow duct re-
gine, there is hardly another national or West- sulting in that MTU assembly bearings were
ern liquid-propellant engine showing same per- destroyed, in addition, there were high-
formance in terms of full-thrust gaining frequency vibrations in the combustion cham-
smoothness, which makes the loads applied to ber. The fire accidents were found to have
the engine and the launch vehicle considerably been caused by the presence of foreign materi-
lower. als (like chips or fillings) in the gas ducts. Cer-
Engine designers say development of a tain bottlenecks in the turbopump assembly op-
recoverable high-thrust power unit is a chal-
NFM Special Issue No. 10/2000 Page 3
eration had to be overcome, as well. Yet, the failure-free operation, i.e., provide normal
high-frequency vibration able to cause the in- functioning under any operating conditions
jector assembly to destroy was something the without failures that might result in any disas-
designers had to address again and again till trous consequences for the LV’s or the power
the engine was just about to be commissioned. plant’s relevant systems, like hydraulic drive
The combustion chamber development piping destruction or seal failure.
phase included as many as 300 bench firing The design of the RD-171 engine (a
trials of summarized duration of 23,000 s; a modification of RD-170 installed in Zenit-2
total of six different cooling system options LV’s first stage) incorporates four pivoted
were tested along with more than 20 injector combustion chambers, unlike the RD-170 ver-
design options for a variety of nozzle parame- sion for the URKTS System, where two cham-
ters. A replacement of the combustion chamber bers are pivoted. Pivoting is ensured by auxil-
head does not require the engine to be totally iary power units (APU) operating on hydrazine
disassembled. The complete RD-170 engine decomposition products. Each booster unit of
can be re-started at least 20 times before total the URKTS System’s first stage includes one
engine overhaul is required. APU; similar APUs were installed on the Bu-
So far, RD-170 has had a record of over ran orbital spacecraft to provide for actuation
120,000 s in bench firings, showing high reli- of the aerodynamic control devices (like elev-
ability. Program managers, however, seem to ons, flaps, rudder) and landing gear. Table 1
be not quite satisfied with the already attained below compares performance of RD-170 and
reliability level, and have been planning devel- the United States’ F-1 liquid-propellant engine.
opment of a more reliable and more economi- Starting from late 80s, agencies responsi-
cal RD-170 design option for reduced fuel con- ble for the national space program have been
sumption. displaying interest in exporting RD-170 to gain
The RD-170 engine is designed to ensure much-desired convertible currency. After per-
RD-180
the oxidizer) is being throttling down) and the mixture ratio variation
converted and heated, capability (± 10 percent). The engine can be
and the automatic fixed or hinge-mounted, as required to ensure
start-up and opera- thrust-vector control capability within ± 6 de-
tion control systems. grees.
Thermal insulation of The described engine is proposed for in-
the combustion stallation on lower stages of the advanced
chamber’s wall is en- Soyuz-2 (Russ Project) and Yedinstvo (Unity)
sured by the fuel- launch vehicles developed, accordingly, by the
enriched wall bound- Progress Design Bureau and the Makeyev. A
ary layer generated comparison of RD-120 and RD-120K perform-
by the chamber injec- ance is provided in Table 3.
tor head, and two
film cooling belts RD-161/RD -161P
(slots). The experimental RD-161 and RD-
The engine went 161PV engines, which are among the latest de-
through full-scale de- velopments by NPO Energomash, were origi-
velopment, bench tri- nally presented at the K Zvezdam ‘93 (To the
als and flight tests. Stars-93) show.
RD-120K Ground test-firing of The liquid oxygen/kerosene RD-161 en-
the fully built-up en- gine offered by Energomash is a home initia-
gine with a nozzle was conducted on the ex- tive development designed for liquid-
haust diffuser test bench providing for simu- propellant engine applications in upper stages
lated high-altitude operation of the engine. of launch vehicles and/or orbital transfer vehi-
Similar to what happened as RD-170 was cles (Block DM), including both the existing
developed, the designers of RD-120 encoun- and future vehicles. The design of RD-161P in
tered fire accidents in the engine’s hot gas- which the propellants are high-concentration
flow passage, failure of the turbopump assem- (93-97 percent) hydrogen peroxide and kero-
bly bearings and high-frequency vibrations in sene is based on an earlier prototype initially
the combustion chamber. Some experts would designed for the orbital maneuver system of
explain the accidents by the less than adequate the MAKS Project’s spacecraft.
design of the combustion chamber injector. Both engines are single-chambered units
The RD-120K engine, a modification of with turbopump fuel-feed system and exhaust
RD-120 distinguished for a shorter nozzle, dif- turbine gas afterburning. The ignition of the
fers from the RD- 120 design in modified lay- fuel components in the RD-161 engine is en-
out of the engine’s top. Indeed, the RD-120 sured by plasma generated as high-voltage,
version installed in the central opening of the high-frequency current is passed through gase-
Zenit-2 second stage’s toroidal tank looks ous oxygen (a development by RKK Energia
somehow compressed on its sides and ex- initially implemented in Buran’s steering mi-
tended vertically. Unlike that, the RD-120K croengines).
mounted on LV’s bottom face is shorter and The engines include practically identical
differs in the layout of the top components, in- combustion chambers with dual-component
cluding the combustion chamber, turbopump (gas/fluid) injectors, high-altitude nozzles and
assembly, gas generator, piping and automat- turbopump assemblies. However, there is dif-
ics. ference in the gas generation flow duct of the
The RD-120K developed as part of home described liquid-propellant engines.
initiative by NPO Energomash is designed for The gas generator duct of the RD-161 en-
use in the first stages of future light- and me- gine is a dual-component, single-injector unit
dium-class launch vehicles. To support the (with rotary-type fuel injection and peripheral
proposed applications, the engine is provided oxidizer atomization). The system is designed
with both the incorporated thrust control capa- to operate under rich oxidizer conditions as it
bility (3.5 percent throttling up or 8.5 percent generates hot gas at approx. 550oC essentially
NFM Special Issue No. 10/2000 Page 8
composed of oxygen and a certain percentage erator’s catalyst package were selected. Table
of water steam and carbon dioxide gas. 4 presents compared performance of the RD-
The gas generator duct of the RD-161P 161 and RD-161P engines.
engine is a single-component catalytic system: NPO Energomash have been out of
hydrogen peroxide passed through the catalyst small-size engine development business for al-
pack is decomposed to produce hot steam-and- most forty years. Yet, designing a small liquid-
gas at approx. 850oC, containing basically propellant rocket engine with high specific im-
steam of water and oxygen. pulse fuelled by environment-friendly fuel
Upon working on the turbopump assem- components is really on the agenda.
bly blades, the steam-and-gas is fed to the In reviewing engines operating on the hy-
combustion chamber for afterburning by drogen peroxide/kerosene pair of fuel compo-
means of the fuel. Owing to the single- nents, one cannot but mention the family of
component design of the gas generator, the fuel Britain’s Gamma liquid-propellant rocket en-
supply and engine start-up system are substan- gines developed in the early and mid-sixties
tially simplified. There is a feature worth being and installed on the Black Knight high-altitude
mentioned specifically if RD-161P is to be de- rocket and the Black Arrow launch vehicle.
scribed: in case no fuel is fed to the combus- Perhaps, no one else but the British can boast
tion chamber, the engine will operate in the so- expertise in designing, development and pro-
called single-component mode and develop re- duction of peroxide engines.
markably high thrust. The greatest difficulty in The scientific and production potential
the development of the fuel supply system was available to the Energomash Association al-
encountered as the materials for the gas gen- lows new technology to be mastered within the
NFM Special Issue No. 10/2000 Page 9
shortest possible time if the required liquid- afterburning, the 161P version provides com-
propellant rocket engine is to be created. Let us paratively low specific impulse (in fact, it is
not forget the available expertise with experi- even lesser than that of similar thrust level en-
mental engines operating on hydrogen perox- gines by KBKhM fuelled by the nitrogen
ide/kerosene and hydrogen perox- tetroxide/asymmetric dimethyl hydrazine pair
ide/pentaborane fuel: those were developed of fuel components). Representatives of Ener-
and tested by Energomash in the mid-sixties as gomash claim their RD-161P peroxide-fuelled
part of the Soviet Lunar program. liquid-propellant rocket engine is intended to
The RD-161 includes an original carbon prove feasibility of a relatively simple small-
plastic nozzle extension, some 500 mm in size recoverable motor to be fuelled by non-
length. The radiation-cooled extension pro- toxic, environment-friendly propellants, that
vides for the engine’s Isp to be increased ap- could provide for essentially unlimited dura-
proximately 5-fold. tion of space operation. No task to attain any
The RD-161 engine should be described ultimate specific impulse was set, for as long
as an advanced unit: indeed, even though the as the value could be increased by 10-15 units
more energy-capacious Synthine synthetic hy- in the future, if required.
drocarbon fuel is not being used, the engine
shows the highest specific impulse among all NK-33/NK -43
available Lox/kerosene engines. Experts be- Many Russia’s and international compa-
lieve turning to Synthine fuel is possible in the nies have been displaying major interest lately
future: despite certain potential problems with in the NK-33 and NK-43 rocket engines by
cooling, the new fuel could add at least 10 Dvigately NK of Samara. The engines were
units to the engine’s specific impulse parame- presented to public for the first time at Aviadvi-
ter. gatel-90 show.
In the proposed configuration, the RD- The two products are Russia’s first ever
161P engine is quite small-sized, essentially recoverable liquid-propellant rocket engines
because the nozzle is relatively short. Despite originally developed more than 25 years ago.
the fuel-saving scheme including generator gas Since then, the engines have passed full-scale
stalled in the first stage of the Proton launch General doing marketing research for the en-
vehicle. Indeed, NK-33 engine may well be de- gines in Western markets performed five bench
scribed as one of the world’s best in terms of trials of NK-33 at their test facility in Sacra-
mass-to-thrust ratio. mento.
In its turn, the NK-43 engine is the So far, Dvigately NK have been known to
world’s most powerful high-altitude have orders in stock for delivery of NK-33 and
lox/kerosene rocket engine. The engine’s top NK-43 engines for future K-1 launch vehicles
(combustion chamber, turbopump assembly, by the United States’ Kistler Aerospace, as
automatics and the initial section of the nozzle) well as for Yamal LV (see NFM 12/98 for de-
is similar to that of the NK-33. However, the tails) by Energia and the Air Launch devel-
nozzle area expansion ratio is much greater. oped by the corporation of the same name (see
Engine reliability was verified by increasing NFM 15/2000).
total firings to as many as ten.
According to some foreign experts, the NK-31/NK-39
remarkable performance of the engines manu- The attractiveness of the NK-31 and NK-
factured in Samara allows one to assume large- 39 engines by Dvigately NK is explained by
scale co-operation of foreign partners with the essentially the same reasons as is the case with
Russian manufacturer is quite possible, start- NK-33 and NK-43.
ing, for instance, from joint Russian-US design Development of the prototype NK-31 en-
efforts for new liquid-propellant rocket engines gine, known to public as NK-9 and designed
to direct installation of engines by originally for the first stage of the GR-1 global
N.D.Kuznetsov on the existing and future for- rocket by Korolyov OKB-1, began in 1959.
eign rockets. The GR-1’s second stage included a high-
As an example, by replacing two booster altitude version of the same liquid-propellant
engines currently installed on Atlas LV with engine designated as NK-9V. That latter one
two NK-33s, payloads injected to transfer or- was in fact the immediate predecessor of NK-
bits for eventual geostationary orbiting could 39 and NK-31.
be increased from 3,630 kg to 4,173 kg. After development works on GR-1 were
By agreement with Dvigately NK, Aerojet discontinued, the NK-9V version with ex-
tended service life was used in the upper (the principal fuel components burned with high
3rd and the 4th) stages of the super heavy Lunar excess of oxidizer.
N-1 carrier rocket. In order to suit for the new The NK-31 and NK-39 engines differ
launch vehicle, the engine power was degraded from the prototype NK-9V unit by a simplified
through a reduction of the turbopump opera- hydro-pneumatic scheme, more advanced auto-
tion intensity. matics and improved turbopump and combus-
The NK-39 engine for N-1’s third stage, tion chamber assemblies. Plug-in connections
and the NK-31 for the same rocket’s fourth and interchangeability of parts add to the en-
stage were developed between 1970-1974 gine’s maintainability.
based on a work statement issued anew to al- Pitifully, similar to NK-33 and NK-43,
low for the initial flight test results of N-1 neither the prototype engine, nor NK-39 or
rocket and improve reliability, ensure failure- NK-31 have never been flown realistically in
free performance and safety of the engine any LV, even despite numerous proposals were
without changing the layout. Interdepartmental made both before and after the described liq-
tests of the engines were completed by 1972. uid-propellant engines were used in the N-1
Engine recovery capability allows each Project. Certain interest in the engines has been
commercial unit to be proof-tested first and re- recently shown by national and foreign compa-
tested later as part of the overall rocket system. nies (including a business from France plan-
The NK-31 engine is a single-chambered ning installation on the VEHRA demo air-
unit with a turbopump fuel feed system de- craft).
signed for environment-friendly non-self-
inflammable fuel (the fuel is kerosene, the oxi- KVD-1
dizer is liquid oxygen). The unit is a close-loop So far, the one and only oxygen/hydrogen
engine with the exhaust turbine gas afterburned liquid-propellant rocket engine in Russia
at high pressure in the main combustion cham- known to have passed through full-scale
ber. The propellant for the turbopump assem- ground testing routine has been the KVD-1 en-
bly’s turbine is the burning products of the gine. Even despite more than 35 years have
block of today’s Zenit-3 LV (at Sea Launch) or tary station after separation from the final stage
a future modification of same, thus allowing of the LV to as fast as the escape velocity and
the LV’s capabilities to be dramatically en- to ensure numerous flight trajectory correc-
hanced during high-altitude elliptical and/or tions, deboosting, Martian orbit entry and orbit
geosynchronous satellite launches. maneuvering.
Though the missions of the mentioned
S5.92 stations failed, nothing could be said to repri-
The prototype S5.92 engine was devel- mand the power plant, and a proposal followed
oped as part of the Soviet N-1-L3 Project and to use the S5.92 engines in both the existing
was to be installed on the "Zh" block or the and the future power plants of spacecraft and
power unit designed for departure of the launch vehicles.
manned Lunar spacecraft integral to the N-1 - The single-chambered S5.92 engine is an
L-3 system from the Lunar orbit back to Earth. open layout unit with the propellants fed by a
KRD-1 engines were also developed in parallel turpopump. The turbine is operated by the
with the described engine to provide lift-off main propellants, the exhaust is effected
capability from the Lunar surface and return through fixed steering nozzles. A feature of the
mission to Earth for the return rockets of the engine is the unusually hinged (rather than
automatic space stations Luna-16, -20, -24; in gimballed) mount of the chamber to ensure its
addition, development works continued on the plane-parallel motion inside the power plant.
KTDU-417 engines designed to provide mis- The approach provides for the engine thrust
sion trajectory correction and Moon landing of vector to be displaced relative to the center of
those stations. In fact, the mentioned engines masses, which in the described power plant is
had much in common, even despite their pro- found very close to the engine head (under the
pellants differed. situation, gimballing would not provide the
The development of today’s S5.92 began arm required to generate the moment of thrust).
in 1978. The engine is designed for the multi- S5.92 engine is operational in two modes: the
functional rocket unit integratable into a vari- high-thrust mode and the low-thrust mode.
ety of spacecraft, including Fobos-1, -2 and High-thrust mode is applied in major speed al-
Mars-96. The power plant of which S5.92 is a teration maneuvering, while low-thrust mode is
part was to boost up an automatic interplane-
RD-161 RD-170
Energia-Buran
RD-171
Soyuz-2 RD-161K
3rd stage
NPO Energomash
RD-191
RD-120
Soyuz-2 Atlas 3A 1st stage
3rd stage
RD-120K
nd
Angara 1st stage
Zenit 2 stage
Dvigateli NK
Soyuz-2 1st & 2nd st NK-31
Yedinstvo NK-33
NK-39
KB Kmimmash NK-43
KVD-1
KBKhA
S5.92 RD-0110
RD-0120
RD-0124
GSLV
Yamal
Air Launch
Kistler