The Exploration Company has successfully completed a six-week test campaign of the oxygen-rich preburner for its Typhoon rocket engine.
With co-financing from the French space agency CNES, The Exploration Company began work on its Typhoon rocket engine in January 2024. The reusable engine uses a full-flow staged combustion cycle and is designed to produce 250 tonnes of thrust, which is comparable to a SpaceX Raptor.”
On 31 July, the company announced that it had completed a series of 16 hot-fire tests of the oxygen-rich preburner for the Typhoon engine. The preburner powers a rocket engine’s turbopumps, which feed fuel and oxidiser into the combustion chamber at high pressure. The six-week test campaign was conducted on the P8 research and development test bench at the German aerospace agency DLR’s facilities in Lampoldshausen.
According to the company, once it had overcome low-frequency instabilities, it achieved stable combustion test firings of up to 85 seconds, a significant improvement over its previous test campaign earlier this year.
In early February, the company revealed that it had completed the first six-week test campaign of the preburner. Due to challenges, which included hardware failures, it was unable to achieve more than 16 seconds of stable combustion at that time.
While there’s been clear progress since the February test campaign, the 31 July update offered no indication of a path forward.
At this point, the Typhoon engine does not have a confirmed application, as it is far too powerful for any of the company’s current in-space logistics projects. According to information provided to European Spaceflight by the company, The Exploration Company partnered with an industrial prime to submit a proposal for the European Space Agency’s European Launcher Challenge. While unconfirmed, the company’s contribution to the bid likely included the Typhoon engine. The Exploration Company has not made any public comments on whether the unnamed industrial prime was among the five companies selected by ESA to move forward. As a result, the engine’s future remains uncertain.
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It’s odd that there’s so little transparency surrounding this taxpayer-funded project. I can only hope that this Typhoon engine ultimately serves a useful purpose, so that all the money and effort aren’t wasted.