• Journal of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers
• /
• v.23 no.6
• /
• pp.72-86
• /
• 2019

SpaceX is currently leading the global launch market with the successful launch and recovery of Falcon 9 v1.2 Block 5. SpaceX developed Merlin engine, a kerosene gas generator engine, and continuously upgraded the engine from Falcon 1 to Falcon Heavy to increase payload weight. SpaceX suffered a lot of failures early on, but with the help of NASA, it was possible to overcome many crises and develop vehicles. In addition, it successfully developed reusable vehicles, which drastically reduced operating costs. Subsequent launch vehicles in Korea also need to be developed with reference to SpaceX's development strategy.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
• /
• v.48 no.9
• /
• pp.703-709
• /
• 2020

Pintle injector is known to have been adopted as injector of Lunar Module Descent Engine (LMDE) and contributed to success of the Apollo program and recently used in merlin engine. In this study, 500N Lab-Scale pintle injector thruster was manufactured and the combustion experiment with LOx/GCH4 was conducted. However, the proto-type thruster was showed some problems, such as low combustion efficiency and melting of pintle tip. To solve these problems, the flow guide in pintle tip was suggested through the CFD simulation. After addition of flow guide module, the combustion efficiency increased and pintle tip did not melt until the end of combustion.