Starship,Spacex’s mars bound rocket is going to have a huge update. It’s previous engine raptor is getting a remodel and it’s going to bring revolution.
It’s a big boost to power from the last raptor engine that was used in falcon 9 rocket which was named “BFR”. The previous engine was fueled by rocket propellant but this one is going to be fueled by liquid oxygen and methane. The spacex raptor 2 is intended to carry astronauts and bring them back.
SpaceX starship: what is raptor 2?
It is a more powerful tweaked version of the already existing rraptor engine. The spacex raptor 2 engine is used for test fli8ghts in starships most recent flight was in May 2021 that reached a height of 33000 ft
The Starship consists of two components:-
The ship itself it’s also called the starship which is 160 feet tall an d includes crew and cargo
The heavy booster that is 230 feet tall and helps the ship to leave the earth
The construction is expected to reach 400 feet in total
The raptor powers the both while the ship features six engines Musk explained in 2019 that the booster could hold anywhere between 24 to 37 engines
There are two variants of the raptor engine
The sea level variant- The super heavy booster will use this variant. It will be consisted of three of the six engines of the ship.
The Vacuum Variant- This is the variant optimized for space and will use three of the six engines on the ship.
It is heard that the sea level variant will have a thrust of 200 tons but there are plans to increase it to 250 tons. “Current plan is to increase base Raptor thrust to ~230 tons or ~500 million lbs & increase booster engine count to 32 or 33. All Raptors on booster, whether fixed or gimbaling, would be the same. 33*230 gets ~7600 tons of thrust & T/W of ~1.5.”
So this is a engine that offers a bit more power than the previous
Starship-What does raptor 2 means for mars mission?
Musks comment suggests that the previous plan was to genret thrust of 16 million pounds but the comment suggested that it could go upto 17 million pounds. For comparison the most powerful rocket was saturn V that flew in 1973 and generate a thrust of 7.6 million pounds.
