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The electric-pump-fed engine is a
bipropellant rocket A liquid-propellant rocket or liquid rocket utilizes a rocket engine that uses liquid propellants. Liquids are desirable because they have a reasonably high density and high specific impulse (''I''sp). This allows the volume of the propellant ta ...
engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ...
in which the fuel pumps are electrically powered, and so all of the input propellant is directly burned in the main combustion chamber, and none is diverted to drive the pumps. This differs from traditional rocket engine designs, in which the pumps are driven by a portion of the input propellants. An electric cycle engine uses electric
pump A pump is a device that moves fluids ( liquids or gases), or sometimes slurries, by mechanical action, typically converted from electrical energy into hydraulic energy. Pumps can be classified into three major groups according to the method the ...
s to pressurize the propellants from a low-pressure fuel tank to high-pressure
combustion chamber A combustion chamber is part of an internal combustion engine in which the fuel/air mix is burned. For steam engines, the term has also been used for an extension of the firebox which is used to allow a more complete combustion process. Intern ...
levels, generally from to . The pumps are powered by an
electric motor An electric motor is an electrical machine that converts electrical energy into mechanical energy. Most electric motors operate through the interaction between the motor's magnetic field and electric current in a wire winding to generate forc ...
, with electricity from a battery bank. Electrical pumps had been used in the secondary propulsion system of the Agena upper stage vehicle. As of December 2020, the only rocket engines to use electric
propellant A propellant (or propellent) is a mass that is expelled or expanded in such a way as to create a thrust or other motive force in accordance with Newton's third law of motion, and "propel" a vehicle, projectile, or fluid payload. In vehicles, the ...
pump systems are the Rutherford engine, ten of which power the
Electron The electron (, or in nuclear reactions) is a subatomic particle with a negative one elementary electric charge. Electrons belong to the first generation of the lepton particle family, and are generally thought to be elementary partic ...
rocket, and the Delphin engine, five of which power the first stage of Astra Space's Rocket 3. On 21 January 2018, Electron was the first electric pump-fed rocket to reach orbit. In comparison to turbo-pumped rocket cycles such as staged combustion and
gas generator A gas generator is a device for generating gas. A gas generator may create gas by a chemical reaction or from a solid or liquid source, when storing a pressurized gas is undesirable or impractical. The term often refers to a device that uses a ...
, an electric cycle engine has potentially worse performance due to the added mass of batteries, but may have lower development and manufacturing costs due its mechanical simplicity, its lack of high temperature turbomachinery, and its easier controllability.


See also

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Combustion tap-off cycle The combustion tap-off cycle is a power cycle of a bipropellant rocket engine. The cycle takes a small portion of hot exhaust gas from the rocket engine's combustion chamber and routes it through turbopump turbines to pump fuel before being exhaus ...
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Expander cycle The expander cycle is a power cycle of a bipropellant rocket engine. In this cycle, the fuel is used to cool the engine's combustion chamber, picking up heat and changing phase. The now heated and gaseous fuel then powers the turbine that drives ...
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Gas-generator cycle The gas-generator cycle is a power cycle of a pumped liquid bipropellant rocket engine. Part of the unburned propellant is burned in a gas generator (or preburner) and the resulting hot gas is used to power the propellant pumps before being exhau ...
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Pressure-fed engine The pressure-fed engine is a class of rocket engine designs. A separate gas supply, usually helium, pressurizes the propellant tanks to force fuel and oxidizer to the combustion chamber. To maintain adequate flow, the tank pressures must exceed th ...
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Rocket engine A rocket engine uses stored rocket propellants as the reaction mass for forming a high-speed propulsive Jet (fluid), jet of fluid, usually high-temperature gas. Rocket engines are reaction engines, producing thrust by ejecting mass rearward, i ...
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Solid-propellant rocket A solid-propellant rocket or solid rocket is a rocket with a rocket engine that uses solid propellants (fuel/ oxidizer). The earliest rockets were solid-fuel rockets powered by gunpowder; they were used in warfare by the Arabs, Chinese, Persi ...
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Staged combustion cycle The staged combustion cycle (sometimes known as topping cycle, preburner cycle, or closed cycle) is a power cycle of a bipropellant rocket engine. In the staged combustion cycle, propellant flows through multiple combustion chambers, and is ...


References

{{spacecraft propulsion Combustion Rocket engines Rocket engines by cycle Spacecraft propulsion Thermodynamic cycles