Aerojet Rocketdyne is a

subsidiary A subsidiary, subsidiary company, or daughter company is a company (law), company completely or partially owned or controlled by another company, called the parent company or holding company, which has legal and financial control over the subsidia ...

of American

defense Defense or defence may refer to: Tactical, martial, and political acts or groups * Defense (military), forces primarily intended for warfare * Civil defense, the organizing of civilians to deal with emergencies or enemy attacks * Defense industr ...

company L3Harris that manufactures rocket,

hypersonic In aerodynamics, a hypersonic speed is one that exceeds five times the speed of sound, often stated as starting at speeds of Mach 5 and above. The precise Mach number at which a craft can be said to be flying at hypersonic speed varies, since i ...

, and electric propulsive systems for space, defense, civil and commercial applications. Aerojet traces its origins to the General Tire and Rubber Company (later renamed GenCorp, Inc. as it diversified) established in 1915, while

Rocketdyne Rocketdyne is an American rocket engine design and production company headquartered in Canoga Park, California, Canoga Park, in the western San Fernando Valley of suburban Los Angeles, California, Los Angeles, in southern California. Rocketdyne ...

was created as a division of

North American Aviation North American Aviation (NAA) was a major American aerospace manufacturer that designed and built several notable aircraft and spacecraft. Its products included the T-6 Texan trainer, the P-51 Mustang fighter, the B-25 Mitchell bomber, the F- ...

in 1955. Aerojet Rocketdyne was formed in 2013 when Aerojet and

Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne (PWR) was an American company that designed and produced rocket engines that use liquid rocket propellants, liquid propellants. It was a division of Pratt & Whitney, a fully owned subsidiary of United Technologies Corpo ...

were merged, following the latter's acquisition by GenCorp, Inc. from

Pratt & Whitney Pratt & Whitney is an American aerospace manufacturer with global service operations. It is a subsidiary of RTX Corporation (formerly Raytheon Technologies). Pratt & Whitney's aircraft engines are widely used in both civil aviation (especially ...

. Aerojet Rocketdyne was acquired by L3Harris in July 2023 for $4.7 billion.

History

Background: Aerojet

Several decades after it began manufacturing rubber products, General Tire & Rubber diversified into broadcasting and aeronautics. In the 1940s, the Aerojet company began experimenting with various rocket designs. For a solid-fuel rocket, they needed binders, and turned to General Tire & Rubber for assistance. General became a partner in the company. Radio broadcasting began with the purchase of several radio networks starting in 1943. In 1952, its purchase of WOR-TV expanded the broadcast business into television. In 1953, General Tire & Rubber bought the

RKO Radio Pictures RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, is an American film production and distribution company, historically one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Kei ...

movie studio. All of its media and entertainment holdings were organized into the RKO General division. Due to the studio and rocket businesses, General Tire & Rubber came to own a great deal of property in California. Its internal facilities management unit began commercializing its operations, landing General Tire & Rubber in the real estate business. This started when Aerojet-General Corporation acquired approximately of land in Eastern Sacramento County. Aerojet converted these former gold fields into one of the premier rocket manufacturing and testing facilities in the Western world. However, most of this land was used to provide safe buffer zones for Aerojet's testing and manufacturing operations. Later, as the need for these facilities and safety zones decreased, the property became available for other uses. Located northeast of Sacramento along U.S. Highway 50, the properties were valuable, being in a key growth corridor in the region. Approximately of the Aerojet lands are now being planned as a community called Easton. Easton Development Company LLC was formed to assist in the process.

Background: Rocketdyne

In 1955,

spun off

, a developer of rocket motors that built upon research conducted into the German

V-2 Rocket The V2 (), with the technical name ''Aggregat (rocket family), Aggregat-4'' (A4), was the world's first long-range missile guidance, guided ballistic missile. The missile, powered by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, was developed during the S ...

after World War II. Rocketdyne would become a major supplier for

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

, producing the Rocketdyne F-1 engine for the

Saturn V The Saturn V is a retired American super heavy-lift launch vehicle developed by NASA under the Apollo program for human exploration of the Moon. The rocket was human-rated, had multistage rocket, three stages, and was powered by liquid-propel ...

rocket of the Apollo Space Program as well as the

RS-25 The RS-25, also known as the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME), is a liquid-fuel cryogenic rocket engine that was used on NASA's Space Shuttle and is used on the Space Launch System. Designed and manufactured in the United States by Rocketd ...

engine of the

Space Shuttle program The Space Shuttle program was the fourth human spaceflight program carried out by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which accomplished routine transportation for Earth-to-orbit crew and cargo from 1981 to 2011. Its ...

and its successor the

Space Launch System The Space Launch System (SLS) is an American Super heavy-lift launch vehicle, super heavy-lift Expendable launch system, expendable launch vehicle used by NASA. As the primary launch vehicle of the Artemis program, Artemis Moon landing progra ...

(SLS) program. Aerojet Rocketdyne engines have contributed to every successful

Mars mission, including powering the launch, entry, descent, and landing phases of the Perseverance rover mission.

Name change

In 1984, General Tire created a parent holding company, GenCorp, Inc., for its various business ventures. The main subsidiaries were: * General Tire and Rubber * RKO General, the broadcast arm of the conglomerate; * DiversiTech General, a manufacturer of tennis balls and polymer products, including automotive soundproofing and home wallpapers. * Aerojet General, a defense (missile) contractor. Through its RKO General subsidiary, the company also held stakes in: *

Frontier Airlines Frontier Airlines, Inc. is a major American ultra low-cost airline headquartered in Denver, Colorado. It operates flights to over 120 destinations in the United States, Caribbean, Mexico and Central America, and employs more than 5,000 staff. ...

. * RKO bottlers, which operated

Pepsi-Cola Pepsi is a Carbonated water, carbonated soft drink with a cola flavor, manufactured by PepsiCo which serves as its flagship product. In 2023, Pepsi was the second most valuable soft drink brand worldwide behind Coca-Cola; the two share a long ...

distributorships; and several resorts and hotels, including the Westward Look resort in

Tucson, Arizona Tucson (; ; ) is a city in Pima County, Arizona, United States, and its county seat. It is the second-most populous city in Arizona, behind Phoenix, Arizona, Phoenix, with a population of 542,630 in the 2020 United States census. The Tucson ...

Disconglomeration

Faced with a

hostile takeover In business, a takeover is the purchase of one company (law), company (the ''target'') by another (the ''acquirer'' or ''bidder''). In the UK, the term refers to the acquisition of a public company whose shares are publicly listed, in contrast t ...

attempt, among other difficulties, GenCorp, Inc. shed some of its long-held units in the late 1980s. RKO General ran into difficulties with the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains j ...

(FCC) during license renewal proceedings in the late 1980s. The FCC was reluctant to renew the broadcast licenses, due to widespread lying to advertisers and regulators. As a result of the protracted proceedings, GenCorp sold RKO General's broadcast properties beginning in 1987. GenCorp, Inc. also sold its former flagship, General Tire, to German tire manufacturer Continental AG in order to concentrate on Aerojet. In 1999, GenCorp, Inc. spun off its Decorative & Building Products and Performance Chemicals businesses. GenCorp, Inc. formed OMNOVA Solutions Inc. into a separate, publicly traded company, and transferred those businesses into it. GenCorp, Inc.'s two remaining businesses, as of 2008, were Aerojet and Easton Real Estate.

Pension problems and leadership changes

GenCorp, Inc. withdrew its over-funded pension during the real estate boom years of 2006 and 2007. The real estate bust caused an underfunding of the pension plan of over $300 million. This caused a freeze of its pension plan on February 1, 2009, and an end to

401(k) In the United States, a 401(k) plan is an employer-sponsored, defined-contribution, personal pension (savings) account, as defined in subsection 401(k) of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code. Periodic employee contributions come directly out of their ...

match on January 15, 2009. The move was expected to save the company 29 million a year. In March 2008, hedge fund Steel Partners II, which owned 14% of GenCorp, Inc., made an agreement that saw Terry J. Hall step down as CEO and gave Steel Partners II control of three board seats plus the selection of the new CEO (who would also hold a board seat). Steel Partners II had previously attempted a

in 2004, and forced the deal after complaining about "significant underperformance and deterioration of share price". Aerojet President J. Scott Neish was named interim CEO. In January 2010, Scott Seymour, the former head of Northrop Grumman Integrated Systems from 2002 to 2008, was appointed permanent CEO of GenCorp, Inc. and Neish resigned.

Aeronautics expansion

In July 2012, GenCorp, Inc. agreed to buy rocket engine producer

from

United Technologies Corporation United Technologies Corporation (UTC) was an American multinational corporation, multinational list of conglomerates, conglomerate headquartered in Farmington, Connecticut. It researched, developed, and manufactured products in numerous are ...

for $550 million."Who's Where", '' Aviation Week & Space Technology'', January 1, 2007 The FTC approved the deal on June 10, 2013, and it closed on June 17. GenCorp, Inc. was later renamed ''Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings, Inc'' on April 27, 2015.

Abandoned acquisition by Lockheed Martin

On December 20, 2020, it was announced that

Lockheed Martin The Lockheed Martin Corporation is an American Arms industry, defense and aerospace manufacturer with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta on March 15, 1995. It is headquartered in North ...

would acquire the company for $4.4 billion. The acquisition was expected to close in first quarter of 2022, but this received opposition from Raytheon Technologies. Later the FTC sued to block this deal on a 4–0 vote in January 2022 on grounds that this would eliminate the largest independent maker of rocket motors and Lockheed subsequently abandoned the deal in February 2022.

Acquisition by L3Harris

In December 2022,

L3Harris Technologies L3Harris Technologies, Inc. is an American technology company, defense contractor, and information technology service (economics), services provider that produces products for command and control systems, wireless equipment, tactical radios, avi ...

agreed to buy the company for $4.7 billion in cash. The acquisition was completed in July 2023. L3Harris named former CTO Ross Niebergall as president of the new Aerojet Rocketdyne business segment, which would now be headquartered in Palm Bay, Florida.

Products

Pratt Whitney Rocketdyne space shuttle main engines

Current engines

( LH₂/ LOX) – Previously known as the Space Shuttle main engine (SSME), it was the reusable main engine developed by

for the now-retired

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable launch system, reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. ...

. Remaining RS-25D engines are planned for use on early

rocket launches after which an expendable version, RS-25E will be developed for follow-on SLS launches. * RL10 ( LH₂/ LOX) – Developed by

and currently used on the

Centaur A centaur ( ; ; ), occasionally hippocentaur, also called Ixionidae (), is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse that was said to live in the mountains of Thessaly. In one version o ...

upper stage for the

Atlas V Atlas V is an expendable launch system and the fifth major version in the Atlas (rocket family), Atlas launch vehicle family. It was developed by Lockheed Martin and has been operated by United Launch Alliance (ULA) since 2006. Primarily used to ...

. It is also currently used on the Space Launch System on the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS) and will be used on the Exploration Upper Stage (EUS) in the future. Formerly used on the upper stage for the Delta IV, the Centaur upper stage for

Titan Titan most often refers to: * Titan (moon), the largest moon of Saturn * Titans, a race of deities in Greek mythology Titan or Titans may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Fictional entities Fictional locations * Titan in fiction, fictiona ...

, the S-IV upper stage for the Saturn I, the vertical-landing McDonnell Douglas DC-X "Delta Clipper". It was intended to serve as the main propulsion engine for the proposed

Altair Altair is the brightest star in the constellation of Aquila (constellation), Aquila and the list of brightest stars, twelfth-brightest star in the night sky. It has the Bayer designation Alpha Aquilae, which is Latinisation of name ...

lunar lander. Two RL-10 engines are used on Centaur V upper stage of ULA Vulcan. * R-4D ( MMH/ NTO) – 100 lbf (exact thrust depends on variant) hypergolic thruster, originally developed by Marquardt as RCS thrusters for the Apollo SM and LM. Currently used as secondary engines on the Orion

European Service Module The European Service Module (ESM) is the service module component of the Orion (spacecraft), Orion spacecraft, serving as its primary power and propulsion component until it is discarded at the end of each mission. In January 2013, NASA announced ...

, and as apogee motors on various satellite buses. * MR103G — 0.2 lb

hydrazine Hydrazine is an inorganic compound with the chemical formula . It is a simple pnictogen hydride, and is a colourless flammable liquid with an ammonia-like odour. Hydrazine is highly hazardous unless handled in solution as, for example, hydraz ...

monopropellant Monopropellants are propellants consisting of chemicals that release energy through exothermic chemical decomposition. The molecular bond energy of the monopropellant is released usually through use of a catalyst. This can be contrasted with biprop ...

thruster * MR111g — 1 lb hydrazine monopropellant thruster * MR106L — 5-7 lb hydrazine monopropellant thruster * MR107M — 45 lb hydrazine monopropellant thruster * Blue Origin CCE (

solid rocket motor 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. The inception of gunpowder rockets in warfare can be cre ...

or SRM) — the

Blue Origin Blue Origin Enterprises, L.P. is an American space technology company headquartered in Kent, Washington. The company operates the suborbital New Shepard rocket and the heavy-lift New Glenn rocket. In addition to producing engines for its own ...

New Shepard New Shepard is a Reusable launch vehicle, fully reusable Sub-orbital spaceflight, sub-orbital launch vehicle developed for space tourism by Blue Origin. The vehicle is named after Alan Shepard, who became the List of space travelers by nationali ...

Crew Capsule Escape Solid Rocket Motor is built by Aerojet Rocketdyne.

Former production engines and others

* Rocketdyne F-1 (RP-1/LOX) – The main engine of the first stage of the

rocket used in the

Apollo program The Apollo program, also known as Project Apollo, was the United States human spaceflight program led by NASA, which Moon landing, landed the first humans on the Moon in 1969. Apollo followed Project Mercury that put the first Americans in sp ...

. The most powerful single combustion chamber liquid-propellant rocket engine ever developed. *

Rocketdyne J-2 The J-2, commonly known as Rocketdyne J-2, was a liquid-fuel rocket, liquid-fuel cryogenic rocket engine used on NASA's Saturn IB and Saturn V launch vehicles. Built in the United States by Rocketdyne, the J-2 burned Cryogenic fuel, cryogenic liqu ...

(LH₂/LOX) – Used on the upper stage of the Saturn IB and second and upper stages of

. * SJ61 (

JP-7 Turbine Fuel Low Volatility JP-7, commonly known as JP-7 (referred to as Jet Propellant 7 prior to MIL-DTL-38219) is a specialized type of jet fuel developed at Pratt and Whitney by master chemist Clarence Brown CB Eichman in 1955 for the Centra ...

/ingested air) – A dual-mode

ramjet A ramjet is a form of airbreathing jet engine that requires forward motion of the engine to provide air for combustion. Ramjets work most efficiently at supersonic speeds around and can operate up to . Ramjets can be particularly appropriat ...

scramjet A scramjet (supersonic combustion ramjet) is a variant of a ramjet airbreathing jet engine in which combustion takes place in supersonic airflow. As in ramjets, a scramjet relies on high vehicle speed to compress the incoming air forcefully b ...

engine flown on the Boeing X-51 hypersonic demonstration vehicle. * AJ10 (

Aerozine 50 __NOTOC__ Aerozine 50 is a 50:50 mix by weight of hydrazine and unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (UDMH), developed in the late 1950s by Aerojet General Corporation as a storable, high-energy, hypergolic fuel for the Titan II ICBM rocket engines ...

/ N₂O₄) – Second stage engine for the

Delta II Delta II was an expendable launch system, originally designed and built by McDonnell Douglas, and sometimes known as the Thorad Delta 1. Delta II was part of the Delta rocket family, derived directly from the Delta 3000, and entered service in ...

, used as the Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) engine for the Space Shuttle, and the main engine for the European

Orion Service Module The European Service Module (ESM) is the service module component of the Orion (spacecraft), Orion spacecraft, serving as its primary power and propulsion component until it is discarded at the end of each mission. In January 2013, NASA announced ...

. * AR1 (RP-1/LOX) – A proposed thrust

RP-1 RP-1 (Rocket Propellant-1 or Refined Petroleum-1) and similar fuels like RG-1 and T-1 are highly refined kerosene formulations used as rocket fuel. Liquid-fueled rockets that use RP-1 as fuel are known as kerolox rockets. In their engines, RP- ...

/ LOX oxidizer-rich staged combustion cycle engine. * Rocketdyne H-1 (RP-1/LOX) – A first stage engine flown on the Saturn I and Saturn IB launch vehicles. *

RS-27 The RS-27 (Rocket System-27) was a liquid-propellant rocket engine developed in 1974 by Rocketdyne to replace the aging Rocketdyne S-3D, MB-3 in the Delta. Incorporating components of the venerable MB-3 and the Rocketdyne H-1, H-1 designs, the ...

(RP-1/LOX) – A first stage engine flown on the Delta 2000 launch vehicle. *

RS-27A The RS-27 (Rocket System-27) was a liquid-propellant rocket engine developed in 1974 by Rocketdyne to replace the aging MB-3 in the Delta. Incorporating components of the venerable MB-3 and the H-1 designs, the RS-27 was a modernized version ...

(RP-1/LOX) – A first stage engine flown on the

and Delta III. * RS-68 (LH₂/LOX) – A first stage engine flown on the Delta IV, designed as a simplified version of the RS-25 due to its expendable usage. It is the largest hydrogen-fueled rocket engine ever flown. * J-2X (LH₂/LOX) – An engine that was originally being developed for the Ares I's upper stage before the cancellation of the

Constellation program The Constellation program (abbreviated CxP) was a crewed spaceflight program developed by NASA, the space agency of the United States, from 2005 to 2009. The major goals of the program were "completion of the International Space Station" and a " ...

. The engine was considered for the

's Exploration Upper Stage before being replaced with a cluster of four RL10s. It is based on the

. * Baby Bantam (

/ LOX) – An thrust engine. In June 2014, Aerojet Rocketdyne announced that they had "manufactured and successfully tested an engine which had been entirely 3D printed". * AJ-26 (

/LOX) – Rebranded and modified NK-33 engines imported from

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

. Used as first stage engine for the

Antares Antares is the brightest star in the constellation of Scorpius. It has the Bayer designation α Scorpii, which is Latinisation of names, Latinised to Alpha Scorpii. Often referred to as "the heart of the scorpion", Antares is flanked by ...

before being replaced by the RD-181. * AJ-60A (Solid – HTPB) – A solid rocket motor formerly used for the Atlas V launch vehicle, until being replaced by the Northrop Grumman GEM-63 in 2021. *AR-22 (LH₂/LOX) – An engine in development from 2017 to 2020 for the XS-1 spacecraft, also known as the Phantom Express. The engine is based on the

and utilizing parts remaining in Aerojet Rocketdyne and NASA inventories from earlier versions of the RS-25. Two of the engines would have been built for the spaceplane. Boeing pulled out of the project in January 2020, effectively ending it.

In development

X3 ion thruster

On 13 October 2017, it was reported that Aerojet Rocketdyne completed a keystone demonstration on a new X3

ion thruster An ion thruster, ion drive, or ion engine is a form of electric propulsion used for spacecraft propulsion. An ion thruster creates a cloud of positive ions from a neutral gas by ionizing it to extract some electrons from its atoms. The i ...

, which is a central part of the XR-100 system for the

NextSTEP NeXTSTEP is a discontinued object-oriented, multitasking operating system based on the Mach kernel and the UNIX-derived BSD. It was developed by NeXT, founded by Steve Jobs, in the late 1980s and early 1990s and was initially used for its ...

program. The X3 ion thruster was designed by the

University of Michigan The University of Michigan (U-M, U of M, or Michigan) is a public university, public research university in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest institution of higher education in the state. The University of Mi ...

and is being developed in partnership with the University of Michigan, NASA, and the Air Force. The X3 is a

Hall-effect thruster In spacecraft propulsion, a Hall-effect thruster (HET) is a type of ion thruster in which the propellant is accelerated by an electric field. Hall-effect thrusters (based on the discovery by Edwin Hall) are sometimes referred to as Hall thruste ...

operating at over 100 kW of power. During the demonstration, it broke records for the maximum power output, thrust and operating current achieved by a Hall thruster to date. It operated at a range of power from 5 kW to 102 kW, with electric current of up to 260 amperes. It generated 5.4 newtons of thrust, "which is the highest level of thrust achieved by any plasma thruster to date". A novelty in its design is that it incorporates three plasma channels, each a few centimeters deep, nested around one another in concentric rings. The system is and almost in diameter.

Other notable products

Multi-mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator

Aerojet Rocketdyne is the prime contractor to the

US Department of Energy US or Us most often refers to: * Us (pronoun), ''Us'' (pronoun), the objective case of the English first-person plural pronoun ''we'' * US, an abbreviation for the United States US, U.S., Us, us, or u.s. may also refer to: Arts and entertainme ...

for the Multi-mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator. The first flight MMRTG is currently powering the Mars

Curiosity Rover ''Curiosity'' is a car-sized Mars rover Space exploration, exploring Gale (crater), Gale crater and Mount Sharp on Mars as part of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission. ''Curiosity'' was launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station ...

, and a second flight unit powers the Perseverance Rover.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings Aerojet aircraft Rocketdyne L3Harris Technologies Holding companies of the United States Manufacturing companies based in Greater Los Angeles Technology companies based in Greater Los Angeles Companies based in El Segundo, California American companies established in 1915 Technology companies established in 1915 1915 establishments in Ohio Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange Aerospace companies of the United States 2023 mergers and acquisitions