The RD-253 () and its later variants, the RD-275 and RD-275M, are

liquid-propellant rocket A liquid-propellant rocket or liquid rocket uses a rocket engine burning liquid rocket propellant, liquid propellants. (Alternate approaches use gaseous or Solid-propellant rocket , solid propellants.) Liquids are desirable propellants because th ...

engines 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 gen ...

developed in the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

by Energomash. The engines are used on the first stage of the

Proton A proton is a stable subatomic particle, symbol , Hydron (chemistry), H+, or 1H+ with a positive electric charge of +1 ''e'' (elementary charge). Its mass is slightly less than the mass of a neutron and approximately times the mass of an e ...

launch vehicle and use an oxidizer-rich staged combustion cycle to power the turbopumps. The engine burns a

hypergolic A hypergolic propellant is a rocket propellant combination used in a rocket engine, whose components spontaneously ignite when they come into contact with each other. The two propellant components usually consist of a fuel and an oxidizer. The ...

mixture of

unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine Unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (abbreviated as UDMH; also known as 1,1-dimethylhydrazine, heptyl or Geptil) is a chemical compound with the formula H2NN(CH3)2 that is primarily used as a rocket propellant. At room temperature, UDMH is a colorle ...

(UDMH) fuel with

dinitrogen tetroxide Dinitrogen tetroxide, commonly referred to as nitrogen tetroxide (NTO), and occasionally (usually among ex-USSR/Russian rocket engineers) as amyl, is the chemical compound N2O4. It is a useful reagent in chemical synthesis. It forms an equilibrium ...

() oxidizer, which are highly toxic, but storable at room temperature.

History

Development of the RD-253 started in 1961. Preliminary investigations and development of the engine and its further production was performed under the guidance of

Valentin Glushko Valentin Petrovich Glushko (; ; born 2 September 1908 – 10 January 1989) was a Soviet engineer who was program manager of the Soviet space program from 1974 until 1989. Glushko served as a main designer of rocket engines in the Soviet progra ...

and finished in 1963. The RD-253 uses an oxidiser-rich staged combustion cycle. It was used for the first time in July 1965, when six engines powered the first stage of the

rocket. Development and production of RD-253 was a qualitative leap forward for rocketry of that time by achieving high levels of

thrust Thrust is a reaction force described quantitatively by Newton's third law. When a system expels or accelerates mass in one direction, the accelerated mass will cause a force of equal magnitude but opposite direction to be applied to that ...

specific impulse Specific impulse (usually abbreviated ) is a measure of how efficiently a reaction mass engine, such as a rocket engine, rocket using propellant or a jet engine using fuel, generates thrust. In general, this is a ratio of the ''Impulse (physics), ...

and pressure in the

combustion chamber A combustion chamber is part of an internal combustion engine in which the air–fuel ratio, fuel/air mix is burned. For steam engines, the term has also been used for an extension of the Firebox (steam engine), firebox which is used to allow a mo ...

. This engine is one of the most reliable engines in the

USSR The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

and modern

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 ...

. As the first stage of the

Proton-K The Proton-K, also designated Proton 8K82K after its GRAU index or SL-12 after its model number, was a Russian, previously Soviet, carrier rocket derived from the earlier Proton. It was built by Khrunichev, and launched from sites 81/23, 8 ...

rocket used six RD-253 engines, the system played a pivotal role in Russian space missions when this rocket was chosen as a carrier, including the following programs: "Luna", "

Venera The Venera (, 'Venus') program was a series of space probes developed by the Soviet Union between 1961 and 1984 to gather information about the planet Venus. Thirteen probes successfully entered the Venusian atmosphere, including the two ...

", "Mars probe", crewed orbital stations "Salyut", "

Mir ''Mir'' (, ; ) was a space station operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, first by the Soviet Union and later by the Russia, Russian Federation. ''Mir'' was the first modular space station and was assembled in orbit from 1986 to ...

", and it launched several principal modules for ISS. It was widely used for the launches of heavy satellites. The last RD-253 rocket engine was used on a Proton-K rocket and launched on March 30, 2012. Since the original development of the engine, several modifications were designed that were not flown. One of them was the RD-256 engine, for which development stopped on experimental models. It was not used in flights and was designed for a cancelled vehicle. The RD-254 variant was supplied with an extended nozzle for use in vacuum.

Current state and development

All rights to sell and employ the RD-253 for

rocket are held by Energomash which produces it in Perm,

. The modification RD-275 (14D14) appeared as the result of development in 1987–1993, with the purpose to achieve a more powerful version of the engine. Its 7.7% higher thrust was reached by raising pressure in the

and enabled an increase of payload mass to geostationary orbit (GEO) up to more than . The successful maiden flight of a

rocket with the new engine was completed in 1995. Energomash started the development of next more powerful version of engine in 2001. It has 5.2% higher thrust and has the designation 14D14M (RD-275M). It was designed to allow the rocket to deliver more payload to GEO. In the period from 2002 to 2003 years some experimental work was completed with this version of the engine. It included four test firings of three experimental RD-275M with a total time of 735 s. In the middle of 2005, this engine went into production by government commission. The first launch of a

Proton-M The Proton-M, (Протон-М) GRAU index 8K82M or , is an Expendable launch system, expendable Russian heavy-lift launch vehicle derived from the Soviet Union, Soviet-developed Proton (rocket family), Proton. It is built by Khrunichev State R ...

with 14D14M engines was launched on July 7, 2007. The final version RD-275M is sometimes designated as RD-276, but through 2009 the name RD-275M (14D14M) was more common. Some sources points out the cost of production per engine as much as 1.5 million

USD The United States dollar (symbol: $; currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introduced the U.S. dollar at par with the Spanish silver dollar, divided it int ...

and sometimes calls some lower figures around 1 million

per unit.

Versions

During the years there have been many versions of this engine: * RD-220: Initial proposal for the N-1 first stage. * RD-221: Initial proposal for the N-1 second stage. * RD-222 (

GRAU The Main Missile and Artillery Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation (), commonly referred to by its transliterated acronym GRAU (), is a department of the Russian Ministry of Defense. It is subordinate to the Chief of ...

Index 11D41): Development program for the N-1 first stage. * RD-223 (

Index 11D42): Development program for the N-1 second stage. * RD-253 (

Index 11D43): Serial production version for the

(8K62) first stage. Was proposed for the N-1 first stage. * RD-253F (

Index 11D43F): Project for R-36M (15А14) first stage. * RD-254 (

Index 11D44): Project for

UR-700 The Universal Rocket or ''UR'' family of missiles and carrier rockets is a Russian, previously Soviet rocket family. Intended to allow the same technology to be used in all Soviet rockets, the UR is produced by the Khrunichev State Research and P ...

third stage and for

and N-1 second stages, it was a RD-253 high-altitude version. * RD-275 (

Index 14D14): Serial production for

first stage. RD-253 with increased thrust by 8%. * RD-276 (

Index 14D14М): Serial production for

first stage. Sometimes previously called RD-275M. Improved RD-275.

History

Current state and development

Versions

See also

References