14 DAY TRIAL // Yesterday, the European Space Agency tested the prototype of a new type of rocket motor, named P80, which was designed to propel the future small Vega launcher. The test took place at the Guiana Space Center, in Kourou, at 15:35 GMT.
After ignition, the measurements revealed that, in a duration of 111 seconds, the P80 rocket motor was able to deliver 190 tonnes of thrust, equivalent to about a third of the power produced by one of the stages of an Ariane 5 solid booster rocket, and it behaved much in the way that scientists have predicted it would. The main disadvantage of the currently used solid fuel rocket boosters is that once the fuel is being ignited, nothing can be done to stop the energetic reaction. As a precaution measure, the P80 engine has been equipped with a break open mechanism, in order to end the test in case the engine would suffer a critical malfunction.
The first test of a P80 engine was made on the 30th of November last year, in order to experiment the technology used and to validate the motor behavior, so it would pass the qualification stage of the model. However, the test that took place yesterday was made on an engine that represented the models to be used in the flight configuration, in order to evaluate the readiness of the P80 engine for its first flight, which will take place somewhere at the end of the next year.
Unlike the classic solid fuel engines, the P80 consists of 88 tonnes of solid propellant, contained in a single propellant segment, while the engines produced today all have multiple segments; the segments are produced separately and are mated together afterwards.
P80 design removes the heavy steel outer structure, used in the Ariane 5 rockets, with a lightweight filament-wound casted out of composite materials, and uses simplified igniters with carbon fiber structures. Innovative design includes, for the first time, a steerable nozzle made out of composite materials, which can be produced at relative low costs (by casting it out of simpler and fewer elements), plus an increased flexibility of the nozzle, which allows better thrust vector control through the electromechanical actuators.
The platform on which it was tested is usually being used for tests on Ariane 5 motors, thus the P80 will now be disassembled and sent in Europe, for post-firing examination and analysis.
According to Stefano Bianchi, ESA's head of the Vega program, this is the biggest mono-segment of solid-fuel booster, encased in filament-wound ever built. The engine has a dual role in its development stage, both as technology demonstrator and as first stage of the Vega spacecraft, and the project involves staff from ESA, the Italian Space Agency and the French Space Agency.
The Vega satellite launcher, developed by the ESA, is designed to use only solid fuel engines, in a three stage vehicle that has a liquid fueled injection module. When completed, it will be able to lift multiple payloads up to 1,500 kilograms, at altitudes as high as 700 kilometers, to put them in a circular orbit, and also to lift satellites weighing from 300 to 2,000 kilograms, reaching maximum altitudes of 1,500 kilometers.
After qualifying, Vega spacecrafts will be sold and operated by the Arianespace, in the Guiana Space Center, as an alternative for the use of Ariane 5 and Soyuz rockets, which are currently able to put satellites into space ranging from small to mid size.