Copernical Team
Rocket Lab Successfully Completes Initial Hot Fire Test of Archimedes Engine for Neutron Rocket
Write a comment
Rocket Lab USA, Inc. (Nasdaq: RKLB) has conducted the first hot fire test of its new Archimedes rocket engine, marking an important step toward the inaugural launch of its Neutron medium-lift rocket.
The successful hot fire test took place in August 2024 at Rocket Lab's Engine Test Complex, located within NASA's Stennis Space Center in Hancock County, Mississippi. During the test, Archimed Rocket Lab Installs Advanced Carbon Composite Manufacturing System for Neutron Rocket Production
Write a comment
Rocket Lab USA, Inc. (Nasdaq: RKLB), a global leader in launch services and space systems, has commenced the installation of a state-of-the-art automated fiber placement (AFP) machine at its Neutron rocket production facility in Middle River, Maryland. The machine, touted as the largest of its kind, is set to revolutionize the production of carbon composite structures for Rocket Lab's Neutron la Variable-Thrust Rocket Engine Passes Initial Hot-Fire Tests
Write a comment
The European Space Agency (ESA) has successfully completed the first phase of hot-fire tests on a new variable-thrust rocket engine, part of the Future Launchers Preparatory Programme (FLPP). Conducted in Warsaw, Poland, the tests focused on a rocket engine developed by a Polish consortium that is exploring innovative designs for propellant valves and injectors. These designs aim to vary thrust The hidden intricacies of Messier 106
Write a comment
Image:
The hidden intricacies of Messier 106 Build your own Ariane 6 rocket with ESA!
Write a comment
Build your own Ariane 6 rocket with ESA!
Download your printable kit and join the competition.
NASA weighs Crew Dragon rescue for stranded Starliner crew
Write a comment
What was meant to be a weeklong trip to the International Space Station (ISS) for the first NASA astronauts to fly with Boeing could extend to eight months, with the agency considering bringing them home on a SpaceX spaceship.
A final decision on whether to persist with Boeing's troubled Starliner - which experienced worrying propulsion issues as it flew up to the orbital platform in June - Here's how Curiosity's sky crane changed the way NASA explores Mars
Write a comment
Twelve years ago, NASA landed its six-wheeled science lab using a daring new technology that lowers the rover using a robotic jetpack.
NASA's Curiosity rover mission is celebrating a dozen years on the red planet, where the six-wheeled scientist continues to make big discoveries as it inches up the foothills of a Martian mountain. Just landing successfully on Mars is a feat, but the Curiosity mission went several steps further on Aug. 5, 2012, touching down with a bold new technique: the sky crane maneuver.
A swooping robotic jetpack delivered Curiosity to its landing area and lowered it to the surface with nylon ropes, then cut the ropes and flew off to conduct a controlled crash landing safely out of range of the rover.
The Perseids are here. Here's how to see the 'fireballs' of summer's brightest meteor shower
Write a comment
The Perseids are back to dazzle the sky with bursts of light and color.
The annual meteor shower, active since July, peaks before dawn Monday. It's one of the brightest and most easily viewed showers of the year, producing "bright blue meteors—and lots of them," said University of Warwick astronomer Don Pollacco.
More than 50 meteors per hour are expected, according to the American Meteor Society. The shower lasts through Sept.
Drop it like it's hot: Space Rider model falls gracefully
Write a comment
Over the last four months, the Space Rider team has been running a drop-test campaign whereby a full-scale model of the future orbital laboratory is dropped from a helicopter to test and qualify the deployment of its parachutes, at Salto di Quirra in Sardinia, Italy.
The Space Rider project is an uncrewed laboratory about the size of two minivans that will be able to stay in orbit for up to two months. The spacecraft comes in two parts, an orbital module that supplies everything it needs to fly around our planet and a reentry module that brings Space Rider and its experiments back to Earth.
Over the course of this test campaign that started in April and is expected to finish in autumn, the teams are using a model of Space Rider that has a similar weight distribution as the real 3,000 kg reentry module. This allows the team to test the parachutes, parafoil and control winches that automatically guide the spacecraft to a soft touchdown on Earth.
Dropped from a maximum height of 3.5 km, drogue chutes deploy to help slow down the test model to a safe speed to extract the parafoil that will allow the spacecraft to be steered to a landing strip.
