Technological achievements are somehow always facilitated by competition and conflict, and
that may occasionally be more physical than merely mental in nature.
For instance, we can observe how intense competition between the two famous space company - Blue
Origin and SpaceX has led to an outstanding advancement in space travel and exploration.
Though a guru like Elon Musk has a burning desire to land humans on Mars, and perhaps
make the planet a heritage for his generation and himself.
At the moment, the competition between Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos is more like a track race.
To correctly determine who will win the space sector, one of these founders have to create
a reliable and reusable rocket that will guarantee safety of life and equipment on every lift-off
and landing.
If you take a closer look at the current situation on ground, the winner will be the one who
achieves the aim of making humans an interplanetary species first.
In the short term, SpaceX seems to be in the lead, as we have seen several of Jeff Bezos'
efforts to overtake SpaceX fail spectacularly, while Elon Musk appears to be racking up victory
after victory.
And considering Musk's ambitions, it's clear that he will actually be the winner of the
space race, even in the midst of his rivals like Virgin galactic, and Blue Origin.
But we won't praise him now, since he hasn't yet landed on Mars.
So, he should bear in mind that - that's a challenge he's got to conquer, we are not
imposing it on him, but you know, he had promised the world to land humans on Mars and we are
eagerly waiting for him to do so - so that we will all be excited and definitely award
him as the hero of our time.
At a time like this, Spacex and Blue origin has got a heat-to-head round on creating a
rocket engine that beats the earth's gravity and also survive on a long journey to other
planets in space.
In this video we will discuss how spacex raptor engine outperforms Blue Origin BE-4 engine
in regards to space shuttle.
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SpaceX and Blue Origin are constructing the most advanced spacecrafts that may haven’t
existed in the world before, but these rockets need powerful rocket engines to propel them
into space.
spaceX has earned quite a reputation for itself in the aerospace business, haven successfully
launched a large number of rocket engines, some of which are completely built and others
still in development.
These rocket engines include the Merlin, kestrel, Draco, superDraco, and most significantly
the raptor engine.
This engines are regarded today as the "King of the Rocket Engines."
Whereas the beginning of Blue Origin's rocket adventure started with building the New Glenn
spacecraft, which was designed to carry out low-cost lunar missions and to inspire Jeff
Bezos's goals of landing humans in ISS and also on the moon.
We can’t also hide the fact that New Glenn is a massive rocket that will need an extremely
strong engine to launch it into space.
The BE- engine which will power the New Glenn spacecraft is the first Blue Origin engine
to be used in a rocket engine that is fired by liquified gases.
United Launch Alliance is a spacecraft launch service provider based in the United States
that is responsible for the construction and operation of a variety of rocket vehicles,
and they've partnered with Blue Origin to accomplish several projects.
Given spaceX's low-cost services and the company's plans to develop reusable rockets, the United
Launch Alliance (ULA) has opted to collaborate with 'blue origin' and develop what should
be termed the next generation of monster engines, known as the BE-4 engine, to power its vulcan
rocket.
But what is quite funny is that the ULA has been working on the vulcan rocket vehicle
since 2014, and till date, it hasn't made any successful flight.
Besides the BE-4 engine will also be utilized on the blue Moon Lander mission spacecraft
now under construction.
According to Blue Origin, the bE-4 rocket engine is a stage combustion rocket engine
powered by liquefied natural gas that is very rich in oxygen and capable of providing up
to 240 tons of thrust, contrary to the raptor engine, which is capable of delivering around
200 tons of thrust.
While both the raptor engine and the BE-4 engines are staged combustion cycle or you
can also call them closed cycle rocket engines, they have minor design changes.
For instance, the raptor engine, which is manufactured by spacex is a twin-shaft full-flow
staged combustion engine that is far more efficient than the BE-4's liquefied natural
gas and high-oxygen combustion chamber.
Furthermore, its combustion cycle employs a combination of oxygen and methane as propellants,
while the raptor engine makes use of cryogenic liquid methane and oxygen, that gives it the
heavy thrust during lift-off.
According to Elon Musk, methane fuel can theoretically be refined on Mars, though this claim has
not been practically verified.
But if Musk can refine methane fuel on Mars, it will be used in the starship on its return
to earth, and when it lands on earth, the rocket will be refilled with liquid methane
here on earth before another relaunch back to Mars.
So try to envision spacex transportation plans between earth and Mars.
However, in contrast to the raptor engine, the BE-4's development and testing have been
a nightmare, with several setbacks and reports that puts Blue Origin and United Launch Collaboration
alliance out of terms for some time now.
Given that Blue Origin's CEO, Jeff Bezos, is still raking in millions of dollars from
his flourishing e-commerce company Amazon, the United Launch Alliance (ULA) believes
that he may not be paying too much attention to blue origin, and they've been contemplating
on this as the hidden reason why the BE-4 engine has yet to achieve success.
When the Vulcan vehicle was first announced, ULA executive president Tony Bruno said that
the vehicle would be ready for launch by 2021.
But since then, nothing happened, and Bruno has blamed Blue Origin for the mishaps and
delays.
The vulcan will employ two BE-4 engines with a combined output of 2.4 mega newtons on each
first stage.
But what get us bothered is how the company intends to make use of two BE-4 engines when
one has not worked properly.
Though Bruno believes that the Vulcan may still be launched in 2021, but the year awaits
no one and sooner, it will come to an end.
So, assertion is unlikely to happen.
However, it wouldn't hurt to remain optimistic.
This and several other factors explain why spaceX's Raptor engine has absolutely destroyed
Blue Origin's BE-4 engine in a one-to-one match.
That is - if we place them in a head-to-head competition on a football field.
Now lets examine the various categories which SpaceX's Raptor engine completely destroyed
the BE-4 engine.
First - is the different thrust utilized in each case.
The BE-4 engine can reach an overall thrust of 240 mega newtons, which is just slightly
greater than the 210 mega newtons of the raptors' engines.
When it comes to thrust to weight ratio, the raptor has an advantage over the BE-4, with
a 107:1 advantage over the BE-4's 80:1 advantage.
The second ground is the impulse rate; The BE-4 has a specific impulse rate of 310
vac, whereas the raptor has approximately 340 vac, and a chamber pressure of approximately
135 bars, whereas the raptor's chamber pressure is 270 bars.
However, even if the BE-4 engine and the raptor engine operate in accordance with their respective
specifications, these specs position the raptor engine much ahead of the BE-4 engine.
Now lets take a look at some other considerations worthy to emphasize;
When it comes to cost, the raptors' economics of scale for high-volume manufacturing and
workplace management methods provides a significant advantage over the BE4.
This is realistic due to the fact that the raptor has everything needed, from components
to the machinery required for its assembly, all of which are manufactured in a small number
of places by a small number of firms, while not quite 'in house' closer to spaceX.
What we should also consider is that the raptor engine already exists, as opposed to the BE-4
engine, which is still in the early stages of development.
Earlier this year, spaceX completed and successfully tested its 100th raptor rocket engine, easily
outperforming everything Blue Origin could expect to do with the BE-4 engine.
Which of these two companies do you like – Blue Origin or Spacex?
Please do well to share your thoughts in the comment section below.
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