A rocket engine, or simply "rocket", is a jet engine that uses only stored propellant mass for forming its high speed propulsive jet. Rocket engines are reaction engines and obtain thrust in accordance with Newton's third law. Since they need no external material to form their jet, rocket engines can be used for spacecraft propulsion as well as terrestrial uses, such as missiles. Most rocket engines are internal combustion engines, although non-combusting forms also exist.
Rocket engines as a group have the highest exhaust velocities, are by far the lightest, but are the least propellant efficient of all types of jet engines.
Read more about Rocket Engine: Terminology, Principle of Operation, Overall Rocket Engine Performance, Cooling, Mechanical Issues, Acoustic Issues, Testing, Safety, Chemistry, Ignition, Plume Physics, History of Rocket Engines
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... The costs of rockets can be roughly divided into propellant costs, the costs of obtaining and/or producing the 'dry mass' of the rocket and the costs ... Most of the takeoff mass of a rocket is normally propellant ... substantial amounts are needed, for all but the very cheapest rockets it turns out that the propellant costs are usually comparatively small, although not completely negligible ...
... The Heinkel He 176 was a German rocket-powered aircraft ... be propelled solely by a liquid-fuelled rocket, making its first powered flight on 20 June 1939 with Erich Warsitz at the controls ... was not spectacular, but it did provide "proof of concept" for rocket propulsion ...
... A rocket launcher is any device that launches a rocket-propelled projectile, although the term is often used in reference to mechanisms that are portable and capable of being operated by an individual ...
... Nova was a series of proposed rocket designs, originally as NASA's first large launchers for missions similar to the production-level Saturn V, and later as larger follow-ons to the Saturn V intended ... Thus, "Nova" does not refer to a specific rocket design, just a rocket larger than the Saturn V in most cases ... which, instead, had giant twin Aerojet M-1 engines in stage 2) ...
... As with the classical rocket equation, one wants to calculate the velocity change that a rocket can achieve depending on the specific impulse and the mass ratio, i ... momentum produced by the exhaust of a small amount of rocket fuel divided by the mass of that small amount of rocket fuel, in an inertial reference frame where the rocket is at rest before using that small amount ...
Famous quotes containing the words engines and/or rocket:
“We are living in a demented world. And we know it. It would not come as a surprise to anyone if tomorrow the madness gave way to a frenzy which would leave our poor Europe in a state of distracted stupor, with engines still turning and flags streaming in the breeze, but with the spirit gone.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)
“A rocket is an experiment; a star is an observation.”
—José Bergamín (1895–1983)