Spaceflight Insider

News Archive / Tagged: BE-4

  • Blue Origin breaks ground on new BE-4 engine production facility

    Cullen DesforgesJanuary 27th, 2019

    On Jan.25, 2019, Blue Origin broke ground on its new engine production and assembly facility in Huntsville, Alabama, about 25 miles from United Launch Alliance’s Decatur assembly facility.

  • ULA selects Blue Origin’s BE-4 engine for Vulcan rocket

    Curt GodwinSeptember 27th, 2018

    Aerojet Rocketdyne lost out to Blue Origin for the production of the main rocket engine for the Vulcan lunch system. How will this guide the development of the new rocket?

  • Jeff Bezos tweets latest BE-4 engine test footage

    Derek RichardsonMarch 14th, 2018

    Blue Origin has successfully tested its BE-4 engine at its longest duration yet revealed by the secretive spaceflight company. In a video tweeted out by the company’s founder, Amazon.com’s Jeff Bezos, it was announced that the engine, which is capable of 550,000 pounds (2,400 kilonewtons) of thrust, was tested at 65 percent of full-power for about 114 seconds.

  • Blue Origin conducts first hot-fire test of BE-4 engine

    Bart LeahyOctober 21st, 2017

    Blue Origin is moving forward with its rocket development program, hot-firing a 550,000-pound-force (2,446.5-kilonewton) thrust liquid natural gas / liquid oxygen BE-4 engine at its facility in Texas this week.

  • Blue Origin’s BE-4 engine test hardware suffers failure

    Derek RichardsonMay 16th, 2017

    In a tweet on Sunday, May 14, 2017, NewSpace company Blue Origin announced it had lost a set of powerpack test hardware for its BE-4 engine in development. No details were released as to what happened or why.

  • Aerojet Rocketdyne consolidating, optimizing operations

    Scott JohnsonApril 23rd, 2017

    Aerojet Rocketdyne recently announced the next phase of what it calls its Competitive Improvement Program (CIP), a plan to consolidate and optimize the company's operation. It is hoped that this will result in an annual savings of $230 million.