{"id":91068,"date":"2019-05-21T11:23:01","date_gmt":"2019-05-21T18:23:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2019\/05\/nasa-and-virgin-orbit-have-3d-printed-a-working-rocket-engine-part"},"modified":"2019-05-21T11:23:01","modified_gmt":"2019-05-21T18:23:01","slug":"nasa-and-virgin-orbit-have-3d-printed-a-working-rocket-engine-part","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2019\/05\/nasa-and-virgin-orbit-have-3d-printed-a-working-rocket-engine-part","title":{"rendered":"NASA and Virgin Orbit have 3D-printed a working rocket engine part"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/nasa-and-virgin-orbit-have-3d-printed-a-working-rocket-engine-part2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>They have successfully test-fired 3D-printed combustion chambers made from multiple materials.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The news:<\/strong> By combining their manufacturing and testing capabilities, small-satellite launcher Virgin Orbit and NASA created a rocket combustion chamber that was 3D-printed from multiple metals. A combustion chamber is the container where all the propellants get mixed up and ignite\u2014so it must be able to cope with extreme heat and force. The <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/centers\/marshall\/news\/news\/releases\/2019\/nasa-and-virgin-orbit-3d-print-test-rocket-combustion-chamber.html\">test part<\/a> that used the chamber generated more than 2,000 pounds of thrust in a series of 60-second test fires. You can watch a video of the test firing <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Virgin_Orbit\/status\/1129129896309977089\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why are chambers a challenge?<\/strong> Because it has to withstand so much, it must be designed to a very high standard, meaning the part is expensive and time consuming to make.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.technologyreview.com\/f\/613564\/nasa-and-virgin-orbit-have-3d-printed-a-working-rocket-engine-part\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><\/p>\n<div style=\"clear:both;\">Read more<\/div>\n<p><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>They have successfully test-fired 3D-printed combustion chambers made from multiple materials. The news: By combining their manufacturing and testing capabilities, small-satellite launcher Virgin Orbit and NASA created a rocket combustion chamber that was 3D-printed from multiple metals. A combustion chamber is the container where all the propellants get mixed up and ignite\u2014so it must be [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":513,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1489,1514],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-91068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-3d-printing","category-space-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/513"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91068\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}