Why is SpaceX not using aerospike?

SpaceX isn’t using single stage to orbit vehicles. They have a two-stage vehicle. The first stage has engines optimized for sea level external pressure, and the second stage has an engine optimized for vacuum. They don’t need aerospike engines and wouldn’t significantly benefit from them.

Is aerospike engine better?

Advantages and Disadvantages of Using an Aerospike Nozzle: The aerospike nozzle has 90\% overall better performance than the conventional bell shaped nozzle. The efficiency at low altitudes is much higher because the atmospheric pressure restricts the expansion of the exhaust gas.

Where are the aerospike engines?

Lockheed Martin’s industry partner for the engine, Boeing Rocketdyne, has built components of four liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen-fueled, fuel-cooled linear aerospike engines with engineering support from NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.

How do Rockets not melt?

How are rocket engine nozzles able to survive very high temperatures without melting? The temperature of the gaseous products exiting from the nozzle is higher than the melting point of the nozzle material.

Does spacex use aerospike?

Mr Dodd then asked why the team chose not to use aerospike, a type of rocket engine that maintains its aerodynamic efficiency across a wide range of altitudes, while using 25 to 30 percent less fuel. However, Musk had a surprising response.

Do aerospike engines work in space?

But an aerospike is a pretty good way to do a single stage to orbit rocket, since you can essentially utilize a vacuum optimized engine at sea level and not only will it not explode, it’ll operate about as well at sea level as a sea-level optimized rocket engine.

Who made rocket fuel?

Robert H. Goddard
He has been called the man who ushered in the Space Age. Two of Goddard’s 214 patented inventions, a multi-stage rocket (1914), and a liquid-fuel rocket (1914), were important milestones toward spaceflight….

Why is rocket fuel cooled?

Regenerative cooling, in the context of rocket engine design, is a configuration in which some or all of the propellant is passed through tubes, channels, or in a jacket around the combustion chamber or nozzle to cool the engine. This is effective because the propellents are often cryogenic.