NEW ROCKETS WILL BE TESTED AT EDWARDS LAB.Byline: Daily News Staff and Wire Services McDonnell Douglas McDonnell Douglas was a major American aerospace manufacturer and defense contractor, producing a number of famous commercial and military aircraft. It merged with Boeing in 1997 to form The Boeing Company. will test engines for a new generation of space rockets at Edwards Air Force Base's Phillips Laboratory, a spokesman said Friday. Testing of engines for the evolved expendable launch vehicle The Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program was a United States government, primarily a Department of Defense–sponsored effort to develop at least one family of space launch vehicles, that would meet the long term needs of the military and fulfill commercial will begin in late 1997 and carry through 1998. ``Yes, we are planning our engine tests at Edwards,'' said Dave Schweikle, McDonnell Douglas' EELV EELV Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle EELV End-Expiratory Lung Volume EELV Extended Expendable Launch Vehicle program manager in Huntington Beach Huntington Beach, city (1990 pop. 181,519), Orange co., S Calif., on the Pacific coast, across from Santa Catalina Island, in an oil-producing area; inc. 1909. It manufactures aerospace vehicles, aircraft parts, optical instruments, and heat transfer equipment. . The EELV program is intended to cut the cost of putting a payload such as a satellite into space by 25 percent to 50 percent. The EELV is intended to replace the existing fleet of Delta, Atlas and Titan rockets, all created in the 1950s. McDonnell Douglas and Lockheed Martin For the former company, see . Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) is a leading multinational aerospace manufacturer and advanced technology company formed in 1995 by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta. were selected Friday by the Air Force to develop prototypes of a new launch vehicle. Each company will receive about $60 million to develop the prototypes. The two companies beat out Boeing Co. and Alliant Techsystems Alliant Techsystems NYSE: ATK is a major US aerospace and defense contractor with sales of approximately USD $3.6 billion (fiscal year 2007) [1] and strong positions in propulsion, composite structures, munitions, precision capabilities, and civil and sporting Inc. for the two development contracts. In 1998, the Air Force will choose one of the two contractors to design, manufacture and fly the new family of rockets beginning in 2001. At Edwards, a rocket test stand idle since the end of the Apollo moon mission program is being refurbished at a cost of $6.7 million for the new rocket tests. Mothballed since the early 1970s, test stand 1-A is a 13-story concrete and steel structure into which rocket engines are strapped for stationary ignition. It was built in 1956 at a cost of $11 million and first used for the Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile intercontinental ballistic missile: see guided missile. program. The stand's superstructure was destroyed in a March 1959 accident and rebuilt in 1960 to test the F-1 Saturn rocket engines for the Apollo moon mission program. Partners of McDonnell Douglas on the program are Boeing's Rocketdyne division, Aerojet, Pratt & Whitney and AlliedSignal Aerospace. Rocketdyne is developing a first-stage engine that will use liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. The engine is expected to have a 30 percent improvement in performance over liquid oxygen and kerosene-fueled engines and will have 93 percent fewer parts. Lockheed Martin's rocket would be powered by a Russian-developed engine that will be made in Florida by United Technologies. The Lockheed Martin proposal also calls for using streamlined launch procedures to trim cuts. |
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