How Can European Rockets Compete? // Featuring RFA & ISAR

Join as as we go inside Rocket Factory Augsburg and ISAR Aerospace to figure out how new European launchers can compete in the global commercial market.

https://www.rfa.space/

https://www.isaraerospace.com/

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modern rocketry was basically born in Europe so it’s no surprise that Europe has done some incredible things in Aerospace operating some world class missions and building some of the most iconic launch Vehicles however to date the only real player in the orbital launch industry to hail from Europe has been Aron space a fairly traditional Aerospace company but that’s all about to change there’s a Resurgence of new space companies racing to be one of Europe’s next launch providers and as exciting as it is it does make me question how are these new companies going to compete with not only the traditional Aerospace industry but also the extremely competitive new space launch industry from all around the world so today we’re going to talk to two companies from right here in Europe rocket Factory Augsburg or RFA who as the name implies hails from Augsburg Germany and we’ll also visit esar Aerospace from Munich Germany as well we’re going to try and figure out you know what are they doing different how are they building these Rockets what’s unique about their systems where are they going to launch them and how are they going to launch them from Europe and we’re going to see how are they going to fit in this competitive Marketplace let’s get started 3 2 [Music] 1 okay this video is going to be a little bit different since we had the opportunity to visit both rocket Factory Augsburg and and esar Aerospace I thought it’d be interesting to compare them to see how they’re similar and how they’re different coming to find out we couldn’t have found two companies that are taking on the challenge of building and operating a rocket more differently which is super fun so what we’ll do is we’re going to go back and forth between these two companies and compare and contrast their Rockets their designs and their philosophies but first here’s a quick overview of each rocket so you know what we’re looking at during these tours RFA is building a rocket called RFA 1 RFA 1 stands 30 m tall and 2 m wide built out of costeffective stainless steel tanks the booster has nine Helix engines that are oxyrich stage combustion running on rp1 and liquid oxygen otherwise known as klocks with 100 kons of thrust each the second stage has a single vacuum optimized Helix engine and has a small orbital transfer vehicle as a third stage to called red shift the rocket is capable of an impressive 1300 kg to Sun synchronous orbit and will launch from the saxford Spaceport in Scotland’s Shetland Islands esar is building a rocket called Spectrum which is 28 M tall and 2 m wide built out of lightweight fully carbon composite tanks the booster has nine Aquilla engines that are open cycle running on liquid oxygen and liquid propane or propox which I don’t know if that’s a word but it is now and the second stage has a single vacuum optimized Aquilla engine spectrum is capable of 700 kg to SSO and launch from the andoya Spaceport in Norway as well as the Guana Space Center in French Guana and just for a quick side-by-side reference here’s how these Rockets compare to fireflies Alpha from the United States they’re all quite large small set launchers and will be competing for similar payloads now we don’t necessarily have reliable price figures for a lot of these Rockets so we can’t really do like a good dollar to kilogram Ratio or anything but one thing we do know is there’ll likely be some European agencies and companies who will be happy to fly on a European rocket I should also mention quick that there are a handful of other launchers from Europe getting close to launching as well but we’ll just be focusing on these two today okay now let me introduce you to Dr Stefan Bank from RFA who will take me somewhere I actually have never been before inside a rocket okay are you good that was good that was much better than first interview from inside of a rocket oh this is crazy that is is yeah the the really cool thing if you look around is that you won’t see any large CNC machine parts this is all a sheet metal construction this entire stage is based on sheet metal we don’t have these typical y cords that um you typically find between the Dome And the cylinder they are very large CNC machine super accurate parts that really drive up the cost significantly and this is really a a stage that is purely sheet metal work so it’s super super low cost and so how do you guys determine uh how thick to make everything and and how did you get to stainless steel and how did you make how do you make all these decisions cuz it’s like one little thing changes everything and I just it seems very overwhelming what we basically did in the beginning is we created a kind of artificial intelligence we basically coupled three optimizers the first Optimizer optimizes the trajectory like the best way how to get into space into orbit with the least amount of fuel then we have a second Optimizer that basically can read all of that and decide on all the structural designs that basically it’s a it’s a design code that says okay the wall thickness has to be this and that if the loads if the bending moments and fluxes are this from the trajectory and then very cool we have a third tool and this is our most important tool a large cost database where the optimizer can go in and ask hey look I’ve designed something I made it from composite how expensive is it and the database says look you have chosen this geometry it will be this cost and that’s really key because now we could basically ask the optimizer look what is the cheapest way for the customer and that’s when this code designed the vehicle against to what we wanted I did not want to have a stainless tank that looks cheap right I wanted to identify myself with a really slick beautiful composite stage but um we had no way of getting out of there because the cost of this construction this is a very special kind of stainless construction because it’s super low cost a first stage costs less than a single engine and um we couldn’t get out of this the optimizer basically found this local minimum in this large cost database where you have the brewery tank like like a beer tank like a beer tank it’s basically it’s very specific because it’s a it’s a tank that is made with a wall thickness between 1 to 2 mm for me person personally I wanted to make a really slick beautiful composite stage um it hurt me personally when this Optimizer that I started to really hate always chose the stainless steel construction but the difference is very simple as a composite stage like this costs almost half a million US Dollars and a stainless steel construction of this type is 10 times cheaper and this is something you can’t take out of the equation anymore the optimizer always runs into this local minimum and I can’t ignore it and it’s quite interesting if you look at this in a traditional sense you realize traditional Rockets are built extremely accurately um good example Aran 5 Aran 6 features a 5.4 M diameter and the concentricity requirement is like here we are 2 m in diameter and we only require a concentricity of roughly an inch so UTS of magnitudes um worse the reason why that was done traditionally is because they didn’t have GPS while the rocket was flying into space and that’s why they basically wanted to keep the rocket as cylindrical as possible to make sure that the disturbances through the atmosphere can be calculated and this is one of the gamechanging things now we installed gpfs or Galileo in Europe and now the rocket can be basically built in a really inaccurate fashion almost almost like a little banana shape it’ll just compensate for it will just compensate for it right we don’t care and that’s um this is a good example how hum have put up a system in space which actually allows us now to make getting two space getting two space cheaper more efficient and we fully use that if you read through a lot of requirements on traditional launch Vehicles they still have these very very tight accuracy um requirements in the spec sheets and it’s actually quite difficult to understand why um but we went through all of these requirements and we really we cut out everything that didn’t make sense and this is a very cylindrical tank for you for your eye but in reality it’s a an it’s a design that is based on sheet metal only and this keeps the cost down and therefore makes it really attractive to the customer wow what you see here is um very cool these are all the flow form domes and one of the key challenges fast was to embrace this sheet metal construction we basically had to make sure that we can flow form these domes as quickly as as possible to make them cost effective one of these THS is only a couple of grand and it’s made within just a couple of hours um the problem is it’s not very accurate and if you basically make 10 of those Doms you find they all have a different diameter and we approach the entire stage Construction in a similar fashion to how ball bearing manufacturers manufacture bearings they make a million balls and then they find six that are exactly the same size and they can make one accurate bearing we do the same we make a whole bunch of these domes and and we just sort through them and we will find three Doms that are perfectly um the same size and we can make a stage okay I think this is the perfect opportunity to bounce over to esar Aerospace where I met up with their VP production Bjorn Dressler to see how they’re manufacturing their tanks which is almost the exact opposite of everything that Stefan just said this is was built up in the last 6 months this is uh hard to believe and we are already building parts for the second launch second launch is already being built so we have two main processes here we have manual layup like you see the colleages over there and this is already a zero production so when they finished with this bul head they’re going to proceed with the next bul C we’re running in multiple shifts right now to have the output we are expecting and you probably like it more and I see it moving this this is this is my my top three processes where I can have a meditation on is the is the the PIP bending the the the am additive manufacturing and the the carbon fiber winding oh look at that it’s moving right now isn’t it yeah it’s is and it does it all all day long there’s a second machine next to it uh we just removed the part and it went into the autoclave I’ve always wanted to see this I’ve actually never seen one of these Machines working and it’s beautiful I mean it is like a that’s a work of art it’s amazing and it’s and it’s almost looks like from the outside it looks like a a copv a composite over WRA pressure vessel but it’s only composite only composite in this case yeah no no liner inside there are many things you have to figure out that it works but when it works and you have an automated machine you’re quite happy yeah this looks like it’s a more or less finished section here huh yep oh yes look at that how thick is is the the end thickness of this thing is not there’s the the precise answer is as thick it has to be different thicknesses because you don’t have the same force in all the areas right I you don’t want to have overweight right right your rocket look at that that’s amazing so then so once it’s laid up it’s going to be laid up over there yeah how do you even get that off of there and over to here like what’s so of the after you wind it you take it off the machine um there are certain uh processes um cutback processes um we we cannot show today and we wouldn’t show um but then you take it off you move it to you you put a vacuum bag around it m you put it in the auto you cure it and from then on you you you Mill it and you put the the bike heads in all the features like all the features and then you see it becoming a rugged yeah and that’s what we’re going to see uh soon in the launcher assembly cool so while RFA was focusing on lowering the cost esar seems to be focusing on performance and the scale of manufacturing but now let’s hop back to RFA and take a look at their Helix engine where we can see some of their unique production philosophies go another step further super cool this is the Holy Grail of um rocket Factory this is where we make Helix Motors so what’s the main combustion chamers pressure it’s 100 bar in this very early version of course we want to take this entire Helix engine up to approach much higher chamber pressures in the future um we want to push it all the way to 300 bar but now we have very little time the first design is limited to 100 bar chamber pressure we want to get into orbit now as quickly as possible with a 100 bar we have heaps of margin everywhere right and um with a 100 bar we have it’s simple enough to get to orbit quickly remember there’s 100 companies who are trying to do this we will die if we don’t go into orbit now as quickly as somehow possible and this is right now um the time where we fix the engine performance and configuration and we move on to this first fly this as aggressively as we somehow can if you push this chamber pressure from 100 bar up to 300 the engine doesn’t actually grow in size it stays the same thing and uh you can see this is why the rfa1 launch vehicle can basically grow twice in length this is the key right every time the propulsion Engineers pull out more performance more thrust or more ISP you can literally grow the RO you can just grow the rocket and we increase payload and the price per payload reduces and hopefully we get paid at the end of that hopefully we get paid at the end of the day and we can survive the the the key here is all of this is um Automotive the company that makes all these Inlet lines and all these Bellows they make exhaust systems for expensive cars and it’s the same thing like if you buy an expensive German um car the exhaust system company is exactly the same company that makes all the stainless propellant lines also on the vehicle it’s all the same very cheap um this Bellow you find in compensators all the way after the collector um before the catalytic converters on the car so does that mean that they’re do they have to do anything different when it’s cryogenic temperatures cuz you think almost theut exhaust would be the opposite end of the scale you know yeah absolutely so this is where the core IP of us is we basically use all these Automotive companies and components but the reality is that it’s not one to one the same thing we change material specs heat treatments welding specifications acceptance testing methods all of that IP we roll in and for the manufacturers they love it because they can charge us twice the price and they think they’re making a killing little do they know that we save a factor of 10 compared to the old school Aerospace um part that is custom made by some Aerospace company right so then this is and this is a uh TVC actuator here correct yeah it’s a TVC actuator and the actual brushless DC motor in here is the same motor that you will find in a lot of electric scooters in the future it’s the same thing it’s already built in um quite large numbers the same with this ball screw this ball screw here is from an industrial application they built tons of them of course the internals are slightly different for us again same principle it’s a little bit more expensive for them to make us this customized variant but for us it’s one tenth of the cost compared to going to a dedicated specific space company the gimbal is a really cool example it’s straight out of a race car it’s um literally nothing nothing different you could design the gimbal yourself um from scratch and make it expensive but this is only a couple of $100 and it’s straight out of an automotive application um straight out of a race car the same with a lot of the valves um we actually went to a lot of these German automotive companies and we asked them look what are the most reliable sensors and the most reliable valves that you guys use in your cars and they told us look they’re actually not in the car the most reliable valves that we have run all the spot welding guns in the manufacturing line um because if that fails we lose millions of dollars every hour of this manufacturing line standing still and that is the valve we have chosen and we basically said look we’re going to use this Val everywhere and this is like a standard valve and the engineers didn’t have a a choice to go and get something custom we basically said this is a valve we will talk to the manufacturer to make it bulletproof increase the pressure rating to 400 bar and then we just use it everywhere and we have hundreds of these valves on the vehicle on the engine it’s always the same thing and have they been in testing so far have they been reliable and up to your standard and they were the most reliable valves they are the most reliable piece of equipment that we have on the entire vehicle and um the key comes from obviously this valve is built in thousands of um in very large numbers thousands every year and again it’s not exactly the same as the Val will you will find on a manufacturing line at um these Automotive companies it’s slightly adjusted we have different seals we have slightly different parameters in it the key is it’s not from a dedicated space supplier that charges you 5 10 grand per valve this costs a few hundred per Val so your biggest worry is not about maximizing the you know going down to the gram for every single component and trying to minimize the the mass of the vehicle you’re really looking at every single single thing as what is the cheapest way to get to work absolutely for us to be competitive there’s only one thing and that’s the payload cost to the customer and it’s all cost based we have a mass model but the mass model is not super stringent it allows us to basically spin in all these Automotive Solutions and literally we are a a bunch of Automotive guys that build a rocket rather than a rocket company building a rocket you’re probably you’re probably familiar with these connectors you will find them on every Port very similar you will find these on the ecus of um cars and some of them run airbag signals so how reliable are they as super reliable yeah they have to be so as long as they use the right material um without a lot of water in it we can use them in in vacuum and then they’re good to be used here the key is that they’ve built millions and millions we built about 10 million Motor Vehicles a year right right that’s a lot of experience and you have to tap in there if you don’t tap in there you’re making a mistake this is what we’re all about we use automotive to the core every single component we ask how would this look like in automotive and how much does it cost in automotive and we always find not small differences we find orders of magnitudes of differences in cost and that’s what the key here is to make it really low cost for the customer so actually engrave even your initials here no way my ini are going to go to space baby yeah sure this engine better not blow up well it’s his responsibility now yeah that’s awesome all right so you’re going to I I can you let’s just do it like this you get this fast enough because you need to get one quick in yep uh otherwise it falls down I hold it for you you just F the first one in just goes right here so we put this here is about an M8 bolt oh it’s M6 yes M6 is the is the flight computer cator or is unfortunately the box is it really hurts me because I wanted to use a cheap box that um cost $5 but we decided to CNC machine it and it’s I hate it looking at it U it knows that there is some money missing in the company because we decided to CNC machine a box um it should be some you probably need to one or the other part which looks really Eros SPAC so you can say Essen yeah I mean at the end of the day it’s at least beautiful right it is beautiful at least what you will find on the inside is um really low cost so it really does just absolutely bug you to the Core when it’s CNC machine if I see a c if I see a CNC machine part I know okay I want this for my own projects in my own garage but when I see it here in the company I’m like that’s just way too expensive then we have this nice bracket right which is like nicely laser cut two dimens and just well it together so that’s what we do the key here the key if you look into Automotive why they can make cars so cheap it’s because it’s the entire car is based on sheet metal everything is sheet metal right they don’t see Inc machine much right and this is why sheet metal is the key answer um every design that you see here I always ask the engineers look show me the sheet metal version the sheet metal version is King I mean that is cheap and that’s King and if you use the right material it can be equally as good as some CN CNC machine so RFA wants to buy as much from other companies whenever possible but this is very different from what is’s VP of launch Vehicles Marco steamer said to me before our tour so we always look into how can we have maximum control over everything how can we have the most understanding how can we have everything as vertical as we can inhouse um because we are convinced this is what makes us the fastest in the end also the most cost effective in developing and in the end operating our systems so esar is focusing on vertical integration scalability and as as much full Automation in production as possible which they say will enable them to build many Rockets cost competitively and this was pretty evident when Bjorn showed me their 3D printers wow so just tiny tiny bit by tiny bit is this the thrust chamber itself that’s being printed here or is or what are we actually looking at yeah so cool you also see here is uh on the side you see the small pieces MH they are now welded it’s a welding process in the end of the day and and this are for Quality controls so we te them tear them apart we want to get the most out of the material like all the companies do but we have it with every single part we have the test Parts where we double check how we can enhance the material specifications and while we are watching this there’s a thermal camera watching this uh to ensure that there are no sectors where we overheat the material because that would weaken our product in the end of the day yeah so it’s always watching confirming making sure that everything’s good and in case we figure out that we are not satisfied with material specifications we could like rewind on the cameras and really see what happened in this exact moment wow uh we’re very happy about this and this is at at at the moment the latest technology in this field uh the printer manufacturer is close by we are kind of a a customer where they usually ask if we want to introduce new technology so we’re checking this but this gives us a competitive advantage of course to be very fast and very predictable in what we’re doing and again vertical integration was seen with their engine computers and wiring harnesses too everything build inh house layups Hardware housings testing this is a very unique approach to to have this depth of vertical integration right but in the end of the day first it’s a huge hustle because you start at zero but then in the end of the day I mean you can ask the colleague who build it right and then you can figure out how to improve it very quickly y you don’t have to read wiring diagrams from a supplyer you don’t have to get them on the phone when they don’t have the opening hours and this kind of stuff so yep okay so now let’s go check out one of estar’s early development engines with Marco where I learned a few surprising facts let’s go through our engine assembly real quick yes and have a look at that so this is one of our se- level engines that we use in the first stage nine of them in total look at even the okay so I already have questions yes shoot okay so this is our this is our gas generator here correct the that’s the turbine the the turbine basically this part here that’s the gas generator that feeds hot gas here into the turbine and then it spins that big part and goes to the exhaust y so it’s an open cycle we don’t feed it back into the main chamber right um it goes to the exhaust and then this turbine Powers the two pumps that sit on the shaft um upstream and so basically this is the liquid oxygen that comes in here from the top and goes up here and then the lower one is the propane propane and the uh I’m I’m curious why the uh why we have a little like delevel nozzle thing in the turbine exhaust what’s that for uh this is purely for performance so we can get a slightly higher ISP also from the exhaust stream because it helps speed up the exhaust velocity or what exactly huh it’s a small nozzle that’s and that that’s crazy I don’t know why that surprises me um I’m surprised there’s enough pressure so does it actually get supersonic here then the at the end of it so it actually chokes the flow and goes Supersonic and so it even would contribute a small amount of thrust I to yeah you don’t want to waste any of that propellent right right that’s pretty spectacular okay so like you said the oxygen comes in on the top here yeah so oxygen oh I better make sure I’m pointing so oxygen comes at the top goes through the pump here goes over here to the so this is the main valve the main oxygen valve main oxygen valve assembly yep which then wait wait wait why is your main oxygen assembly valve go into the oh goes right into the uh oh got hang it goes right into the this is the manifold for the bottom of the chamber that’s the manifold exactly are you cooling half of your chamber with with oxygen it looks like it and basically from there it goes through the chamber walls into the injector head which is up here so you’re using liquid oxygen as in the through the regen channels yes we do that’s cool I I’ve only heard of one other engine doing that and it’s the Dual expander cycle engine I think it’s the B7 does does both and a few there’s a Russian engine that did that too and I’ve always wondered why not because it just seems like it actually makes a lot of sense you know and obviously the the risk is if you have a leak somewhere hot gas as oxygen leak equals bad but just don’t have a leak exactly but that’s a simple just just don’t have a Le it’s simple to say um so yes I think people um people are afraid of touching the topic because um hard oxygen that’s just going to burn with anything you give it um so you need to really control that very very well yeah but in the end um oxygen give can give you a lot of cooling power yeah um that you can really benefit from okay that’s awesome so let me follow the the fuel and see if we can figure out what the follow the fuel and see what the fuel’s doing so the fuel exactly so this is this is the propan pump so we will have to go to um this side here oh yeah just that little guy there to follow the propane flow into the main valve the main fuel valve down here and this is the coming in there main fuel valve and then the main fuel valves mostly looks like it’s going through the regen Channel down the nozzle back up the nozzle at what point does it go into the into the gas generator there you go out of the nozzle yep and up into the injector yeah and for the gas generator we tap off the propells directly from the main valve so you don’t have this line connected right now yep um but it goes basically the main valve assembly consists of several valves that control the entire cycle right so you see one line being attached here that is certainly the propane line oh right yep yep so yeah let me so the propane line runs that’s going to go back from that main fuel valve area right exactly and then run from here down and that’s how it’s getting into this pre-b burner which of course or the the gas gener which of course the gas generator is basically just a fuel Rich uh basically a fuel Rich small rocket engine itself exactly so you burn it fuel Rich so the gas doesn’t get too hot because we don’t have regen cooling of the gas generator and especially the turbine blades cannot see that much temperature because definitely don’t want to have reach and cooling of turbine blades that’s why you go fuel Rich to just burn colder it’s not as efficient as having a perfect combustion but it’s it’s good enough for the bypass you’re getting as much energy out of it as you can while keeping it at a sustainable maintainable temperature exactly um How do you spin start this engine then what’s the spin start mechanism H it’s pressure fat spin start okay and just nitrogen or helium okay and so that so in spin do you actually just literally flow it through the gas generator and like that or is it a separate like spin start no no the kick port or something the there’s a there’s a dedicated port for the kickart um which the fact is that this going down meets into here this line cuz it has its own tap here you know our benion better than I do this is exactly this is the spin starter okay yep that is so I love the compact turbo Machinery I mean it just reminds me of you know I’ve seen turbochargers on cars yeah you know about the size so to see this powering a rocket engine capable of how many yeah but this this has the power off multiple cars right oh like a 100 cars basically which I think people just don’t understand the amount of energy that gets you know Unleashed in something even this size is is phenomenal Y and then do you guys I mean like things like this this this gimbal Mount here I mean do you guys manufacture that in house or is that sure yeah um that’s also a manufactured in house that was actually one of the very early test rcks that we had built was for the gimbal to do the structural testing and to actually uh um swivel the engine around um all inhouse built um basically needs to Bear the whole thrust load and transmit that into that thrust structure so very highly loaded part um but what you see on this engine is pretty much all of that is designed and built in house and especially when it comes to propulsion we want to keep that technology in house as much as we can wow back to RFA we’re going to check out their flight one first stage which was undergoing pre-flight qualification testing all right where are we okay so this is our test facility we are just acceptance testing the first stage you can probably see it through the trees let’s walk over this is our secret secret location it’s actually we’re very we’re in alburg we’re actually um not somewhere on the outskirts and um this is where we have done the largest cryogenic burst test that Germany has ever done um you probably remember this from some of the videos but we had the same setup last year here and we went all the way up to the point where it all failed with uh liquid nitrogen now this time around this is the flight article for the first flight we can’t kill it it needs to survive this needs to needs to this is an acceptance test now so a little bit lower loads but the loads are still higher than what it will see in Flight right and this is key now this like two main tests one is just a pressure test and the second test is basically the drain test we basically tell the Press system to start pressing the tanks and then we will measure all the mass flows of um both um basically propellants coming out of the stage tanks and we need to verify that it’s enough so that we can operate our engines um and switch them on properly all right so uh where so how do you guys ship this and and where’s your launch pad again yeah we we launching from the north of the UK from Scotland sord and um the cool thing is that we basically just put this thing on a truck and the truck itself goes on ferry one two three and then we’re there H so and where’s the port that it goes to do you go to like Hamburg or something yeah this thing this thing basically travels through Germany on a truck Germany is a small country takes you like seven hours and you’re um basically from albur all the way in Hamburg and then it goes on to first ferry second and third Ferry and then within a couple of days you’re there but this this can fit inside a normal fairly normal like on the road container yeah okay there if you look at um the SpaceX diameter that’s sort of the largest diameter you can um basically put on the road in the US it’s sort of similar here um we are smaller than that we are 2 m so all the transportation is straightforward there’s no special requirements for it and um yeah there’s not a big deal to ship this to suif for inside of like a container or is it just shipped like no it’s stainless steam man it’s like it can be can be open it’s ductile we will make sure that um it’s covered somewhat right um but um we will we we will not put massive precautions into shipping this thing I mean it needs to be low cost in every single operation that we do and is it slightly pressurized while shipping to do you maintain some pressure during Shi we can yeah so we when the vehicle grows when the engineers when we increase chamber pressure at some point we have to put in a small amount of pressure but this very first vehicle which we call minimum viable product MVP the first prototype we don’t actually need any pressure inside but as the vehicle grows at some point we have to put 0.1 point2 bars in and then that inner stage that’s the uh yeah a carbon fiber carb that’s carbon fiber because the that’s very interesting the optimizer never chose um stainless for the interstages because the interstages are not internally pressurized right and that means like the the best cost to benefit ratio you get if you lose use a really low density high strength material but what it has done is it has always chosen Automotive Composites so this is not a space composite it costs about half than the uh space grade high performance High modular composite um we use a material that is very cheap it’s half the cost and again it’s not we didn’t want to do that but the optimizer told us look this is it’s the best way to make it cost efficient for the customer um to use automotive grade Composites next we took a lift up to get a closer look at the rocket and its inner stage you can see the intermediate bik it can you see this can you see these two close to each other this is basically we’ve been in the first stage earlier today and this is the second one um is basically the one where the buad is located internally okay yeah so this is what we were seeing on the ground yeah and when we were in it before I forgot did he even have a bulkhead in it were we or were we at the bul cad we were at the bulad we were exactly at this point so we were basically in this area of the stage and you can see some of these welds here that look a little bit funny in color um these are basically locations where we have had to uh reweld and close uh the tank to be absolutely 100% leak tide this is still an ongoing process but we’re getting quite good at it so let’s go up now and have a look into the interstage see this this um this interface is super critical because basically the composite is perfectly in diameter but the stages are all different so can you see these flexible fingers these flexible fingers basically allow us to adopt the accurate interstage to any diameter tank and once we’re adopted then we weld it on right right so it’s basically reverse typically what you typically do in engineering you weld and then you rivet and then you’re done we do it the opposite way around we put everything on its head here we Riv it first then we put it on then we weld it how how do you ensure that the interner stage is going to be aligned like uh left you know left right on the axis how do you know it’s going to be like perfectly aligned yeah we we basically take three spots around the circumference and accurately measure length all the way from the bottom to all the way to the top and then you have three points and you can really accurately um measure it out and basically only start welding and tacking it on if the alignment is perfect the the best thing is that we don’t need this to be super accurate as we had this um conversation this morning if the entire concentricity is within 1 in good enough and that’s the key to make this cost efficient and we can make these stages really everywhere it doesn’t need to be a super Advanced Factory we can make these in literally any sort of place that knows how to do um industrial stuff now you get a you get to have a look into the into the interstage and this is basically where the first stage this is basically where the second stage nozzle and the second stage engine is housed in um during the ascent so the second stage flanes right onto here and um this composite interstage is something very interesting can you see the the the carbon structure can you see the structure yeah that’s something super special that makes this inter stage indeed very lightweight and very um performant lastly let’s go back to esar and see their fairings and flight Hardware to get a sense of what their vehicle will look like when it’s completed so this is the payload fairing you can actually hear it I can hear the echo in the payload fairing um so there’s already a few things that I’m seeing like you get the little copv bottles and those through those bra the lines the steel lines are what actually pop open all the little pneumatic actuator things that exactly so what you see here um along the split lines also here on the bottom that’s our our genetic separation locks oh great um cuz this has to hold on to the the the payload adapter or the upper upper stages uh hold on to the upper stage basically right exactly so and this is really just purely platic there is no pyot techniques involved we can test it check it out as much as we want to before flight and then it’s super reliable super low shock in Flight um so this is the horizontal separation that splits the fairing from the upper stage and then we have the vertical split line and then we just have very simple gas spring pushers that will basically push the two fairing halves apart that makes sense so what so these are are these the vents then that exactly sorry I’m pointing I’m making sure that I can see it on my own camera so these are the vents that uh help regulate how quickly it depressurizes right uh mainly if you see if you look further down there um you see a big interface which is for our air conditioning oh so while we are sitting on the pad or even during roll out or during AIT uh when we have the payload integrated already and encapsulated we need to constantly make sure that the right conditions are um basically provided on so the right temperature the right humidity and that come through that air conditioning interface and these are the vent ports to vent out the air again oh to vent out the air again exactly does it work at all on a scent though because I know you don’t want to depressurize the payload fairing at the same speed as you know on a scent you don’t want to totally depressurize too quickly how do you regulate that or do does it not matter it it’s pretty much a passive um system so you just depressurize the fairing as you fly through the atmosphere here and the pressure decreases outside you rent the fair um it’s a very simple of system um but the the AC is actually quite challenging because we want to launch from northern Norway where it gets really really cold um we want to launch from French Guana which is tropical very high humidity very high temperatures we need to be able to deal with all of that with the same system basically and especially humidity um that is hard to get rid of and you need a lot of ventilation and this whole structure like one of those half shells as we said you can lift that with two people and carry it around the entire production done that um it’s it’s super light it’s a composite sandwich sandwich structure yep with like aluminum honeycomb or something then yep and then um of course you need a heat protection on top which is normal when you have carbon composite because especially that part of the rocket gets really hot when you have uh basically supersonic Hypersonic speeds and you compress the air in front it gets really really hot so you also need the heat protection there um which protects the carbon composite what you see here I think you can guess what it is um this is our payload fearing adapter or payload adapter whatever you want to say that’s the payload adapter so it’s actually a standard elv interface uh which you would know from also the US launchers mhm um and cbal Space Program exactly and this is where the payload faing attaches to as well and the payload will sit right on top of course with all kinds of adapters you can you can imagine on top of that super light um if you want we can lift it is the cork here is that just to prevent like scuffing of the in because this actually bolts into the inside of the of the top of the second stage right this is actually the skin and the cord is basically heat protection this is on the out this is actually on the outside yes oh that’s crazy yeah I would love to lift it though I would take your invite on on can I go ahead it’s FL Hardware don’t destroy it oh my gosh that’s actually pretty crazy that the entire thing yeah that’s pretty nuts dang so this is all on the outside so so these are the hinges then for the for where the fairing attaches right exactly this is where the fairing attaches this is basically where the separation locks will engage Y and then they will swing open that’s really also a composite sandwich structure super light super stiff um exactly the right thing for pale of fa all right then we can move to the inter stage so this sits on top of our first stage oxygen tank and basically we’re right now now looking towards the interface to the second stage so this is where the separation system will be attached it’s actually exactly the same system that we use on the payload fairing cool so the same pneumatic locks um the very same mechanism slightly different and adapted pushers maybe a little bigger more mass to push to push the stages apart but essentially the very same system that we therefore also can um completely test and check out before we fly make sure it works properly and don’t use pyro techniques that are oneof and you never know if it’s going to work in the end or not and this allows you to then you’ll get double the the test time double I mean everything is doubled up so absolutely the moment we tested this fairing um we had a big foam pit here in the hall and we made it separate and fall into the foam pit we knew the separation system works and it will work here as well right what you see over there on the Blue Table is the Assembly of our thrust structure on the first stage where the nine engines are being attached um this is the second one we can check out the structural testing area now where we have a fully assembled one already oh awesome let’s do that all right so this is our multi-purpose structural test R which we use for all kind of structural testing of our primary structures you see the massive hydraulic cylinders here oh jeez um that we used to actuate and to create all the load cases that we would have in flight so we can compress the structures we can bend them um we actually already we also have a tarp to really pull for example on the fairing um to really create all the flight loads that we would encounter and what you see rigged up right here is the F section of our first stage so this is the thrust structure that you can actually see the interface points where the nine engines will be attached to and and how the whole load is then transferred into the carbon composite skin right through the through those uh trellis frame looking things and up into this up into the skin there right now of course it’s uh completely wired up with strain gaugers and measurement that all those cables will not fly um but this the test setup to really um accept that thrust structure for our first flight so just to confirm obviously see that the carbon composite ring that we see is just there for the testing stand basically it’s not exactly that’s that’s kind of a dummy structure um in in real life this will be attached to the first stage propane tank we saw that cylinder in the carbon manufacturing that’s what will be attached to and then you’re going to have a separate structure um basically a heat shield that protects the entire area um from any you know flows separation induced hot gas um going back up going upwards and and burning some sensitive stuff in the structure and so all of the like all the cables we see now are basically each attached to different strain gauges exactly so there’s no other there’s no flight Hardware on this it’s literally this entire bundle snake of cables is all just to feed data back to your computers to let it know how exactly it’s handling these loads exactly that’s own that’s all test instrumentation um only the structures that you see are flight way and um those structures where it is actually attached to the rig this is our hold down release interface okay so this is where actually the hold down release mechanism the clams will engage in cool and where basically the entire 70 tons of thrust will have to be with stod while we sit on the pad until we release so both companies are taking wildly different approaches to how to be competitive so let’s hear in their own words how do they plan to thrive in this competitive market very cool Champa Keegan I love this look this is the number one country when it comes to space um they’re flying into space hundreds of times every year Europe is flying to orbit a handful of times this year it’s really devastating well and how do you guys plan to change that we build Rockets just like cars and we’re just going to undercut anyone on price if I may add one thing about how we want to compete um it’s not purely scalability and automation it is the level of autonomy and vertical integration that we have we are extremely flexible and agile in the way we can we can work as a company so for example if we have an engine on our test site test side we build up ourselves we operated ourselves we know it perfectly inside out um um we get the test results we have all the design tools written inhouse ourselves we can adapt immediately whatever learnings we have in the testing we can adapt the design we can throw it to production we need one week to produce an engine wow and then we can send it up to our test site again and go test the next iteration that’s the core strength of our company and in my opinion this will be a very interesting experiment to see where these companies will be in 10 years considering just how differently they’re taking on this challenge but I don’t think there’s any particular key to success here I don’t think there’s any one thing that a company can do to ensure they’ll be the next top rocket company Europe is inherently at a small disadvantage by not having any Eastern coastlines and its fairly Northern latitudes that all make it more challenging from a performance standpoint but Europe is also a hub for some of the finest engineering some of the most high-tech manufacturing lines and some of the highest educated population in the world and just like all things space flight nothing is guaranteed nothing is certain but it’s the fine margins that make the difference and with some of the smartest Minds in the world working to solve such complex issues chasing those nines so to speak I have no doubt some beautiful combination of the right design risk investment engineering and talented hardworking Personnel will help build the Rockets of our future be sure and follow both RFA and esar on their social media accounts to keep up with all their action I can’t wait to cheer them on as their Rockets get ready for their first flights and if working for one of these companies is of interest to you don’t hesitate to check out their career pages to see available positions now they didn’t tell me to say this but I feel like it’d just be a no-brainer both companies were awesome and it’d be so fun to work for them in my opinion and as always I owe a huge thank you to my patreon supporters YouTube members and ex subscribers for helping make videos like this possible if you want to support the work I do head on over to patreon.com Everyday astronaut or hit the join button on YouTube or just leave a comment like and share to show your support that’s going to do it for me I’m Tim Dodd the everyday astronaut bringing space down to earth for everyday people [Music]