Claims
- 1. A rocket propulsion system, comprising:
- 2. The rocket propulsion system of claim 1, wherein said turbopump includes a gas generator capable of producing an adjustable exhaust stream that drives said turbopump.
- 3. The rocket propulsion system of claim 2, wherein said gas generator decomposes a material to produce said adjustable exhaust stream.
- 4. The rocket propulsion system of claim 3, wherein said material comprises hydrogen peroxide.
- 5. The rocket propulsion system of claim 4, wherein said hydrogen peroxide comprises highly concentrated hydrogen peroxide.
- 6. The rocket propulsion system of claim 3, wherein said gas generator uses a catalyst to decompose a portion of said material and thermal decomposition for another portion of said material.
- 7. A turbopump assembly, comprising:
- 8. The turbopump assembly of claim 7, wherein said material is hydrogen peroxide.
- 9. The turbopump assembly of claim 8, wherein said hydrogen peroxide comprises highly concentrated hydrogen peroxide.
- 10. A method of throttling a rocket engine, comprising the steps of:
- 11. The method of claim 10, wherein said exhaust stream drives a turbopump assembly supplying a fuel or an oxidizer to the rocket engine.
- 12. The method of claim 10, wherein said material is hydrogen peroxide.
- 13. The method of claim 12, wherein said hydrogen peroxide comprises highly concentrated hydrogen peroxide.
- 14. The method of claim 10, wherein the selectively adding step decomposes said additional amount of said material.
- 15. The method of claim 14, wherein the selectively adding step thermally decomposes said additional amount of said material.
- 16. The method of claim 10, further comprising a step of cooling said catalyst bed.
- 17. The method of claim 16, wherein the cooling step utilizes said additional amount of said material.
- 18. The method of claim 10, wherein said discharge produced by said introducing step has a constant mass flow.
- 19. The method of claim 10, further comprising the step of adjusting said additional amount of said material added to said discharge for altering said mass flow of said exhaust stream.
- 20. In a rocket propulsion system having a turbopump supplying fuel or oxidizer to a rocket engine, wherein the improvement comprises said turbopump being throttleable.
- 21. The rocket propulsion system of claim 20, wherein said turbopump is throttleable using a gas generator.
- 22. The rocket propulsion system of claim 21, wherein said gas generator decomposes hydrogen peroxide.
- 23. The rocket propulsion system of claim 22, wherein said hydrogen peroxide comprises highly concentrated hydrogen peroxide.
Cross Reference to Related Applications
[0001] This application is a divisional of United States Patent Application number 09/896,608 filed on 29 June 2001 and is related to United States Patent Application number 09/896,355 filed on 29 June 2001, both of which are herein incorporated by reference.
Divisions (1)
|
Number |
Date |
Country |
Parent |
09/896608 |
Jun 2001 |
US |
Child |
10065968 |
Dec 2002 |
US |