Overview
- Astrobotic said two Chakram prototypes ran for a combined 470 seconds at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, including one 300-second burn with more than 4,000 pounds of thrust and no sign of damage.
- The company said the thrust ranks among the highest reported for this engine class and that the 300-second run was the longest known RDRE burn.
- Rotating‑detonation rocket engines create thrust from supersonic shockwaves that circle a channel, which can boost fuel efficiency and shrink engine size but makes control and cooling hard.
- Astrobotic plans further work on regenerative cooling, throttling, and weight reduction for versions aimed at Griffin landers and new reusable suborbital vehicles, with no flight date set.
- The tests join a broader push on RDREs that includes a 2025 Venus Aerospace flight of a small RDRE rocket and a NASA hot fire of a 3D‑printed detonating engine that reached about 5,800 pounds of thrust for 251 seconds.