SpaceX Raptor 3 engine will reduce over 40 metric tons of mass in future Starship

SpaceX has revealed some new information about the upcoming Raptor 3 engine, saying that it will contribute around 1.1 metric tons of mass saving for future Starship vehicles.

“Here’s at SpaceX we like to continuously improve our design by eliminating the parts we don’t need, we call this algorithm. That helps us simplify design and drive us toward rapid reliable reuse,” said Chris G from SpaceX Communication during Starship Flight 8 first attempt.

The company has searched the area for improvements and found the parts that are no longer needed in the assembly. This led to further optimizations in the final design for manufacturing and reusability.

These all things combined have helped engineers to remove a large engine heat shield. SpaceX said these won’t be required in the next-generation Starship and each engine will reduce at least 1.1 metric tons of mass.

The booster alone features 33 Raptor engines, which take the ship to space, and save SpaceX more than 36 metric tons of mass with Raptor 3.

On the other hand, the upper stage equips 6 Raptor engines to continue operations in orbit and beyond. These will save 6.6 metric tons, and combined with the first stage. These 39 Raptor engines will save more than 40 metric tons of mass during flight.

The current version of Starship has 100-150 tons of payload capacity, and this new mass saving will create even more space for high weight payloads.

That’s not it, these engines are size efficient and improve architecture inside the engine section. It may allow SpaceX to increase 1,2 or even more engines in the first stage to increase liftoff power.

Statics

The current generation Raptor 2 sea level variant has 230 tf of thrust, 347 second specific impulse, 1630kg engine mass, and 2875kg engine+vehicle-side commodities and hardware mass.

Raptor 3 increases the thrust to 280 tf, specific impulse is increased at 350s, engine mass is 1525kg, and engine+vehicle-side commodities and hardware mass is 1720kg.

Check the comparison here.

SpaceX Raptor 1, 2 and 3 Comparison (Source – SpaceX)