recently, SpaceX published a picture of the celebration of the
production of the 100th Raptor engine.

Would it be correct to state that humanity has never seen production
rate of rocket engines at this rate?

Or have there been programmes in the past (military missiles etc) that
equated the speed at which rocket engines are produced? (even if total
numbers are lower). Or have all such government programmes been decisgne
to keep employment for years and hence reduced production rates on
(polutical) purpose?


It is sort of ironic that a project to build re-usable spacecraft would
end up with production rates much higher than those of disposable single
use rockets.

Reality check:

Considering that Raptors haven't flown more than a couple of minutes and haven't gone to "space" yet, and succesfully landed from 10km altitude
only once, is it really possible for SpaceX to have such confidence to
declare the design "final" and ramp up production to a rate never seen
by humanity?

It is possible that the 100th Raptor produced doesn't mean 100 usable
engines. aka: How many engines need to be produced to get 33 working
engines? (thinking of CPU chip production where there is expectation
that a number of cores that are etched into silicon will be deffective
and either the whole CPU is ditched or see core number reduced and /or
its speed reduced).

Or it is a given that each rocket engine produced will result in a
usable engine because they will spend whatever time is needed to fix any problem with it?

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In article <yihNI.93213$VU3.3077@fx46.iad>,
jfmezei.spamnot@vaxination.ca says...

recently, SpaceX published a picture of the celebration of the
production of the 100th Raptor engine.

Would it be correct to state that humanity has never seen production
rate of rocket engines at this rate?

No. At the height of its production, in the 1980s, 60 Soyuz launchers
were produced in a year. Since the core and boosters share the same
engine (four main nozzles), that would equal 300 per year.

Cite:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_(rocket_family)

<snip>

Reality check:

Considering that Raptors haven't flown more than a couple of minutes and haven't gone to "space" yet, and succesfully landed from 10km altitude
only once, is it really possible for SpaceX to have such confidence to declare the design "final" and ramp up production to a rate never seen
by humanity?

At this point in time, SpaceX has no doubt accumulated far more Raptor
test firing time than flight time. Test time counts for a lot in liquid
fueled rocket engine development.

It is possible that the 100th Raptor produced doesn't mean 100 usable engines. aka: How many engines need to be produced to get 33 working
engines? (thinking of CPU chip production where there is expectation
that a number of cores that are etched into silicon will be deffective
and either the whole CPU is ditched or see core number reduced and /or
its speed reduced).

There aren't likely many completed engines that can't be made to work.
If a part fails when you test fire them, you'd replace the failed part
(s) and try again.

Or it is a given that each rocket engine produced will result in a
usable engine because they will spend whatever time is needed to fix any problem with it?

This.

Jeff

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