Rocket motor and launch vehicle startup Evolution Space on Monday said it successfully conducted a full-scale statie fire of a solid rocket motor (SRM) designed to meet current tactical applications.
This summer the California-based company will flight-test its motor as it transitions from development to qualification to meet space and defense applications.
The motor used in the recent test at the company’s private site in Mojave, Calif., is over five-feet long and “was sized to mirror one of the tactical motors facing significant shortages as global conflicts arise,” Evolution Space said. Development of the rocket motor is self-funded.
The company’s Whiplash SRM generated more than 9,000 pounds of thrust for about one second, exceeding targeted performance metrics for fast-burning tactical propellants, Evolution said.
Evolution said the test demonstrates its technology meets performance requirements for strategic and tactical architectures.
“Because we focused on the product first, we hold a unique market position that doesn’t require the extra buffer of time to develop the technology for the product after we’ve started a conversation,” Steve Heller, CEO and founder of Evolution, said in a statement. “Instead, it’s about minor adjustments to an already high TRL (technology readiness level) system and having the product afield as urgently as it’s needed.”
In January, Evolution said it has received a Phase 1 Small Business Innovation Research contract from the Air Force’s AFWERX innovation arm to study solid propulsion hypersonic boost and target solutions.
The vertically integrated company is also developing and producing sub-orbital launch vehicles.