

A Spaceplane Is Born: XCOR Piston Pumps – the Holy Grail  - novalis78
http://moonandback.com/2013/09/23/a-spaceplane-is-born-xcor-piston-pumps-the-holy-grail-one-of-a-few/

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fernly
> The typical life-span of a high performance rocket turbo pump today is about
> 30 minutes... before it renders itself unusable ... [and] will cost between
> $500,000 and several million dollars...

OK, I am boggled...

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DuskStar
This is part of why SpaceX is so focused on enabling recovery and reuse of
their launch vehicles - the rocket costs an enormous amount relative to the
propellant/launch site.

As for the turbo pump only running for 30 minutes - if the launch vehicle it's
attached to is going to destroy itself, why bother designing the pump to last
longer, likely adding several pounds? "Oh, this new pump will last 100x longer
than that old model - but you're just going to crash it into the ground at
several hundred miles an hour, because recovering it would cost far more than
just buying one more of the old model. Sound good?"

