aerospike engine


aerospike engine

[‚e·rō¦spīk ′en·jən] (aerospace engineering) An advanced liquid-propellant rocket engine that uses an axisymmetric plug nozzle, in combination with a torus-shaped combustion chamber and a turbine exhaust system that injects the turbine drive gases into the nozzle base, to achieve a geometry that is only one-quarter the length of a conventional rocket engine, as well as automatic altitude compensation, resulting in superior low-altitude performance.