BT-4
Engine · Japan
Original archive entry. The text, images and links below are kept as they were written.
Pressure-fed liquid propellant engine developoed by IHI Aerospace of Japan. Originally developed for the cancelled LUNAR-A, later adopted internationally for use as the apogee engine for geostationary communications satellites (A2100 and GEOStar-2 buses), and the HTV and Cygnus automated cargo spacecraft. The thruster was built on the technology base from license build of the second stage attitude control system for the N-1 rocket in the 1970's, followed by the first indigenous-design Japanese thrusters for the ETS-4 (Kiku-3) satellite in the 1980's.