Liquid-propellant rocket engine
Also known as Rutherford engine · Rocket Lab Rutherford
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Rutherford is a liquid-propellant rocket engine designed by aerospace company Rocket Lab and manufactured in Long Beach, California. The engine is used on the company's own rocket, Electron. It uses LOX and RP-1 as its propellants and is the first flight-ready engine to use the electric-pump-fed cycle. The rocket uses a cluster of nine identical engines on the first stage, and one vacuum-optimized version with a longer nozzle on the second stage. This arrangement is also known as an octaweb. The sea-level version produces 24.9 kN (5,600 lbf) of thrust and has a specific impulse of 311 s (3.05 km/s), while the vacuum optimized-version produces 25.8 kN (5,800 lbf) of thrust and has a specific impulse of 343 s (3.36 km/s).