Re: Falcon 1 Maiden Launch Delayed Until Dec

> Its not very encouraging if the first flight of a reusable craft gets
> delayed for concerns over nozzle erosion.
>
The nozzle of the Merlin engine is expendable and ablatively cooled.
According to elon musk, there is no economic case fore reusing the
engine nozzle since it is a very cheap part compared to other engine
parts. I think he once said that there are valves in the Merlin engine
that cost more than the whole ablative nozzle.

Another thing is that the engine nozzle is the part that hits the water
first during recovery, so it would be quite hard to make it reusable
even if it were regeneratively cooled.

.

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