![]() ![]() Neutron will instead serve as a general purpose booster for commercial and government satellites, and the ISS is unlikely to be on its list of potential destinations. It would be far more accurate to say that Rocket Lab is building the Neutron to directly compete with the Antares, if it wasn’t for the fact that the Antares is only used to loft resupply missions to the International Space Station. The renders of the Neutron even bear a strong resemblance to Grumman’s booster, though to be fair, the rocket equation doesn’t allow for much in the way of artistic license. Both stand approximately 40 meters (130 feet) tall, use the same LOX/RP-1 propellants, have identical LEO payload capacities, and are expected to use the same launch pad at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) in Virginia. Rather, the Neutron is an exceptionally close match for Northrop Grumman’s Antares. Calling the two boosters direct competitors would be overly generous to Rocket Lab’s offering, to say the least. ![]() While that may technically be true, the Falcon 9’s 15,600 kg (34,400 lb) LEO capacity puts it in an entirely different league than the Neutron. Indeed, in a recent investor presentation, Rocket Lab specifically lists the Neutron as a “direct alternative to SpaceX Falcon 9”, and claims that the rocket’s target payload capacity of 8,000 kg (17,600 lb) to low Earth orbit (LEO) would be sufficient to carry 98% of the satellites currently manifested to launch through 2028. While there’s a market for these small payloads, their overall operational efficiency would be improved by a larger rocket would allow multiple customers to be served on each launch. Even in its upgraded form, the Electron can only carry 300 kg (660 lb) to low Earth orbit. If Rocket Lab is developing a second booster, it stands to reason that they’re looking to take some of the market that’s currently being served by their only real competition, the Falcon 9. But even still, the recent announcement that the company will be developing a far larger rocket they call Neutron to fly by 2024 took many in the industry by surprise especially since Peter Beck himself had previously said they would never build it. Considering their explosive growth, it’s only natural they’d want to maintain that momentum going forward. In fact Electron is now the second most active orbital booster in the United States, behind SpaceX’s Falcon 9. Rocket Lab’s gambit paid off, and the company has greatly outpaced competitors such as Virgin Orbit, Astra, and Relativity. By the end of 2020, a total of fifteen Electron rockets had completed their missions, carrying payloads from both commercial customers and government agencies such as NASA, the United States Air Force, and DARPA. While that first launch in 2017 didn’t make it to orbit, the next year, Rocket Lab could boast three successful flights. Packing so many revolutionary technical advancements into a single vehicle was a risk, but Rocket Lab founder Peter Beck believed a technical shakeup was the only way to get ahead in an increasingly competitive market. It even looked different than its peers, as rather than a metal fuselage, the Electron was built from a lightweight carbon composite which gave it a distinctive black color scheme. The small commercially developed rocket was the first to use fully 3D printed main engines, and instead of pumping its propellants with traditional turbines, the vehicle used electric motors that jettisoned their depleted battery packs overboard during ascent to reduce weight. When Rocket Lab launched their first Electron booster in 2017, it was unlike anything that had ever flown before. ![]()
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