JSC Kuznetsov (Russian: ПАО «Кузнецов») is one of the leading Russian producers of aircraft engines, liquid-propellant rocket engines as well as aeroderivative gas turbines and modular stations.
The current joint-stock company was established through the consolidation of several Samara-based aerospace engine companies, including JSC N.D. Kuznetsov SNTK, JSC Samara Design Bureau of Machine Building and JSC NPO Povolzhskiy AviTI.
History
The company was established in 1912 as the Gnome Factory of Moscow, after the French aircraft engine company Gnome et Rhône which supplied the engine parts assembled by the plant.[2] In 1925 it was renamed 'Frunze Factory No. 24', after Bolshevik leader Mikhail Frunze.[2] The factory was evacuated to its current location in Samara in 1941.[2]
The Samara Frunze Engine-Building Production Association was one of the principal aerospace engine production complexes in Russia, with six plants and 25,000 employees in the early 1990s. It has produced turbojet and turboprop engines for military and civil use, including Blackjack and Backfire bombers and Tu-154 transports. The NK-12M engine produced by Frunze is the most powerful turboprop in the world. Samara Frunze also produced engines for the Salyut spacecraft and for the Mir space station.[3]
Re-established as the joint-stock company Motorostroitel in 1994, it retained this denomination until 2010, when it was merged with several other Samara-based engine plants on the verge of bankruptcy.[2] It then took the name of one of new its subsidiaries, Kuznetsov Design Bureau.[4]
The current production range of JSC Kuznetsov includes the NK-33 rocket engine, the Kuznetsov NK-32 aviation engine and the NK-37ST industrial engine.[5] In 2016 the company announced plans to produce a modernized version of its NK-32 engine by the end of the year.[citation needed]
Aircraft engines
The Kuznetzov Bureau first became notable for producing the monstrous Kuznetsov NK-12turboprop engine that powered the Tupolev Tu-95bomber beginning in 1952 as a development of the Junkers 0022 engine. The new engine eventually generated about 15,000 horsepower (11.2 megawatts), far more than any Western turboprop engine of its time, and it was also used in the large Antonov An-22Soviet Air Force transport.
Kuznetsov's most powerful aviation engine is the Kuznetsov NK-321 that propels the Tupolev Tu-160 bomber and was formerly used in the later models of the Tu-144 supersonic transport (an SST that is now obsolete and no longer flown). The NK-321 produced a maximum of about 245 kN (55,000 lbf) of thrust.
Kuznetsov NK-12 contra rotating turboprop. Powers all the versions of the Tupolev Tu-95, Tupolev Tu-114, Tupolev Tu-126, Antonov An-22 and the A-90 Orlyonok ekranoplan. Initially designated as TV-12, but was renamed to NK-12 in honor of the company's founder, Nikolai Kuznetsov.
The Orbital SciencesAntares light-to-medium-lift launcher has two modified NK-33 in its first stage, a solid second stage and a hypergolic orbit stage.[9] The NK-33s are first imported from Russia to the United States and then modified into Aerojet AJ26s, which involves removing some harnessing, adding U.S. electronics, qualifying it for U.S. propellants, and modifying the steering system.[10]
The Antares rocket was successfully launched from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility on April 21, 2013. This marked the first successful launch of the NK-33 heritage engines built in early 1970s.[11]
Kuznetsov rocket engines include:
Kuznetsov oxygen-rich stage-combustion RP1/LOX rocket engine family. Including NK-9, NK-15, NK-19, NK-21, NK-33, NK-39, NK-43. The original version was designed to power an ICBM. In the 1970s some improved versions were built for the ill-fated Soviet Lunar mission. More than 150 NK-33 engines were produced and stored in a warehouse ever since, with 36 engines having been sold to Aerojet general in the 1990s. Two NK-33 derived engines (Aerojet AJ-26) are used in the first stage of the Antares rocket developed by Orbital Sciences Corporation. The Antares rocket was successfully launched from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility on April 21, 2013. This marked the first successful launch of the NK-33 heritage engines built in the early 1970s.[11]RKTs Progress also uses the NK-33 as the first-stage engine of the lightweight version of the Soyuz rocket family, the Soyuz-2.1v.[12]
