Description
The M-1 used the gas-generator cycle, burning some of its liquid hydrogen and oxygen in a small combustor to provide hot gases for running the fuel pumps. In the case of the M-1, the hydrogen and oxygen turbopumps were completely separate, each using their own turbine, rather than running both off a common power shaft. The hydrogen and oxygen pumps were some of the most powerful ever built at the time, producing 75,000 horsepower for the former, and 27,000 hp (20,000 kW) for the latter.
Normally a gas-generator engine would dump the exhaust from the turbines overboard. In the case of the M-1, the resulting exhaust was fairly cool, and was instead directed into cooling pipes on the lower portion of the engine skirt. This meant that liquid hydrogen was needed for cooling only on the high-heat areas of the engine —the combustion chamber, nozzle and upper part of the skirt— reducing plumbing complexity considerably. The gas entered the skirt area at about 700 °F (371 °C), heating to about 1,000 °F (538 °C) before being dumped through a series of small nozzles at the end of the skirt. The exhaust added 28,000 lbf (120 kN) of thrust.
The engine was started by driving the pumps to speed by helium gas stored in a separate high-pressure container. This started the fuel flow into the main engine and gas generator. The main engine was ignited by a generator that sprayed sparks into the combustion area. Shutdown was achieved by simply turning off the fuel flow to the gas generator, allowing the pumps to slow down on their own.
The use of separate turbopumps and other components allowed the various parts of the M-1 to be built and tested individually. Over the three-year lifetime of the project, a total of eight combustion chambers were built (two of them uncooled test units), eleven gas generators, four oxygen pumps, as well as four hydrogen pumps that were in the process of being completed.
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