[r9etb]

SpaceDev successfully test fired a motor with its proprietary propellant equal to about one-half the total capacity of the motor.

Proprietary.... Bah. If it's a hybrid, they're using LOX and (probably) paraffin. NASA, Stanford, and LockMart have been working hard on this for a while now.

[farmfriend]

Interesting.

[anymouse]

Actually SpaceDev bought the patents on this hybrid engine from Ameroc, who developed and tested full up engines back in the 1980s before the untimely death of it's founder in a auto wreck driving back from an engine test at their central California test facility. I interviewed with Ameroc at their Camarillo, CA facility back in 1987 when they were going strong. Some smart people working there.

NASA, Stanford and LockMart weren't interested in hybrid technology back then, until Ameroc showed how cheap, powerful and safe it was in comparison to solid or liquid rocket engines. I'm glad that SpaceDev is resurecting this technology, especially in Scaled Composites effort to win the X-Prize and reroute manned spaceflight development around NASA and its bloated contractors like LockMart.