F1 Nova Prime
The cornerstone of the program. A methane full-flow staged combustion engine delivering 2.5 million pounds of sea-level thrust — pairing an F-1 scale bell with an AI-optimized contour for the heavy-lift era.
Defined by scale. Governed by discipline.
F1 Nova Prime is characterized at a conceptual, high-level class — communicating capability without exposing proprietary internals.
An F-1 scale bell, shaped by intelligence
Nova Prime carries a bell nozzle at F-1 heritage scale, but its contour is no longer bound by legacy tooling. The expansion profile is refined through AI-driven optimization to balance performance, structural margin, and manufacturability.
What we present here is the conceptual silhouette. Injector patterns, turbopump geometry, and cooling architecture remain proprietary and are not depicted.
Full-Flow Cycle
A methane FFSC cycle for clean, complete combustion and favorable turbine operating conditions.
Clustered Thrust
Designed to fly in clusters of seven to nine on a heavy-lift booster — redundancy and control by architecture.
AI-Optimized Contour
Geometry refined computationally to extract performance the legacy approach could not reach.
Reuse-First
Engineered from the outset for rapid inspection, refurbishment, and repeated flight.
Built to fly again — and again.
Reusability is not a feature bolted onto Nova Prime; it is a design premise. The cycle, thermal management approach, and structural strategy are all selected to support high-cadence flight with predictable maintenance.
Methane is central to this philosophy — a clean-burning propellant that supports reuse economics and simplifies turnaround between flights.