TESTING THE RD-170

Like the RD-0120, Energomash’s RD-170 engines for the strap-on boosters under­went a step-by-step test program, moving from autonomous tests of individual components to full-scale test firings at increasing rates of thrust. Bench tests were not only carried out with the engines alone (at Energomash’s own test facility), but also with the engines mounted on the modular part of the strap-ons (at

Nllkhimmash). Test firings of complete strap-ons at Baykonur’s UKSS pad were ultimately canceled, at least partially because the RD-171, the near twin of the RD-170, had already undergone flight testing on the first stage of the Zenit rocket. The road to success for the RD-170 proved much more arduous than for the RD-0120, with several setbacks plunging the program into deep crisis in the early 1980s.