Turbopump, Steam Generator and Frame, V-2 Rocket Engine

The turbopump and steam generator assembly of the V-2 engine drew the propellants--liquid oxygen and 75% alcohol--from the missile's tanks and injected them under pressure into the combustion chamber. At a thrust of 25 metric tons (about 56,000 lb), the V-2 was the world's first large liquid-propellant rocket engine, and as such was of groundbreaking historical importance. It was also the first large turbo-pumped liquid-fuel rocket engine, following on earlier German experiments.

The turbopump had to move approx. 9700 kg (21,400 lb.) of liquid oxygen from the tanks to the engine during the sixty-second burning time. Driving the turbopump was the steam generator, which used hydrogen peroxide (codenamed T-Stoff) mixed with Z-Stoff, a catalyst consisting of a 27% solution of sodium permanganate. Those liquids were forced into a mixing chamber by compressed air. This Smithsonian artifact was a gift of the U.S. Air Force Museum in 1959.