National Space Propulsion Facility comes to Bucks
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The UK Space Agency is investing £4.12m in a National Propulsion Test Facility at Westcott, near Aylesbury, giving the UK a new facility for space technology testing.
The UK Space Agency investment will add new capabilities for the UK space sector. Government funding will:
• create a new vacuum facility at the Westcott propulsion test site. When used together with the existing industry owned rocket firing test cells, this will allow the simulation of high altitude testing of thrusters up to 2kN
• upgrade an existing industry owned test chamber to improve capabilities in the 25N thrust range
• open the facilities, alongside a smaller 1N thruster test chamber at the site, for the community to use
The Rocket Propulsion Establishment, set up in 1946, was for many years so secret that it was not marked on Ordnance Survey maps.
Rocket motors for British guided missiles were designed and developed at Westcott until the mid-1990s. The site, eventually taken over by British Aerospace, is now a business park which already houses a number of space technology companies.