A turbopump is a propellant pump with two main components: a rotodynamic pump and a driving gas turbine, usually both mounted on the same shaft, or sometimes geared together. They were initially developed in Germany in the early 1940s. The purpose of a turbopump is to produce a high-pressure fluid for feeding a combustion chamber or other use. While other use cases exist, they are most commonly found in liquid rocket engines.
Part of an axial turbopump designed and built for the M-1 rocket engine
The V-2 rocket used a circular turbopump to pressurize the propellant.
A gas turbine, gas turbine engine, or also known by its old name internal combustion turbine, is a type of continuous flow internal combustion engine. The main parts common to all gas turbine engines form the power-producing part and are, in the direction of flow:a rotating gas compressor
a combustor
a compressor-driving turbine.
Sketch of John Barber's gas turbine, from his patent
typical axial-flow gas turbine turbojet, the J85, sectioned for display. Flow is left to right, multistage compressor on left, combustion chambers center, two-stage turbine on right
An LM6000 in an electrical power plant application
Gateway Generating Station, a combined-cycle gas-fired power station in California, uses two GE 7F.04 combustion turbines to burn natural gas.
