PARIS — MT Aerospace of Germany will provide large aluminum segments for the main-stage propellant tank of NASA’s future Space Launch System (SLS) under a contract with Boeing that MT announced June 12.
Under the contract, whose value was not disclosed, Augsburg-based MT, which is majority owned by OHB AG of Bremen, Germany, will provide panels measuring 3 meters by 3 meters for the SLS main stage propellant tanks.
The panels will be shipped to the SLS assembly plant in New Orleans.
The SLS main-stage tanks are to measure about 65 meters in length and 8.4 meters in diameter and are expected to carry nearly 1,000 kilograms of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. It will be 30 percent larger than the external tank of the now-retired U.S. space shuttle, and more than double the length of the main cryogenic stage of Europe’s Ariane 5 ECA heavy-lift vehicle.
