CASIC Rocket Technology Co said its domestically developed Mingfeng series
liquid‑oxygen/methane engines completed a new round of hot-fire tests, bringing
cumulative ground hot-fire time to more than 6,000 seconds. Testing covered a
40%–110% thrust operating range, combined gimbaling and variable-thrust trials,
multiple ignitions, and thrust and mixture‑ratio offset checks. The program
logged more than ten single long-duration burns over 200s and achieved 80 tons
of ground thrust. CASIC aims to push cumulative test time past 10,000s in 2026
to support engine delivery for reusable LOX‑methane rockets targeted for 1H
2027.
