---
title: "How EOS and AMCM technology helped Isar Aerospace reach orbit on second attempt"
url: https://www.voxelmatters.com/how-eos-and-amcm-technology-helped-isar-aerospace-reach-orbit-on-second-attempt/
date: 2026-09-07
modified: 2026-09-07
lang: en
author: "Davide Sher"
description: "Isar Aerospace's Spectrum rocket lifted off from Andøya Spaceport in Norway at 22:12 CEST on September 5, 2026. A little over seven minutes later, the rocket reached an elliptical orbit..."
categories:
  - "Aerospace AM"
  - "AM for Space"
tags:
  - "top news"
image: https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Isar_aerospace_slack-imgs-1-640x426.jpg
word_count: 525
---

# How EOS and AMCM technology helped Isar Aerospace reach orbit on second attempt

[Isar Aerospace](https://www.voxelmatters.directory/company/isar-aerospace-technologies/)'s Spectrum rocket lifted off from Andøya Spaceport in Norway at 22:12 CEST on September 5, 2026. A little over seven minutes later, the rocket reached an elliptical orbit with a perigee of 180 kilometers and an apogee of 500 kilometers before its upper stage carried out a circularization burn. Isar Aerospace confirmed the deployment of all six payloads roughly two hours after liftoff, making it the first privately funded launch company from continental Europe to put satellites into orbit.

This was Spectrum's second flight. The first, in March 2025, ended in the sea off Andøya after about 30 seconds, when the rocket's flight control system overcorrected and shut down its first-stage engines. Eighteen months and several scrubbed attempts later, flight two ran its full sequence: max dynamic pressure, stage separation, second-stage engine ignition, fairing separation, orbit insertion, second engine cutoff and transfer orbit injection, circularization, and payload release, followed by contact with the deployed satellites.

![Discover how Isar Aerospace, EOS and AMCM achieved a milestone by deploying six payloads into orbit during Spectrum](https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Isar_aerospace_tech_gallery_3.jpg)

![Discover how Isar Aerospace, EOS and AMCM achieved a milestone by deploying six payloads into orbit during Spectrum](https://www.voxelmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Isar_aerospace_slack-imgs.jpg)The mission, named Onward and Upward, carried six payloads: five cubesats built by academic and commercial teams, CyBEEsat, TriSat-S, Platform 6, FramSat-1, and SpaceTeamSat1, plus a non-separable experiment called Let It Go, flown under the European Space Agency's Boost! program. Nikolaos Perakis, Spectrum's chief engineer, described the flight as "making history, making history for Spectrum, making history for Isar, making history for Europe."

Europe's ESA already launches from French Guiana with Ariane 6 and Vega-C. However, Spectrum is a privately developed launcher built in Germany and flown from Norway, and this flight was the first orbital launch from continental European soil. Isar Aerospace has said it expects its Ottobrunn production line, near Munich, to scale to more than 30 vehicles a year, aimed at the small-to-medium satellite market.

Getting there relied on additive manufacturing for the parts of the Aquila engine that would have been hardest to machine or cast conventionally. Spectrum's first stage carries nine Aquila engines, with a vacuum-tuned variant powering the second stage, all running on propane and liquid oxygen.

Isar Aerospace worked with EOS and its large-format subsidiary AMCM to build a bespoke, in-house metal 3D printing setup centered on the AMCM M 450 and the EOS M 290. The two systems produce the engine's thrust chamber assembly, the part EOS describes as the heaviest, longest lead time and most expensive to manufacture by other means. Christian Wenzl, Isar Aerospace's head of manufacturing, said the company chose the AMCM M 450 for "the customization done by AMCM," which delivered the build volume its engine design required.

Additive manufacturing is one piece of the manufacturing strategy Isar Aerospace built to own its full supply chain. The company produces Spectrum's primary structure as a single carbon composite part through an automated process, developed its own non-toxic propellants for higher density-specific impulse, and built pyro-free separation systems for the stages and payload fairing, all designed and made in-house.

None of that guarantees a repeat. Isar Aerospace still has to show it can deploy payloads reliably across multiple flights, not just one. But after a first flight that lasted 30 seconds, reaching orbit and deploying six payloads on the second attempt is a result that speaks for itself.