novel gelled fuels containing nanoparticles as hypergolic bipropellants with htp

• DOI: 10.13009/eucass2019-242
• Publication Date: 2019-01-01
• Authors: Ricker, Sophie; Kurilov, Maxim; Freudenmann, Dominic; Kirchberger, Chri...; Hertel, Tobias; Ciezki, Helmut; Schlechtriem, Stefan
• Keywords: IGNITION; gelled propellants; green rocket propellants; ignition; Treibstoffe; 02 engineering and technology; 0210 nano-technology; 7. Clean energy; NEW FUELS

With the aim of replacing toxic, carcinogenic propellants, new gelled bipropellants were developed. Transition metal based nanoparticles were utilised as new catalysts for the hypergolic bipropellant system with HTP as oxidiser and TMEDA as fuel. To test the quality, ignition delay times (IDTs) were determined via drop-on-pool tests. Various parameters were optimised in order to exploit catalytic activity of the nanoparticles. It was found that silver is most suitable and that size, stabilisation and distribution of the nanoparticles are important. An optimised bipropellant was created which reached an average IDT of 8.8 ms 1.0 ms.