Silanes/H2O2: A high-performance synthetic bipropellant for chemical space propulsion

B. Hidding*, M. Pfitzner, C. Bruno, D. Simone

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

4 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The rocket performance of liquid silanes with highly concentrated H 2O2 as rocker bipropellants using the new thermodynamic data was investigated. The vacuum-specific impulses, combustion temperatures in the chamber, nozzle expansion ratio, and densities of the fuels are given as well as the equivalence and corresponding oxidizer-fuel-mass ratio that would be used to obtain the maximum specific impulse. Non toxic hypergolic miscible fuels (NHMF) have been developed that allows to obtain up to 93% of the specific impulse of the NTO/MMH when used with 98% grade H2O2. The ideal rocket performance of the combination of silicon hydrides and 98% pure H2O was predicted to be higher than NTO/MMH at the same conditions. All the silanes/RGHP (rocket-grade hydrogen peroxide) yielded a better peak Ivac and the vacuum-specific impulse of SiH4/RGHP is 10% higher than for NTO/MMH.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)144-147
Number of pages4
JournalJournal of Propulsion and Power
Volume24
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jan 2008

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