Development of a 10 newton hydrogen peroxide monopropellant rocket thruster

Abstract

Propellant is one of the important parts in rocket development. There are many types of propellant such as nitrogen tetroxide and hydrazine but most of them are toxic in nature and can harm our health and environment. This has increased the renewed interest on hydrogen peroxide, also known as “green” propellant that can act as monopropellant or oxidizer which is ideal for spacecraft programs. This research is mainly about developing a rocket thruster by using hydrogen peroxide as monopropellant. Therefore, a 10 Newton rocket thruster has been designed and fabricated. However, in order to test the performance of rocket thruster, there are several preparations that have been done. Firstly, was the preparation of rocket grade hydrogen peroxide (concentration > 85%) from lower concentration of hydrogen peroxide. Next, was development of rocket test facility which consists of two integral parts; (1) static test rig and (2) data acquisition system. Measuring discharge coefficient of the thruster injector was also part of the preparations to ensure the mass flow rate of propellant. Finally, the catalyst pack was prepared where silver screens were used as catalyzer. The hydrogen peroxide would react with the catalyst pack and decompose into water and oxygen. In order to identify the optimum configuration of producing 10 N thrust, several parameters were taken into consideration and they are injector orifice diameter, nozzle throat diameter, type of hydrogen peroxide used, catalyst pack length, compaction pressure of catalyst pack, engine heating temperature and propellant injection pressure. With a total of 5 series of successful hot tests, the optimum configuration of producing 10 N thrust using hydrogen peroxide monopropellant rocket thruster had been achieved. The configuration is: i D = 0.601 mm, t D = 2.236 mm, cp P = 9.29 MPa (50 kg by strain gauge) and 2 P = 37 bar.