Has anyone found a supplier of sub-drum quantities of 70% peroxide? I see lots of suppliers for 35%, and a couple for 50%, but none for 70% so far. I may buy a drum if I have to.
An interesting thought has occurred to me: Furfuryl alcohol is potentially hypergolic with peroxide (according to Bruce Dunn, and credible based on MSDS data). I found a supplier willing to ship me a five gallon jug of this, and we should be testing it next week. A while ago, I spent some time trying to come up with a fuel that could auto-ignite with the catalytic decomposition of 70% peroxide, the idea being to reduce the flame temperature to the point that there was no chance of hurting a radiatively cooled chamber. The only thing we came up with were ether based fuels, which can potentially form explosive compounds all by themselves, so we didn't follow up on it. It is conceivable that a hypergolic propellent combination could work with 70% peroxide. I don't think the magnesium acetate in isporopal alcohol hypergolic fuel would work like this, because I believe it is still relying on the heat of decomposition for ignition, but an actual chemical ignition may still proceed. If the peroxide / furfuryl reaction looks energetic enough, we will fabricate a hypergolic injector and try to fire it on one of our 50 lbf chambers, then try it with 90% diluted down to 70%. This would have some significant benefits: Both 70% peroxide and furfuryl alcohol are < $1 / lb in quantity, and are standard industrial chemicals. It would be a cool burning combination with all the extra water, simplifying cooling a lot. Performance would certainly be lower, but I would be quite happy with a 200 Isp sea level storable biprop. Even with 90%, it might be worth exploring a hypergolic main engine to eliminate catalyst pack hassles and pressure drop. John Carmack _______________________________________________ ERPS-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.erps.org/mailman/listinfo/erps-list
