On Tue, 4 Feb 2003 13:00:43 -0800 (PST), Ben Zarzycki <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Supposedly, the Paraffin/Oxygen can be throttled and has close to the same >performance as the Shuttle's current SRB. It is completely clean and very >easy to obtain. Clean, I'll give it. No aluminum, and I think no chlorine. EPA will like it. But AFAIK - this is the Stanford wax hybrid, right? - they're just doing GOX/wax static tests. If that's the case, they're extrapolating from non-flight weight data to theoretical performance with flight weight hardware. As Michael likes to point out, "The difference between theory and practice is greater in practice than in theory." >I don't mean to suggest ERPS change propellants. I am just wondering how >this new propellant combination may affect the rocketry community. It may give the people doing nitrous hybrids a migration path to LOX? Which is probably worth something. That assumes that Stanford releases the composition of the wax, and that the amateur rocketry community hasn't already considered and rejected this propellant combination. >My main question is, "Would the performance be good enough to >more economically reach LEO for small payloads (such as commercial >satellites)?" Does anyone here know? If the performance is indeed as good as Shuttle SRBs, then yes, one could stack some of these things and make orbit. I don't think it's good enough for SSTO - hybrids and solids require thick case walls because the entire fuel casing has to support the combustion chamber pressure - but that's a guess. -R -- Every complex, difficult problem has a simple, easy solution - which is wrong. [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ ERPS-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.erps.org/mailman/listinfo/erps-list
