Nitrous oxide/Alcohol
Propellant
Original archive entry. The text, images and links below are kept as they were written.
Nitrous oxide/Alcohol propellant. Nitrous oxide has advantages as a rocket engine oxidizer in that it is non-toxic, stable at room temperature, easy to store and relatively safe to carry on a flight. Its disadvantage is that it must be stored as a gas, which make it more bulky than liquid oxidizers. Alcohol (C2H5OH) was the fuel used for the German V-2 rocket, and the first derivative rocket engines in the United States, Soviet Union, and China. After better-performance rocket-grade kerosene was developed by Rocketdyne in the REAP program of 1953, use of alcohol was abandoned. Interest was renewed in the 21st Century as part of this non-toxic, storable propellant combination.
Subtopics
- XR2P1 XCOR Nitrous oxide/Alcohol rocket engine. First stages. Hardware. Engine was run on oxygen and nitrous oxide oxidizers, with propane, ethane, kerosene, turpentine, and a variety of alcohols.
- XR3B4 XCOR Nitrous oxide/Alcohol rocket engine. First stages. Hardware. Regeneratively cooled engine using nitrous oxide and isopropyl alcohol as propellants.