Development of hydrogen peroxide based micro thruster utilizing biomass-based catalyst bed

Abstract

Micro thrusters, also referred to as micro-newton thrusters, are thrusters having a wide range of force capabilities in the micro-newton range. Micro thrusters are used in CubeSats, tiny robots and drones, micro- and nanosatellites, spacecraft attitude control, etc. The aim of the present study is to develop a monopropellant thruster (MPT) for 90 % concentrated hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂). A rotatory evaporator was used to obtain a 90 % H₂O₂ form the available concentration of 50 % H₂O₂. The next stage involved the designing of the monopropellant thruster utilizing the NASA CEA rocket performance algorithm and the derived mathematical model. The test facility was constructed which includes a thruster, a feed line system, a static test firing platform, a data collecting system and the measuring sensors. To measure the thrust of the thruster, a pendulum thrust mechanism was constructed and fabricated into an experimental test stand. Lastly, the MPT chamber, which uses stainless steel mesh, was prepared and packed with the biomass-based catalyst. The 14 bar injection pressure conditions were used for the fire tests. With a mass flow rate of 5 g/s and a decomposition pressure of 10 bar, the theoretical specific impulse (I_sp) was calculated to be 1993.2 Ns/kg at an O/F ratio of 0.002. The test firing with 90 % concentrated hydrogen peroxide gave an experimental specific impulse of 794.5 Ns/kg, which gives efficiency of 39.9 %.