Shuryberko K.V., Surovtcev A. B., Posudiievska O. R.

Oles Honchar Dnipropetrovsk National University

PECULIARITIES OF PASTELIKE ROCKET FUEL AND ITS ACTUALITY

The present day brings forth the problem of development of a new kind of rocket fuel which would eliminate drawbacks of traditional composite solid propellant, as well as of usual liquid rocket fuel.

Engines working on liquid fuel are very complicated in structure and dangerous in operation, however due to the possibility of regulation of the specific impulse of draught because of the regulated fuel supply in the combustion chamber they have an undeniable advantage over solid – fueled engines.

The latter are safe enough in operation and they are considerably more simple in structure, but they can work only once from the starting moment. Therefore, their work doesn’t involve the possibility of regulation of the specific impulse of draught.

Alternatively, the recent researches concentrate on the pastelike fuel which unites the above – mentioned positive properties of liquid and firm fuels. This type of fuel preserves the compositional mobility at certain external influence. It allows to transport fuel to the combustion chamber at a different speed and thus, to regulate the engine draught, as well as (that is no less important) to start and to stop the engine many times.

An important peculiarity of pastelike fuel is that it represents a composition, highly filled with disperse mineral oxidizer, which provides increased values of the specific impulse of draught, charge density, combustion rate, as well as smaller sensitivity to impact-kinetic influences and absence of restrictions on a charge capacity.

Development of this type of fuel also allows to use rocket engines with small dimensions giving an opportunity for their reusable start, which is impossible while using solid fuel. It will considerably simplify and cut the cost of their production because of reduced complexity of the equipment and simplicity of their usage.