Applied Mechanics aid Materials Vols. 110-116 (2012) pp 1380-1386 Inline available since 204 [/Oct/24 at wwv-scientificanet ©2019 Trans Teoh Publications, Switzerland doj:10.428/www scienifie.net/A MM. 110-1 16.1380 Effect of Oxidizer-Fuel Mixture Ratio to the Pressure Exponent of Ammonium Perchlorate Based Composite Propellant Amir Aziz ** and Wan Khairuddin Wan Ali 7° ‘Department of Aeronautical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 UTM Skudai, Johor.Malaysia. “Department of Aeronautical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 UTM Skudai, Johor. Malaysia. *amirS@live.utm.my, Swankhai@tkm.utmany Keywords: Ammonium perchlorate, composite propellant, oxidizer-fuel mixture ratio, burning rate, pressure exponent Abstract. In this paper, experimental investigation of pressure exponent in buming rate of composite propellant was conducted, Four sets of different propellant compositions had been prepared with the combination of Ammonium Perchlorate (AP) as an oxidizer, Aluminum (Al) as fuel and Hydroxy-Terminated Polybutadiene (HTPB) as fuel and binder, For each mixture, HTPB binder was fixed at 15% and cured with isophorone diisocyanate (IPDI). By varying AP and Al, the effect of oxidizer- fuel mixture ratio (O/F) on the whole propellant can be determined. The propellant strands were manufactured using compression molded method and burnt in a strand bumer using wire technique over a range of pressure from Jatm to 3]atm. The results obtained shows that the pressure exponent n, increases with increasing O/F. The highest pressure exponent achieved was 0.561 for propellant p80 which has O/F ratio of 80/20, INTRODUCTION ‘The effeet of pressure exponent on burning characteristic of composite propellant had been tong recognized. Nevertheless only few papers discussed on the effect of oxidizer-fuel mixture ratio to the pressure exponent of ammonium perchlorate (AP) based composite propellant cither from a theoretical or experimental viewpoint, The propellant composition is one of several parameter that influencing the pressure sensitivity or known as pressure exponent [1]. An understanding on the effect of the propellant composition on the value of the pressure exponent is critical to the selection of the proper formulations to satisfy specific needs. The previous studies showed that, varying oxidizer-fuel mixture ratio while inereasing chamber pressure will give different burning rate and pressure exponent [1-3]. N. Kubota and J. Kimura [4] reported that, the pressure exponent of a propellant varies significantly with different pressure range. In this experiment, the strand burner was used to obtain the buming characteristic due to its simplicity, convenient, and cost effectiveness [5]. The buming rates were evaluated within the pressure range of Latm to 3latm. The objectives of this study are to determine the eflect of oxidizer-fuel mixture ratio to the pressure exponent of AP based composite propellant. The scope included measuring buming rate while varying the OF and increasing chamber pressure using strand burner. METHODOLOGY Propellant Selection Composition The specific impulse (Iss) and the burning rate are among the most important performance parameters of propellants. High Iy is required to obtain optimum performance of a propellant. The theoretical 1, was estimated using NASA CEC71 program [6], a computer program for rocket performance. The same program was also applied by several researchers [7-8] to estimates the performance characteristics of AP/HTPB based propellant. The propellant used in # Was composite propellant consisted of ammonium perchlorate (oxidizer), alumi Assi rome. spt ct centr of pages say bregma epi nay ern By a tine Whol este parson oT, ewipcet io anata times mae)