Rocket candy
In the United States, rocket candy motors are legal to make, but illegal to transport without a low explosives users permit.
[3][4] Since they count as amateur motors, they are typically launched at sanctioned Tripoli Rocketry Association research launches which require users to hold a Tripoli Rocketry Association high power level 2 certification.
Rocket candy can be broken down into three major groups of components: fuels, oxidizers, and additives.
The fuel is the substance that burns, releasing rapidly expanding gases that provide thrust as they exit the nozzle.
[5] Sugars with a double bonded oxygen, such as fructose and glucose, are less thermally stable and tend to caramelize when overheated.
Most propellant makers prefer their KNO3 ground to a small particle size, such as 100 mesh (about 150 μm) or smaller.
Brown iron oxide exhibits unusual burn rate acceleration properties under pressure.
If metallic fuels such as aluminum or magnesium are used in a sugar formulation, a danger exists if traces of acids are found in the oxidizer.
Acidic materials can react readily with the metal, producing hydrogen and heat, a dangerous combination.
The addition of weak bases helps to neutralize these acidic materials, greatly reducing their danger.
Titanium metal in the form of flakes or sponge (about 20 mesh in size) is often added to sugar formulations at levels from 5 to 10% in order to produce a sparking flame and smoke on lift off.
This mixture is then compressed into the motor tube, similar to the method for packing black powder into a muzzle loading rifle.
Another, more common, and safer method of preparing a sugar-based rocket propellant is dry heating.
In which he does not grind or mill the potassium nitrate into a powder which results in a viscosity low enough to make the solution pourable when using sorbitol as the fuel for casting grains.
This method of preparation also causes the resultant propellant to resist caramelization in the pot, giving more time to pack it into the motors.
The mixture is not pourable and requires scooping into a mold, and won’t ever be as thin as the dry heating method.
Sugar based rocket propellants have an average Isp(specific impulse) of between 114 and 130 seconds.
Compare that to the average Isp of an APCP (Ammonium perchlorate composite propellant), which is 180 to 260 seconds.
Parkin described how to prepare the propellant mixture by using an electric frying pan as a heat source for the melting operation.
The Double Sugar Shot rocket was expected to reach 33 kilometres (21 mi), or one third of the goal altitude.
[11] The first Mini Sugar Shot rocket, a single-stage dual-pulse design motor prototype of the Extreme Sugar Shot rocket, reached an altitude of 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) before a catastrophic motor malfunction occurred; contact with the second Mini Sugar Shot rocket was lost at an altitude of nearly 6 kilometres (3.7 mi) going in excess of Mach 1.
