Parametric study on hybrid rocket propulsion system performance measured by the system specific impulse

Abstract: Hybrid rocket motors have become of great international interest during the last couple of years. A hybrid rocket motor is propelled by the use of a solid fuel and a liquid oxidizer. The fundamental principle of the hybrid propelled system is that the liquid oxidizer is injected into a combustion chamber to enable the combustion of the solid fuel. The exhaust gases are then accelerated through a nozzle to supersonic velocity to produce the desired level of thrust. To describe the overall performance of a propulsion system, it is common use the specifc impulse which expresses the performance as the total impulse per mass unit of propellant. However, in order to optimize a propulsion system, it is necessary to consider the entire system with the oxidizer tank, feed system, combustion chamber and nozzle. The issue with using the specifc impulse as a performance index is that it does not consider the total mass of the propulsion system. Therefore, this thesis will instead analyze the system specifc impulse, which expresses the performance as the total impulse per mass unit of propulsion system. By studying the entire hybrid propulsion system it is possible to determine the relations between the various parameters of the diferent components and should therefore be able to optimize the mass, volume and system specifc impulse of the system. This master’s thesis aims to illustrate how the hybrid propulsion system can be optimized depending on various fxed parameters. This analysis studies a generic hybrid propulsion systemwith Hydroxyl-terminated polybutadiene (HTPB) as a solid fuel with diferent combinations ofoxidizers. Each oxidizer- and fuel confguration shall have identical combustion chamber presssures and shall generate the same total impulse. Nevertheless, each combination will result indiferent specifc impulses since the optimal confguration for each combination will generate diffferent oxidizer and fuel masses. It is then desirable to analyze how the diferent components ofthe propulsion system are affected by the required oxidizer and fuel for each optimal confgurationand how it drives the design of the system and generates diferent system specifc impulses.