Hello all, my team is considering RP-1 and ethanol right now (to be paired
with LOX) for our main propellant and I was wondering if anyone has any
input on which fuel to use given some constraints and thoughts to follow.
For one, we don't have an infinite budget at our disposal so Ethanol
becomes immediately appealing because it is easy to source, this is on top
of the fact that Ethanol is not ITAR protected and can be mixed with water
for "inherent" cooling. What made RP-1 appealing was the fact that it is
used in the industry so gaining experience with it seems extremely
appealing and, I think, would make our work more "useful/notable" but
sourcing RP-1 is difficult and it is expensive. A slightly tangential
consideration is using lower grade kerosene which I have seen other college
students do but I am concerned with using low-grade kerosene in regen
cooling channels and it obviously has poor performance.