KNO3/Sugar rockets!!!

[rocket5678]

I want to make these same rockets but need some tools!

[engralihaider]

can i use honey in replacment of Corn syrup

[AirCowPeacock]

Sure

[engralihaider]

at what percentage i.e if i use honey as corn syrup what will be the ratio?? thanks ...

[dagabu]

You can try using honey but the effect is poor compared to corn syrup. In truth, you can make your own "corn syrup" by making something called invert sugar.

 

There is no need to buy it or use expensive honey, who needs the impurities, added water, undissolved corn starch and other junk found in the store shelf stuff? All you need is sugar, water, a pan and some citric acid or lemon juice.

 

One thing to consider is to make the R-candy the normal way and not use corn syrup but when you would normally fill the casing with the goop, instead, run it through a cheese grater onto paper, let it dry (humidity needs to be pretty low, less than 50% RH) and use like you would use BP, ram it or press it with a nozzle. Lots of energy and smoke!

[engralihaider]

thanks ,

i have got the powder glucose that contains 97% of glucose while other 3% are Vitamins D and E ,

should i use ???

if yes then at what %age in mixture ???

[dagabu]

Why Glucose? I have not seen any reports of better performance over Sucrose. 60:40 is the standard.

[yvariro]

I personnaly use the 65/35 (KNO3/Sucrose) ratio,wich is really good !

[davidtiah]

To create the perfect sugar rocket. you will need, 75% KNO3. and 25% sugar. and also 1% red iron oxide. add abit of water to the mixture, and boil it until it becomes a paste. Then you can use pour that paste in a tube, make a nozzle and let it dry. thats about it.

[mikeee]

http://www.thefintels.com/aer/rocketindex.htm

 

This is a great website if you are interested in sugar based rockets.

Scott has some really good videos and instructions on different fuels and how to cast the fuel grains.

Scott is building some of the largest "sugar" rockets on record and shows you how he does it.

[dagabu]

To create the perfect sugar rocket. you will need, 75% KNO3. and 25% sugar. and also 1% red iron oxide. add abit of water to the mixture, and boil it until it becomes a paste. Then you can use pour that paste in a tube, make a nozzle and let it dry. thats about it.

 

I really wish it were that simple and that your fuel ratio was correct but you are over oxidized and under fueled with that mixture. The theoretical best performance is 66% KN, 34% Su but a lot of people follow Richard Nakka's suggestion of 60/40 to begin with.

 

There are a lot of steps that were missed there...

[SekndAmendment]

thanks ,

i have got the powder glucose that contains 97% of glucose while other 3% are Vitamins D and E ,

should i use ???

if yes then at what %age in mixture ???

 

Just about any sugar will work, but as dagabu asked, why glucose? If i'm not mistaken a general table sugar is much cheaper. Sucrose is identical in chemical composition to glucose. It's a dissacharide sugar that essentially amounts to two glucose molecules bonded together with the removal of a water molecule. Glucose is C₆H₁₂O₆ and sucrose is C₁₂H₂₂O₁₁ which if you stare at for a minute you'll see is equivalent to 2 Glucoses added together with the removal of H₂O.

[Mumbles]

Sucrose is actually one glucose and one fructose. Being as they're carbohydrates they're structural isomers of one another though. One is a 5 membered ring, and the other is a 6 membered ring.

[SekndAmendment]

Sucrose is actually one glucose and one fructose. Being as they're carbohydrates they're structural isomers of one another though. One is a 5 membered ring, and the other is a 6 membered ring.

Yup, Mumbles is right. It's a fructose molecule and a glucose molecule. I was just highlighting that the difference between sucrose and glucose is a factor of 2, minus a water molecule.

Hence the "...essentially amounts to..."

[Thanatopsis]

I've made some rocket candy that's 70/30 sodium nitrate and sucrose. As a test I've tried burning some and almost every time, it basically blows itself out for lack of a better term. Sometimes it'll go for a few seconds, most of the time a second tops. After a few tried it usually will all go once it's all pretty hot. Did I possibly not remove all the water from it?

[Mumbles]

Possibly not. It's also possible your ratio is bad. A normal KNO3/Sucrose rocket is normally around 60/40 or so. Sodium nitrate has more oxygen per mass, so you'd need less of it, not more of it.

[Thanatopsis]

Thanks. Do you think maybe 55/45 would be a place to start?

[dagabu]

I only tried Sodium Nitrate with sugar once and it would not dry... EVER. Why use such a hygroscopic oxidizer?

[Slugbuster]

Hi im called wayne, I'm just starting out and can't get my rockets to work. They seem to take a while to lift off and don't get very high (less than 10 ft) then drop. I'm using 22mm PVC pipe 50mm long with a 65/35 knsu mix with a 4mm core and a 1.5cm clay plug on nozzle end, none on the top.

What am I be doing wrong? Any help will be greatly welcomed. Thanks in advance.

[LTUPyro]

Hi im called wayne, I'm just starting out and can't get my rockets to work. They seem to take a while to lift off and don't get very high (less than 10 ft) then drop. I'm using 22mm PVC pipe 50mm long with a 65/35 knsu mix with a 4mm core and a 1.5cm clay plug on nozzle end, none on the top.

What am I be doing wrong? Any help will be greatly welcomed. Thanks in advance.

Hi, welcome to forum. First of all, don't use pvc for rocket, it's just not safe. Anyways, make sure kno3 and sugar is finely milled or coffe grinded. Also you should use catalist, in most cases 1-2% of Iron Oxide works well. Also make sure you ram your rockets very well. Search on google or youtube for tutorials, you should find how to make solid fuel rockets.

[Slugbuster]

Thanks for the quick reply. I have watched all the vids on YouTube I can find and as far as I'm aware I following them lol. Is icing sugar better to use than the stuff you put in your tea? Would it be worth trying 65:25:10 kn:su:sulphur? (Or whatever ratio you guys think) and I'm just dry ramming the mix for now until I get used to the ratios etc. was my 4mm nozzle ok or should I try a smaller/larger?

 

Sorry for all the questions thanks very much. Cheers.

[psyco_1322]

Like LTU suggested, try to use paper tubes. PVC makes nasty like plastic shards when things blow up, and they can not find them on X-ray if they stick into you. Paper is not going to hurt you, and it's eco friendly.

 

Generally, if you rocket does not have enough thrust to make it in the sky, it's one of three things, if not a combination.

 

-Your nozzle diameter is too large, the smaller the nozzle, the more pressure your motor builds.

-Your core is too short, longer cores give more surface area to burn, which in turns builds more pressure.

-The fuel is just too slow burning for the nozzle/core configuration you are using. Faster fuel allows pressure to build faster.

 

Someone posted once about a powdered sugar that did not have starch in it for anti-cake. That might have been icing sugar, I don't remember. It's best to use something that doesn't have the corn starch in it. The starch can decrease the burn rate a bit and also decrease adhesion of the fuel when ramming. If you have a coffee grinder, just throw some table sugar in there and 30 seconds later it will be powdered. Same goes with your KNO3, it needs to be powdered, not granules or prills.

 

This is mostly an American forum, so if you would like to use inches, feel free to, since you listed dimensions in mm, I took the time to convert dimensions to mm for you. I can tell you now, your motor is way to short. The nozzle is about right, 4-5mm should be good. The core on the other hand, should probably be a good 50-75mm long. You will want the tube to be about 35-40mm longer that your spindle (the spindle makes the core obviously), to accompany the delay portion of the motor and a clay bulkhead. You will probably find that you will need a bulkhead (clay above the fuel) if you get them in the fling range. With out one, the fuel might just blow through the top of the motor. This is trail and error, you may not need one, then you just might also.

[dan999ification]

PVC does show up on x-rays. But still don't use it for pyro.

 

Dan.

[dangerousamateur]

Hi,

 

22mm PVC pipe 50mm long with a 65/35 knsu mix with a 4mm core and a 1.5cm clay plug on nozzle end

 

That sounds like and endburner?

 

Is 22mm the internal diameter? Then a 4mm nozzle should be OK.

 

Would it be worth trying 65:25:10 kn:su:sulphur?

No. Use Iron oxide as suggested by LTUPyro. Mill it together with your KNO3.

 

 

 

How strong is your pipe?

Besides being dangerous, doesn't the PVC melt and burn through rather quickly, especially in endburners?

[Slugbuster]

Thanks for all the replies. I'm sorry I don't know inches so will try and work it out for you. So from reading the replies should I use paper tube 4" long (100mm) with a core of 3/4 the length and a nozzle of 4mm again. Sticking to 65:35 knsu with 1% iron oxide? How thick should the plug and nozzle be?

Thanks again for the replies these probably seem like stupid questions to you. Being in uk there's not much help for amateur rocketry that I've found. Cheers.