Hypergolic propellant

A hypergolic propellant combination used in a rocket engine is one whose components spontaneously ignite when they come into contact with each other.

The two propellant components usually consist of a fuel and an oxidizer. Although commonly used hypergolic propellants are difficult to handle because of their extreme toxicity and/or corrosiveness, they can be stored as liquids at room temperature and hypergolic engines are easy to ignite reliably and repeatedly.

In contemporary usage, the terms "hypergol" or "hypergolic propellant" usually mean the most common such propellant combination, dinitrogen tetroxide plus hydrazine and/or its relatives monomethylhydrazine and unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine.

Soviet rocket engine researcher Valentin Glushko experimented with hypergolic fuel as early as 1931. It was initially used for "chemical ignition" of engines, starting kerosene/nitric acid engines with an initial charge of phosphorus dissolved in carbon disulfide.

Starting in 1935, Prof. O. Lutz of the German Aeronautical Institute experimented with over 1000 self-igniting propellants. He assisted the Walter Company with the development of C-Stoff which ignited with concentrated hydrogen peroxide. BMW developed engines burning a hypergolic mix of nitric acid with various combinations of amines, xylidines and anilines.

Hypergolic propellants were discovered independently, for the third time, in the U.S. by GALCIT and Navy Annapolis researchers in 1940. They developed engines powered by aniline and nitric acid.Robert Goddard, Reaction Motors and Curtiss-Wright worked on aniline/nitric acid engines in the early 1940s, for small missiles and jet assisted take-off (JATO).

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