Landracing Forum
Tech Information => Technical Discussion => Topic started by: racer x on July 15, 2008, 10:03:11 PM
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I saw a old gas station sign from the late fifty's early sixty's it read
" premium special $ .29c
Alcohol $1.00
Nitro $ 5.00
Hydrazine $ 25.00 "
What is Hydrazine . I know it is like Ammonia . Did people put it in the gas to make it have higher octane or something? Just wondering .
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Rocket fuel, extremely corrosive stuff. Very volatile as a motor fuel, too. Makes nitro blower explosions look like backyard fireworks as compared to small artillery.
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hyrazine is a oxygen scavenger,used in steam power plants and rocket fuel,and race cars,can become pressure senitive when mixed with nitro,and has been known to explode after engine shut down,very corrosive and known carcinigen
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For your own saftey don't even think about it. Before NHRA banned its use there were some horiffic explosions. I was told it would become unstable if it sat too long in the fuel tank, of a nitro dragster.
Tom G.
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I believe (Sort of...) that Art Chrisman used it in a Top Fueler to be the first to break 200 mph back in the late 60's. It could of been somebody else, but.... I remember reading about it in Hot Rod.
Smitty
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitromethane
Hydrazine sensitizes nitromethane, making the nitro more prone to going off.
Hydrazine is not corrosive. However, if splashed on bare skin it can be absorbed into the bloodstream where it attacks the liver.
Hydrazine hot gas generators power the turbines that drive the hydraulic pumps on the shuttle. Hydrazine monopropellant rocket motors are the standard attitude control system in satellites.
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Chris Karamasines's "Chizler" ran 204 in 1960.
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Hydrazine in combination with nitromethane brings an extra kick.
Anhydrous hydrazine (N2H4) brings four hydrogen atoms, that with nitromethane (CH3NO2) with two oxygen molecules that gives more bang then nitro alone. The two together combine with the oxygen in the cylinder much more efficiently than nitromethane alone.
Hydrazine is a rocket fuel all by itself!
The highly toxic properties are enough to ban it on its own. The Shuttle APU's engines use it and after the shuttle lands they wait about 20 minutes before approaching to wait for it to dissipate.
When mixed with nitromethane and allowed to sit for about a week creates an explosive salt that is a Class A explosive more sensitive than nitroglycerin.
Banned for good reason!
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The shuttle's Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) and Reaction Control System (RCS) rocket motors burn monomethyl hydrazine (MMH) and nitrogen tetroxide. Nitrogen tetroxide fumes are heavier than air (not good if there's a leak and you're standing under the shuttle). Nitrogen tetroxide also boils at room temperature if not kept under pressure and forms strong acids when exposed to moisture.
About a 30% mix of hydrazine hydrate in alcohol makes it hypergolic with hydrogen peroxide. This was the basis for the Walter motors used in the Messerschmidt 163B rocket fighters.
The rocket dragster that Breedlove ran on some nonNHRA tracks in the early seventies used a motor burning nitrogen tetroxide and unsymmetrical dimethyl hydrazine (UDMH), derived from the design of the lunar module descent motor developed by TRW.
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Hydrazine is not corrosive.
Not corrosive, eh?
I remember reading that racers who opened their fuel tanks after using hydrazine found that the internal surface looked "like it was coated with powdered laundry soap."
So, yeah - it's corrosive.
And, yes - it was Karamesines who ran the first 200MPH pass using hydrazine in the tank. NHRA disallowed the "record". I remember a "Hot Rod" magazine article showing someone's blower launched into orbit when the motor sneezed on a load of "H".
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Hydrazine is not corrosive.
Not corrosive, eh?
I remember reading that racers who opened their fuel tanks after using hydrazine found that the internal surface looked "like it was coated with powdered laundry soap."
So, yeah - it's corrosive.
And, yes - it was Karamesines who ran the first 200MPH pass using hydrazine in the tank. NHRA disallowed the "record". I remember a "Hot Rod" magazine article showing someone's blower launched into orbit when the motor sneezed on a load of "H".
Hydrazine is used in many other applications as a corrosion inhibitor.
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Wow
Thank you all for the history lesson and information. It sounded like good stuff. From the good old days .
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In the mid 60's, Ray Capps put his right cylinder head (426 Hemi) into the Green Valley grand stands, useing hydrozine and nitro, in the "Head hunter funny car". Very bad stuff.
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I love the hydrazine stories. Crazy stuff!!
40 some years ago when I was a test engineer working on the Thiokol Dynastar diesel engine project at the Lake Denmark, NJ, Reaction Motors test site. I heard the story of a tech who accidentally spilled hydrazine on his pants. They (the pants) disappeared in a flash of flame. Luckily he got away with some minor 1st degree burns and a story to tell. The Reaction Motors crew there were some pretty bright sorts. I thinks that's why they had a pretty good safety record in spite of the hazards.
We test engineers on the diesel engine project had our office in a construction trailer some 75 feet from one of the rocket motor test cells. About once a day they'd fire one of those things off and the walls of the trailer next to my desk would deflect in about half an inch.
That actually was a real fun job.......I was real sorry that it only lasted a year.
Ed Weldon
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Hydrazine is used in many other applications as a corrosion inhibitor.
That may be true, Franklin - but according to the MSDS sheet for Hydrazine it is described as corrosive. OK?
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Hydrazine is used in many other applications as a corrosion inhibitor.
That may be true, Franklin - but according to the MSDS sheet for Hydrazine it is desribed as corrosive. OK?
Check out the Wikipedia article on hydrazine and scroll down to the Reducing Agent paragraph. There you'll see reference to its use as a corrosion inhibitor in boiler water. Follow the link and you'll see further discussion of the subject including reference to that one application and the reason why it is being replaced in that use by Vitamin C (HUH??) which like hydrazine is an oxygen scavenger.
And to any of you amateur chemists out there.......... contact with a mixture of nitromethane and ascorbic acid or the resulting fumes at any measurable concentration will cause permanent male impotence (LOL) Could this one make its way onto the Snopes list?
Ed Weldon
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One change I would make in the Wikipedia article on hydrazine is in its reference to hydrazine as a "low power monopropellant." There are no high power monopropellants because sooner or later even the best candidates, such as diisopropylammonium nitrate crystals dissolved in nitric acid, turned out to be liquid explosives.
While we're on the subject of Wikipedia, check out the article on the bombardier beatle.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardier_beatle
It's got a naturally occurring hydrogen peroxide rocket motor in its butt.
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In the Hotrod Yearbook of 1967? they called it "This fools fuel is liquid dynamite". It think they meant that after it has stopped giving of smoke or fumes it needed only a small bump to set off a big explosion. :evil: Maybe I could still make a reasonable copy of the article and snail mail it to you if you want to blow up your vehicle. :-o
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Title:Water gel explosives Document
Type and Number:United States Patent 4008110
Abstract:A method for producing water gel explosives by stabilizing a dispersion of nitroparaffin, preferably nitromethane, in an aqueous oxidizer salt solution through the simultaneous in situ gelation of the nitromethane dispersed phase and the continuous external aqueous phase, and the product so produced.
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Howdy All, :-D
For clarification on the subject of Hydrazine: The dangerous part of mixing Hydrazine with Nitromethane is that it only takes about 1% Hydrazine mixed with any Nitromethane and Methanol mixture to produce an unstable salt residue that is a Class A explosive. Don't mess with it as it is illegal to use as a fuel additive and it is dangerous (very dangerous) and is so unstable (the salt residue) that any movement can set it off! :-o :roll:
Now that is straight talk from someone that was once braver than the Lone Ranger (or dumber than dirt) in playing with various chemicals to burn in an internal combustion engine. Or the devil made me do it! :evil: 8-)
Take care.
Regards to All,
HB2 :-)
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As previously mentioned hydrazine is a monoprop and its favorite use is for thrusters in space. Since that environment lacks O2 (unless provided) you might wonder what causes a hydrazine thruster reaction. Carrying along O2 and all the associated plumbing is heavy and a very poor design. Hydrazine disassociates in the presence of a catalyst. The N2H4 is pumped through a catalyst bed and an instant reaction takes place. The reaction will turn the inconnel throat and the stainless bell on a thruster red hot. All of the precautions mentioned above should be headed. However, pure N2H4 is fairly easy to handle and store. The problem is that impurities (at ppb values) react in such a way as to make it problematic. If you are educated about it, careful, use the right materials, and practice clean housekeeping, it is quite safe to work with. The last time I bought a 55 gallon drum for my company from the air force (1998) it cost $15,000. It would probably cost $35,000 today. It was shipped in a common 18 wheeler (not an air-ride van) from Texas to California. That is not a smooth ride. Diluted hydrazine is used to clean the hard water deposits out of boilers. While it will attack aluminum, we used pure MMH in an anodized 7075 aluminum system with great success. However, each run was instantly flushed and dried with dry nitrogen. A monoprop reaction on earth is environmentally friendly and the byproducts are O2 and steam.
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Too bad monoprop grade hydrazine is horrifically expensive, other it'd make a great propellant either for a rocket land speed car or a hot gas generator turbine car.
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Too bad monoprop grade hydrazine is horrifically expensive, other it'd make a great propellant either for a rocket land speed car or a hot gas generator turbine car.
What does expensive have to do with it?
Material Safety Data Sheet
Hydrazine MSDS
Potential Acute Health Effects:
Very hazardous in case of skin contact (irritant), of ingestion. Hazardous in case of skin contact (corrosive), of
eye contact (irritant), of inhalation. Slightly hazardous in case of skin contact (permeator). Liquid or spray mist
may produce tissue damage particularly on mucous membranes of eyes, mouth and respiratory tract. Skin
contact may produce burns. Inhalation of the spray mist may produce severe irritation of respiratory tract,
characterized by coughing, choking, or shortness of breath. Severe over-exposure can result in death.
Potential Chronic Health Effects:
Hazardous in case of skin contact (permeator).
CARCINOGENIC EFFECTS: Classified + (PROVEN) by OSHA. Classified 2B (Possible for human.) by IARC.
Classified A2 (Suspected for human.) by ACGIH, 2 (Reasonably anticipated.) by NTP.
MUTAGENIC EFFECTS: Not available.
TERATOGENIC EFFECTS: Not available.
DEVELOPMENTAL TOXICITY: Not available.
The substance is toxic to blood, kidneys, lungs, the nervous system, mucous membranes.
Repeated or prolonged exposure to the substance can produce target organs damage. Repeated or prolonged
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Hydrazine is a corrosion inhibitor in steam plants only. You can't coat your undercarriage with it or anything. It scavenges dissolved oxygen from the steam plant water, minimizing the potential for general corrosion. I could look up the formula here at work, but I'm too lazy, and it isn't like you have a steam plant in your back yard or anything.
Rick A Cone
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IIRC, hydrazine was the reason the Me 163 Komet killed more Germans than Americans.
But I think it is used actively in the F-16 Falcon as fuel for the EPU (Emergenccy Power Unit). Since the F-16 has only one jet engine and the glide slope of a rock, they need to turn the engine into a rocket engine in case it flames out and can't restart.
Could be wrong.
Anyhow, hydrogen peroxide is a better and safer monopropellant. Spray it on a platinum mesh and go to town.
I often wondered what would happen with a water injection system full of hydrogen peroxide, but was too chicken to find out.
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Before hydrazine, we played around with Tetra-nitromethane, but that to was band'd. Tetra was nitro X 3. Pitrick acid before that. The entire fuel system had to be plated when you ran it. The good ole days!!!!!
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Is there a chemist in the house?
If it's related to anhydrous ammonia, it's corrosiveness might be determined by what it comes in contact with.
Here in the midwest, it's not unusual (although less common today) to use an LP tank to store Anhydrous during the planting season. The problem is, Anhydrous will corrode brass and rubber gaskets, whereas a tank with stainless fittings is okay.
If that also applies to Hydrazine, a derivative of Ammonia, perhaps that explains the question as to whether or not it is corrosive? What will it react with?
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I am enjoying this thread immensely. But I had to laugh. I thought hydrazine was the active ingredient in moth balls .
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That would be benzine
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And yes, benzine works as a fuel too! Great additive for methanol. Ah, greater living through chemistry.
Oh yeah! It's a toxic carcinogen too. I wondered where all those brain cells went! :-o
The space shuttle thrusters were mentioned that use monomethyl hydrazine, and nitrogen tetroxide as a hypergolic propellant. The injector plate is about 6 inches in diameter and has several hundred holes about 0.012 diameter. Drilling the holes took 4 days on a CNC that had a really small peck drill cycle. The plate is made of Niobium. Niobium bonds with just about anything and everything and has a 24 step refining process. The shuttle has 38 Primary Reaction Control System (PRCS) thrusters and the nozzle on every one has a different profile to fit the outer skin. There are 6 smaller vernier thrusters for a total of 44. Hint: I worked for the company that made them.
Niobium (columbium) is a real bitch to work with. It was discovered the hard way that if you touched it, it cracked at the touch point when it was welded. Welded with an electron beam welder in a vacuum.
The Marquardt Company made thrusters for just about every satellite and the lunar lander. All of them had a life span measured in seconds. The lunar lander thruster had a rated life of 10 seconds. When the shuttle came along it had a maximum 150 seconds of burn PER misssion. The original specification called for 100 flights with no maintenance. That sure went out the window in a hurry.
The original delivery schedule for the shuttle was hung up on the thruster delivery. Fortunately the main engine took over as the long lead item, then the thermal tile problems took the "heat" off of us.
The shuttle was the first flight vehicle that was reverse speed tested. Other than the really slow drop tests that were more landing tests than anything else, the first flight was from mach 22 to zero! The thrusters are used until the atmosphere is reached and the thrusters start trading off with the flight surfaces.
(http://www.nasa.gov/centers/wstf/images/content/202993main_wstf0878-1091.jpg)(http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/RT/2005/images/RX06-mackay-f1.jpg)
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IIRC, hydrazine was the reason the Me 163 Komet killed more Germans than Americans.
But I think it is used actively in the F-16 Falcon as fuel for the EPU (Emergenccy Power Unit). Since the F-16 has only one jet engine and the glide slope of a rock, they need to turn the engine into a rocket engine in case it flames out and can't restart.
Could be wrong.
Anyhow, hydrogen peroxide is a better and safer monopropellant. Spray it on a platinum mesh and go to town.
I often wondered what would happen with a water injection system full of hydrogen peroxide, but was too chicken to find out.
The 163B Komet used hydrogen peroxide as the oxidizer and alcohol/hydrazine hydrate as the fuel. Hydrogen peroxide does not react to bullets. Or, to be more specific, it reacts great with the lead in bullets. Also the propellant combination used in the Komet is hypergolic, so if the propellants come into contact with each other outside the rocket motor that is also bad.
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Too bad monoprop grade hydrazine is horrifically expensive, other it'd make a great propellant either for a rocket land speed car or a hot gas generator turbine car.
What does expensive have to do with it?
Material Safety Data Sheet
Hydrazine MSDS
Potential Acute Health Effects:
Very hazardous in case of skin contact (irritant), of ingestion. Hazardous in case of skin contact (corrosive), of
eye contact (irritant), of inhalation. Slightly hazardous in case of skin contact (permeator). Liquid or spray mist
may produce tissue damage particularly on mucous membranes of eyes, mouth and respiratory tract. Skin
contact may produce burns. Inhalation of the spray mist may produce severe irritation of respiratory tract,
characterized by coughing, choking, or shortness of breath. Severe over-exposure can result in death.
Potential Chronic Health Effects:
Hazardous in case of skin contact (permeator).
CARCINOGENIC EFFECTS: Classified + (PROVEN) by OSHA. Classified 2B (Possible for human.) by IARC.
Classified A2 (Suspected for human.) by ACGIH, 2 (Reasonably anticipated.) by NTP.
MUTAGENIC EFFECTS: Not available.
TERATOGENIC EFFECTS: Not available.
DEVELOPMENTAL TOXICITY: Not available.
The substance is toxic to blood, kidneys, lungs, the nervous system, mucous membranes.
Repeated or prolonged exposure to the substance can produce target organs damage. Repeated or prolonged
Based on its MSDS, people wouldn't want to run gasolene either. Below is the website for the Walter rocket motors used in the Komet and other WWII aircraft. These were the first fully throttleable rocket motors.
http://www.walter-rockets.i12.com/
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Hey Ratliff, so I suppose that 10,000 lb bombs are as safe to use as firecrackers.
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Hydrazine is used in many other applications as a corrosion inhibitor.
That may be true, Franklin - but according to the MSDS sheet for Hydrazine it is desribed as corrosive. OK?
Check out the Wikipedia article on hydrazine and scroll down to the Reducing Agent paragraph. There you'll see reference to its use as a corrosion inhibitor in boiler water. Follow the link and you'll see further discussion of the subject including reference to that one application and the reason why it is being replaced in that use by Vitamin C (HUH??) which like hydrazine is an oxygen scavenger.
And to any of you amateur chemists out there.......... contact with a mixture of nitromethane and ascorbic acid or the resulting fumes at any measurable concentration will cause permanent male impotence (LOL) Could this one make its way onto the Snopes list?
Ed Weldon
NOW you tell us not to be chewin on vitamin c when Leggit is warming up!
JL222