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Fuels in KSP


KingDominoIII

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I found this sort-of important when trying to make alternative propulsion part mods, so the performance is at least close to stock performance. Ended up treating liquid fuel like an RP-1 / kerosene variant, useable in jet engines and rockets, but that was only so I could get high heat and low heat values.

Basing liquid fuel off hydrogen and comparing its HHV/LHV to "explodium" or ethane, created ethane-breathing engines that might have had realistically poor efficiency, but were horrible for gameplay. Basing it off RP-1 and comparing that to ethane still made for less efficient ethane-breathing engines, but not gameplay-breaking.

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Oxidizer could very well be Liquid Oxygen, although im not 100% sure about that.

Liquid Fuel is even more confusing, since rocket engines obviously based on Hydrolox rockets, and rocket engines obviously based on Kerolox rockets, both use the same fuel. Liquid fuel must be some exotic fuel only found in the Kerbol System. I think this fuel can be stored under lower temperatures to increase the Isp, but is still liquid in room temperature.

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On 4/6/2018 at 7:56 AM, KingDominoIII said:

Share your theories on what liquid fuel, oxidizer, and monopropellant actually are.

 

The ISRU instructions mention hydrogen and oxygen.  That's the one and only in game word on the constituents of fuel, I think, so I'll take it.  It covers everything anyway.  Hydrogen fuel, oxygen oxidizer.  Monopropellant?  Hydrogen peroxide.

How well do jet engines run on hydrogen?  Probably a bit hot and explodey.  Do not smoke around the planes.  DO NOT.

Edited by Corona688
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16 minutes ago, Corona688 said:

 

The ISRU instructions mention hydrogen and oxygen.  That's the one and only in game word on the constituents of fuel, I think, so I'll take it.  It covers everything anyway.  Hydrogen fuel, oxygen oxidizer.  Monopropellant?  Hydrogen peroxide.

How well do jet engines run on hydrogen?  Probably a bit hot and explodey.  Do not smoke around the planes.  DO NOT.

The Russians converted an airliner to run an engine off one, search for "cryoplane".   Jet engines can run off any combustible fluid,  I've seen some youtube videos from a Canadian guy who refurbishes old jets for use as ground power plants, if you want to run off  Natural Gas,  Gasoline, Kerosene, Diesel or even waste vegetable oil  (how good would that smell)  you just change the fuel injector nozzles to account for the viscosity of what you're injecting and that the engine gets the right amount of fuel.

Certainly less involved than converting in internal combustion engine to run off a different fuel - lower octane ratio, would have to put a spacer between engine block and cylinder head to lower compression ratio, something with  higher boiling point than gasoline? would need to worry about your carburettor failing to vapourize the fuel etc.

Biggest problem with liquid fuel being hydrogen,  is that you'd never get a worthwhile amount in big s wings and strakes like you can in game.      Also with that huge surface area to volume ratio, boil off rates would be insane.     also ,  ice forming on wings of aircraft is generally considered a bad thing,  so filling the wings with cryo propellant probably not smart,

 

 

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