AIAA 2013-3989

Joint Propulsion Conferences

July 14 - 17, 2013, San Jose, CA
49th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference

Development of Mono/Bi-Propellant Propulsion System for

Microsatellites and Planning of Space Demonstration

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Shutaro Nishikizawa 1 Takehiro Ohira1 and Hironori Sahara 2

Tokyo Metropolitan University 6-6, Asahigaoka, Hino, Tokyo, 191-0065, Japan

We have been developing a propulsion system for microsatellites based on 60 wt%

hydrogen peroxide solution because of its little toxicity, low cost, and handling properties
compared to the conventional propulsion system. Thus, we completed a mono-propellant
propulsion system for microsatellite with the policies of SAFTY FIRST and EFFECTIVE
COTS. Now we are planning to demonstrate our propulsion systems in a Japanese
microsatellite, Hodoyoshi-1, and the others, which aim to execute their phase shift in orbit,
formation flight, constellation, and end-of-life de-orbiting. These propulsion systems have a
different-sized mono-propellant thruster with 500 mN of thrust and at least 80 seconds of
specific impulse. We have already developed these engineering and flight models and carried
out these performance tests and environment tests such as vibration test for launch,
temperature test, and combination to equipment in the satellites. And now we are also
developing a bi-propellant propulsion system for microsatellite, based on the achievement of
mono-propellant propulsion system. Our propulsion system and the concerning technologies
will lead to establish a way to form an on-orbit constellation with plural microsatellites for
some earth observation mission in the future, and ushers in a new trend in space utilization
with microsatellites. In this paper, we present the results of performance test of monopropellant propulsion system and about a plan of space demonstration.

Nomenclature
CS
S
CG
CL
T
M

=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=

Mach number of mixed flow, m/s

Density of mixed flow, g/m3
Mach number of mixed gas, m/s
Mach number of mixed liquid, m/s
Ratio of specific heat of mixed gas
Boiling point of water, K
Molecular weight of mixed liquid, g/mol
Bulk modulus of mixed liquid
void fraction

I. Introduction

HE development of under-50kg-class microsatellites is recently increasing and its new usage also has been
considered at universities and non-governmental associations. The propulsion system for microsatellites tends to
be eagerly desired for their missions with orbit transfer such as formation flight, constellation, and end-of-life deorbiting. We considered that chemical propulsion is very suitable for propulsion system of the microsatellites due to
its high thrust density and little power consumption. Practicable propulsion system for microsatellites, however,
does not exist so far while the conventional propulsion is awfully expensive due to its unique and identifiable
product characteristics developed by proper specialists with quite high reliability. Moreover, hydrazine is
conventionally treated as the most principal propellant for chemical propulsion, but the developers of microsatellites
are required to handle it under special treatments with particular equipment such as hazmat suit and gas mask

1
2

Graduate student, Department of Aerospace Engineering, 6-6, Hino, Tokyo, AIAA Member.
Associate Professor, Department of Aerospace Engineering, 6-6, Hino, Tokyo, AIAA Member.
1
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Copyright 2013 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights reserved.

because of its high toxicity, so that it is too difficult to handle a hydrazine thruster in the universities and nongovernmental associations.
Accordingly, we have been developing a propulsion system for microsatellites based on hydrogen peroxide
solution because of its little toxicity, low cost, and handling properties compared to the conventional propulsion
system. Thus, we completed a mono-propellant propulsion system for microsatellites with the policies of SAFTY
FIRST and EFFECTIVE COTS. Now we are planning to demonstrate our propulsion system in a Japanese
microsatellite, Hodoyoshi-1, to execute its phase shift in orbit. The propulsion system has a mono-propellant thruster
with 500 mN of thrust and 80 seconds of specific impulse. And we are also developing a bi-propellant propulsion
system for microsatellite, based on the achievement of mono-propellant propulsion system. In this paper, we present
the mono-propellant propulsion system and result of its efficiency test and our concept of bi-propellant propulsion
system.

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II. Propellant
We considered that hydrogen peroxide is suitable for propulsion system of the microsatellites. The hydrogen
peroxide was strenuously researched as propellant in rocket application before 1970, which has high concentration
from of 70 to 99wt%. However, it is rare to use the high-concentration hydrogen peroxide after 1970 due to the
difficulty to handle and store it. In the case of
such a high-concentration hydrogen peroxide,
heat of decomposition is quite larger than that
of its vaporization (Fig.1), so that its
decomposition is accelerated to explode
storage tank once a little decomposition
started. That is why we chose the hydrogen
peroxide with concentration of up to 60wt%
because its heat of decomposition is lower
than that of its vaporization and sufficient
stabilizer are contained in it to control its selfdecomposition. In addition, there is an
advantage that it is easy to purchase the upto-60wt% hydrogen peroxide as a COTS
Figure 1. Heat of Decomposition/Vaporization (h2o2.com).
product.
And we selected dimethyl ether (DME) as
fuel for bi-propellant propulsion system because it is environmentally-friendly fuel with good handleability. DME
has 6.1 atm of vapor pressure at 25 degC., wide explosive range, and high cetane number compared with the other
fuels as shown in Table 1. Especially, the vapor pressure is very suitable for a thruster with combustion pressure of 4
atm designed. Applying the vapor pressure to self pressurization in feed system makes gas-pressured tank be
omissible to reduce mass and volume of propulsion system and realizes to apply a COTS valve of withstanding
pressure up to 1MPa. Additionally DME is easy to ignite and its combustion generates little emissions of particulate
matter to reduce possibility to stuck nozzle by particle.

Table 1. Properties of DME and the other fuels.

Chemical Formula
Boiling Point, degC.
Liquid Density, g/cm3
Gas Specific Gravity
Vapor Pressure, MPa
Explosive Range, %
Cetane Number
(kJ/Nm3)
LHV
(kJ/kg)

DME
CH3OCH3
-25
0.67
1.59
0.61
3.4-27
55-60
59,400
28,900

Propane
C3H8
-42
0.49
1.52
0.94
2.1-9.5
5
91,300
46,500

Methane
CH4
-161.5
0.55
24.9
5.0-15.0
0
36,000
50,200

Methanol
CH3OH
64.6
0.79

180-370
0.84

5.5-36.0
5

0.6-6.5
40-55

20,100

41,900

2
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

LGO

III. Catalyst
This propulsion system needs a catalyst to decompose H 2 O 2 to generate oxygen and water vapor. In catalyst
selection, we conducted a decomposition test with many kinds of catalysts. As the result, we found that TANAKA1/2 and S-405 and KC-12-GA are extremely-good catalysts for our propulsion. In this paper, we used only
TANAKA-1; this catalyst has the highest performance among the four. Specifications of each catalyst are shows in
Table 2.
Table 2. Specification of catalysts
Catalyst

TANAKA-1

TANAKA-2

S-405

KC-12-GA

Structure

Metal-honeycomb

Metal-honeycomb

Particle

Particle

Material

Platinum-based

Palladium-based

Iridium-based

Iridium-based

Particle Size

#14-18

#25-30

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Photo

IV. Feed System

The typical feed system in propulsion consists of propellant line and pressuring line. However, it is difficult to
adopt the feed system to microsatellite because it has too many elements to install them into small volume of
microsatellite. So we introduced blow down system which had feed system equipped with tanks installing respective
bladders pressured by pressurant gas, a set of electromagnetic valves, and other elements as shown in Fig. 2. When
electromagnetic valves open, the bladders pressurized by the gas pressure supply hydrogen peroxide to the thruster,
then, hydrogen peroxide is decomposed with a catalyst there to generate high-temperature vapor and oxygen gas.
There has a high-temperature mixture of vapor, water
liquid droplet, and oxygen gas, which is injected from
a nozzle to generate thrust. We already evaluated its
performance in injection tests on ground and in
vacuum, and are planning to conduct the detailed
vacuum test and mechanical environment test such as
vibration test for its launch. In this way, we succeeded
to reduce the number of elements again compared to
the typical feed system in propulsion.
On the other hand, our consept of the feed system
of bi-propellant propulsion system has Oxider-tanks,
an Fuel-tank, and Gas-Liene. We propose to omit the
G-Line by utilizing vapor pressure of DME instead,
eventually.
Figure 2. Feed system in propulsion.

V. Design of Catalyst Bed

We designed a catalyst bed due to realize a mono-propellant thruster with 500 mN of thrust and 80 seconds of
specific impulse. The thruster obtains a thrust by heat of decomposition of 60wt% hydrogen peroxide by a catalyst
of platinum. Thermochemical equation of hydrogen peroxide is followed by
H 2 O2 = H 2 O +

1
O2 + 96140[J ]
2

(1)

To design a catalyst bed, its volume was determined by calculating the mass flow rate, as may be required. In
addition, oxygen and water are generated after the decomposition of hydrogen peroxide. So the mixed flow consists

3
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

of oxygen, water, and hydrogen peroxide without being decomposed. We calculated Mach number of this mixed
flow by using the void fraction of the mixed flow.
VG
=
(2)
(VG + VL )
CS =

1
1

+
S
2
2
L C L G CG

S = (1 ) L + G
CG =

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CL =

(3)

(4)

RGT
M

(5)

(6)

We calculated the catalyst bed volume from Mach number of the mixed flow, specific impulse, and thrust
obtained. For the outline of the catalyst had already been decided, we decided the catalyst bed from the inner
diameter and length of catalyst. The catalyst bed and tanks are shown in Fig. 3 and Fig. 4.

Figure 3. Catalyst Bed and Nozzle.

Figure 4. Tanks and feed system.

VI. Injection Test

We have been conducting the injection tests and
measurements of performance of the propulsion system we
designed. Propellant tank were pressured at 5 atm with
pressured nitrogen gas to maintain the test condition at a
constant. We used the feed system of blow down system to
provide hydrogen peroxide to the thruster as propellant, and
measured pressure, temperature and mass flow rate at the
respective positions with sampling rate of 10 Hz. An
electromagnetic valve was operated by PWM control with
the cycle of 200 ms and the variable open duty ratio of
20~100 % (every 20%) to control the mass flow rate of
hydrogen peroxide. The result of mass flow rate is shown in
Figure 5. Results of Mass flow rate.
Fig.5. And the example of results of performance test (duty
ratio 80%) is shown in Fig. 6. In estimation of thrust
performances, we supposed specific heat ratio, C* efficiency and nozzle efficiency as 1.3, 0.9, and 0.8, respectively,
as shown in Table 2.
4
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Table 2. The Result of Injection Test of MonoPropellant.

Duty ratio[%]
20
40
60
80

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100

Thrust [mN]

3460.01
4090.02
4100.02
4670.02
4910.02

[s]

82.33.4
88.83.3
92.83.6
89.33.0
88.22.8

Figure 6. Result of pressure and temperature.

VII. Consideration
In the result of injection tests of the mono-propellant propulsion system, its thrust became large relatively as the
duty ratio grew. When the duty ratio is 100%, its thrust was approximately 500 mN. And specific impulse always
achieved over 80 sec. These indicate that propulsion performance becomes the best when the duty ratio becomes the
highest in the mono-propellant system. And when the duty ratio is 60%, its mass flow rate is slightly low. This
reason we thought is the catalyst is slightly blocked. However it is solved by continuing injection.

VIII. Conclusions
It is one of the urgent issues to develop a suitable propulsion system for microsatellite. We had started to develop
such a propulsion system since 2004, and completed it based on the SAFETY FIRST POLICY and EFFECTIVE
COTS at once, by the beginning of 2008. We have been improving the propulsion system since then, and we have
been using hydrogen peroxide with a concentration of 60wt% for propellant as ever for safety and handleability.
And we introduced blow down system which had a feed system equipped with tanks installing respective bladders.
So we succeeded to reduce mass and volume of propulsion system. In the result of injection tests, we obtained thrust
of approximately 500 mN with the specific impulse of over 80 sec in the mono-propellant. Our propulsion system
and the concerning technologies will lead to establish a way to form an on-orbit constellation with plural
microsatellites for some earth observation mission in the future, and to produce in a new trend in space utilization
with microsatellites.

Acknowledgments
This research is granted by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) through the "Funding Program
for World-Leading Innovative R&D on Science and Technology (FIRST Program)," initiated by the Council for
Science and Technology Policy (CSTP).

References
1

Suzuki, N. and Sahara, H.: Generalized Mono-/Bi-Propellant Propulsion System for Microsatellite Based on Non-Toxic
Propellant Technology, Proc. 46th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, 2010, AIAA2010-6805.
2
Suzuki, N. and Sahara, H.: Ignition Test of Bi-Propellant Propulsion System Based on Green Propellants for Microsatellite,
Proc. 47th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, AIAA, 2011-6805.
3
Sutton, G. P. and Biblarz, O.: Rocket Propulsion Elements, 7th ed. Willey-Interscience, New York, (2000), pp 253.
4
H2O2.com, http://h2o2.com/ [cited 15 July 2011]
5
Shutaro, N., Sahara, H., Naoki, M., and Yusuke K.: Development of Mono-Propellant Propulsion System for A Japanese
Microsatellite Hodoyoshi-1, Proc. 46th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit, 2012, AIAA20123757.

5
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics