Galcit

J.E. Shepherd, http //www.galcit.caltech.edu/detn db/ html/db.html, 2005. 

Potassium perchlorate (KP KCIO4) is a weU-known oxidizer, used as an oxidizer component of black powder. Since KP produces potassium oxides and condensed products, the high molecular mass Mg of the combustion products is not favorable for its use as an oxidizer in rocket propellants. A mixture of 75 % KP with 25 % asphalt pitch was used as a rocket propellant named Galcit, which was the original prototype of a composite propellant in the 1940 s. Potassium chlorate (KCIO3) is also a crystalline oxidizer, and although it has a lower oxygen content compared... 

Galcits were heterogeneous mixts contg ca. 25% of asphalt oil fuels and ca 75% of perchlorate oxidizers. Their specific impulse (I ) w s ca 185 secs vs 200 for Ballistite... 

The forerunner of the rocket propellant containing perchlorates as oxidants was the American product, Galcit, developed in the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) of the Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory, at the California Institute of Technology. It consisted of asphalt as a fuel and potassium perchlorate as an oxidant, mixed hot. Originally the material was hot-pressed into rockets. However, at high pressures the flame penetrated between the charge and the walls... 

FSB Field Selection Board galcit Guggenheim Aeronautical Lab-... 

Caltech Explosion Dynamics Laboratory—Thermodynamic Data, www.galcit-caltech. edu/EDL/public/thermo. html, 2002. 

Galcit. See under Asphalt-Perchlorate Castable Propellants A497-L... 

Galcit = solid rocket propellant consisting of KMn04 and asphalt pitch (now obsolete) (USA) galerie d essai = test gallery 249 galette = paste (for double base powders) 244 galvanometre 58... 

A mixture of 75%KCI04 and 25% asphalt pitch, melted together under the name of Galcit, was used as a rocket propellant and was thus a precursor of the modern - Composite Propellants, in which ammonium perchlorate, in the capacity of the oxidizer, is embedded in a plastic material and acts like an oxidizer. 

Galcit(Abbr for Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory, California Institute of Technology). A brief description was given in Vol 1 of Encycl, p A497-R under Asphalt-Perchlorate Castable Propellants. The following may be added ... 

Some castable composite proplnts developed in USA during and after WTII are described in Ref 1, pp 101-02 Ref 8, pp 114-16 Ref 16, pp 336-37. Following are typical compns a)Asphalt potassiuTn perchlorate propellants, The earliest of these were Calcits (spelled Galcits in Ref 1, p 101), developed in early 1940 s at California Institute of Technology in association with Aerojet-General Corp (Ref 1, p 101 Ref S, p 113). The Calcit 53 consisted of K perchlorate 75 asphalt (contg a little oil) 25%. It could be fired at temps +40 +100°F (Ref 8, pp 113-14)... 

Browne S, Ziegler J, Shepherd JE (2008) Numerical solution methods for shock and detonation jump conditions, aeronautics and mechanical engineering. California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, GALCIT Report FM2006-006, Feb 2008... 

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