dantiberian Posted August 19, 2006 Posted August 19, 2006 Hi i am wondering how to granulate sugar to it's smallest size. I am guessing that you saturate it with water and then boil it dry. I looked on the forum for this but couldn't find anything
Pyrohawk Posted August 19, 2006 Posted August 19, 2006 Uhhh....why would you want to do that exactly?? If you put water in it and tried to dry it chances are that it will melt and start to burn. So may I ask what the point of this is? Then maybe I could come up with a more helpful bit of advice!
rocket Posted August 19, 2006 Posted August 19, 2006 The only reason I can think of is for rocket propellant wait there is one other but I wont go there. If you where to boil it down it I would think as the water evaporated the sugar would melt turning in to like caramel then as Pyrohawk said it would burn. The best way would be to throw the sugar in a coffee grinder.
ActionTekJackson Posted August 19, 2006 Posted August 19, 2006 The previous posts are the most likely outcome, if you were to slowly steam off the water all you'd really accomplish is recrystalizing the sugar which would likely form larger crystals than you started with. Just go buy powdered sugar, or do like Rocket suggested, use a coffe grinder. lol, random thought, melt sugar rocket mix, and run it in a cotton candy machine be.... interesting.
al93535 Posted August 19, 2006 Posted August 19, 2006 Why not just mill the sugar to a super fine powder? Or if you don't want it flour fine, use a coffee grinder. But I think the fastest and easiest way is to buy powdered sugar!
TheSidewinder Posted August 21, 2006 Posted August 21, 2006 "Powdered Sugar" (at least here in the US) isn't all sugar. There's quite a lot of other stuff in it to keep it powdered and free-flowing. Not sure what, might be cornstarch flour. I'm not sure of the percentage of non-sugar additives. I think Al's right in that your best bet is to mill it or use a coffee grinder. M
optimus Posted August 21, 2006 Posted August 21, 2006 lol, random thought, melt sugar rocket mix, and run it in a cotton candy machine be.... interesting. I have one of those in my garage. That sounds like a fun project for a rainy afternoon : )
Douchermann Posted August 21, 2006 Posted August 21, 2006 If you mill it, it'll stick to your ball mill and milling media. I've experienced this first hand. It wasn't exactly and inconvienience since water will wash it out, but much of the superfine power was lost due to this.
brainfever Posted August 21, 2006 Posted August 21, 2006 That was probably because your sugar was not perfectly dry ... I suggest an oven drying time of at least 30 minutes at 130°C or something before putting it in your ballmill.
dantiberian Posted August 22, 2006 Author Posted August 22, 2006 Thanks it was just referred to in the sugar rocket topic and i was confused. I did mill it and it turned out fine. Thanks
pa_pyro Posted August 26, 2006 Posted August 26, 2006 I've always used powdered sugar and it works fine for smoke mix/kno3 sugar propellant. I don't really think the impurities would have much effect.
TheSidewinder Posted August 26, 2006 Posted August 26, 2006 I've always used powdered sugar and it works fine for smoke mix/kno3 sugar propellant. I don't really think the impurities would have much effect. OK, good to know. I wasn't at all sure of the non-sugar percentages. Seems like it doesn't matter. Has anyoen done a comparison of fuel made with commercial powdered sugar vs. milled white sugar? M
itwasntme Posted August 26, 2006 Posted August 26, 2006 I made 2 sugar rockets. One using powdered confecctioners(sp?) sugar and one using household granulated sugar. They both did very little but the powdered one moved at least 3 feet. My core was about 70% +/- into the fuel and the nozzle was pure bentonite using a 1/8 nozzle. I would suggest using charcoal in place of sugar. Much better fuel.
ActionTekJackson Posted August 26, 2006 Posted August 26, 2006 I made 2 sugar rockets. One using powdered confecctioners(sp?) sugar and one using household granulated sugar. They both did very little but the powdered one moved at least 3 feet. My core was about 70% +/- into the fuel and the nozzle was pure bentonite using a 1/8 nozzle. I would suggest using charcoal in place of sugar. Much better fuel. This should be posted in the KNO3/Sugar rockets thread, however I'll give some advice, your KNO3 must be as fine as possible if you're not going to melt them down. Get a drier screen or other such item to sift out the really fine KNO3, if possible make it just as fine as store bought powdered sugar, this is what I do and they fly flawlessly.
Tweetybird88 Posted October 3, 2006 Posted October 3, 2006 You can usually find really high-grade superfine sugars for sugar modeling that don't have additives at specialty food stores such as williams and sanoma(?) here in the US
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