MHD Power Generation (VIKING Series) with Hydrocarbon Fuels.

A two-part program is described, which had as its objective the development of compact high performance MHD generators to meet the need for burst-power portable power supplies for a variety of military and industrial applications. The first part of the program, referred to as VIKING I, was an experimental program performed using a high performance MHD generator operating on toluene and oxygen for bursts of about two seconds duration. This generator produced a maximum power of 1.42 MW, and a maximum specific power output electrical output per unit mass flow of 0.62 MWkgsec. The second part of the program was the design of a compact MHD generator VIKING II, of 10 MW power output and 2000 kg dry weight. The design was carried to the point of having completed the basic designs and fabrication plans of all major components and subsystems, and their interfaces.