Potassium Permanganate and Glycerin Hypergol

One hypergolic reaction used in many science demonstrations is the reaction between potassium permanganate and glycerin. The KMnO4 oxidizes the glycerin as they mix together, and the reaction produces heat. The experiment is fairly easy to do, requiring only the two chemicals mentioned and some come common sense. You don't want to burn yourself doing this. All the needs to be done to get the reaction started is for a bit of the glycerin to be poured on top of the KMnO4.



The reaction then may take a bit of time to start, so patience is necessary. When the reaction does start, the mixture will start to smoke and then burst into flame. It's a bit hard to see in these pictures, but the flame has a purple tinge to it. Care should be taken as this stuff does burn quite hot.



All in all, a pretty fun experiment to perform that demonstrates hypergolic reactions.