Ethanol
Pure ethanol at 20 °C — 789 kg/m³ and 1.20 mPa·s, the reference liquid behind specific-gravity work and most laboratory density checks.
| Phase | Liquid |
| Temperature range | Single published state at 20 °C |
| Source | CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, 104th ed. |
Published at 20 °C. This fluid has no temperature curve in this library — the values below are a single measured state, not a function.
| Density | 789 kg/m³ |
| Dynamic viscosity | 1.2 mPa·s |
| Specific heat | 2.44 kJ/(kg·K) |
| Thermal conductivity | 0.171 W/(m·K) |
| Kinematic viscosity ν = µ/ρ | 1.5209 mm²/s |
| Prandtl number Pr = cpµ/k | 17.12 |
Every fluid property in these opens already filled, all from the same state — so a density and a viscosity in one calculation always describe the same fluid at the same temperature.
Specific Gravity
ρ = 789
Reynolds Number
ρ = 789μ = 1.2
Learning zone
Ethanol at 20 °C is 789 kg/m³, a specific gravity of 0.789 against water. That number does most of the work in alcohol measurement: a hydrometer reading in a fermenting wash is really a density measurement, and the drop in density as sugar becomes ethanol is what the gravity scale converts into percent alcohol.
Its viscosity, 1.20 mPa·s, is very close to water's 1.00, which surprises people who expect spirits to feel thicker — the perceived body of a spirit is mouthfeel and congeners, not viscosity. What genuinely differs is the specific heat, 2440 against 4184 J/(kg·K), so ethanol heats and cools roughly twice as fast as water for the same energy, and thermal conductivity of 0.171 against 0.598, less than a third.
Ethanol-water mixtures are famously non-ideal: mixing 50 mL of ethanol with 50 mL of water gives about 96 mL, not 100, because the smaller water molecules pack into the ethanol structure. Density of a mixture cannot be interpolated between the two pure values, which is exactly why alcohol strength tables are measured rather than computed.