Detonation reaction steps frozen by free expansion and analyzed by mass spectrometry

Conference · Sat May 01 00:00:00 EDT 1993

OSTI ID:10158153

Greiner, N R; Fry, H A; Blais, N C; Engelke, R P

Detonation reactions in small pellets of explosive are frozen by free expansion into a large vacuum chamber and analyzed by time-of-flight mass spectrometry. Sensitive explosives like PETN, RDX, and HMX show rapidly evolving reaction zones and mostly simple products like H{sub 2}O, CO, N{sub 2}, and CO{sub 2}. Less sensitive explosives like TATB, HNS, and TNT show slower evolution of the reaction zone, and more complex products in addition to the simple ones seen in PETN. Isotopic substitution shows that the more complex products contain moderate amounts of NH{sub 3}, HCN, NO, HNCO, and NO{sub 2}. Other observations include polymerization of aromatic explosive molecules, adducts to the explosive molecules, and explosive molecules with functional groups missing. The more complex products are reservoirs of unreleased energy that may affect performance.

• Research Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-36
• OSTI ID: 10158153
• Report Number(s): LA-UR-93-1545; CONF-930713-7; ON: DE93012734
• Resource Relation: Conference: 10. detonation symposium,Boston, MA (United States),12-16 Jul 1993; Other Information: PBD: [1993]
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEFENSE
37 INORGANIC
ORGANIC
PHYSICAL AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY
CHEMICAL EXPLOSIONS
TIME-OF-FLIGHT METHOD
CHEMICAL EXPLOSIVES
MASS SPECTROSCOPY
DETONATIONS
PETN
BY-PRODUCTS
CHEMICAL REACTIONS
TATB
450100
400102
CHEMICAL EXPLOSIONS AND EXPLOSIVES
CHEMICAL AND SPECTRAL PROCEDURES