Preliminary IHE Qualification of a PATO/Viton-A Formulation: Shock-to-Detonation Experiments
- Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
All nuclear weapons in the stockpile require high explosive (HE) components to function. These explosives create safety hazards during storage, handling, and stockpile maintenance operations, where unintentional initiation can cause serious injuries, death, or significant damage to facilities and the environment. To mitigate these risks, the explosive formulation(s) used in these components should be as resistant to accidental initiation as possible. Mass-detonable explosives that are “so insensitive that the probability of accidental initiation or transition from burning to detonation is negligible” are defined by Chapter IX of the DOE Explosive Safety Standard as insensitive high explosives (IHE). The IHE in most common use in the DOE is currently PBX 9502 (95%wt TATB, 5%wt Kel-F800). The Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories have established a series of experiments used to classify new HE formulations as either conventional HE (CHE) or IHE. This report describes three sets of gas gun experiments on a new candidate IHE formulation consisting of 95.5%wt 3-Picrylamino-1,2,4-Triazole (PATO) and 4.5%wt Viton-A. These experiments provide a preliminary evaluation of the performance of this material on the shock-to-detonation (SDT) portion of this qualification standard.
- Research Organization:
- Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)
- DOE Contract Number:
- 89233218CNA000001
- OSTI ID:
- 1569596
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR--19-29823
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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