Effects of temperature, particle size, and air humidity on sensibility of typical high-energetic explosives

Abstract

The production and utilization of high-energetic explosives often pose a range of safety hazards, with sensitivity being a key factor in evaluating these risks. To investigate how temperature, particle size, and air humidity affect the responsiveness of commonly used high-energetic explosives, a series of BAM(Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und-prüfung) impact and friction sensitivity tests were carried out to determine the critical impact energy and critical load pressure of four representative high-energetic explosives (RDX, HMX, PETN and CL-20) under different temperatures, particle sizes, and air humidity conditions. The experimental findings facilitated an examination of temperature and particle size affecting the sensitivity of high-energetic explosives, along with an assessment of the influence of air humidity on sensitivity testing. The results clearly indicate that high-energetic explosives display a substantial decline in critical reaction energy when subjected to micrometre-sized particles and an air humidity level of 45% at a temperature of 90 ℃. Furthermore, it was noted that the critical reaction energy of high-energetic explosives diminishes with an increase in temperature within 25 ℃-90 ℃. In the same vein, as the particle sizes of high-energetic explosives increase, so does the critical reaction energy for micrometre-sized particles. High air humidity significantly affects the sensitivity testing of high-energetic explosives, emphasizing the importance of refraining from conducting sensitivity tests in such conditions.

Keywords

high-energetic explosives / temperature / particle size / air humidity / critical reaction energy

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