Ammonium nitrate explosive properties

In oil fields. Petroleum Ammonits are ammonium nitrate explosives with a low (4-9%) nitroglycerine content. Their properties are given in Table 153. 

Medard and Le Roux [1] examined the influence of various methods of mixing on the properties of ammonium nitrate explosives ( Explosifs du type N ). They found that mixing in heavy (5 ton) edge-runners gives explosives of higher sensitiveness and rate of detonation than the same explosives mixed in kneaders of the Werner-Pfleiderer type. 

Ammon-Gelit TDF, a safehandling, gelatinous ammonium nitrate explosive, is, due to its similar properties, an alternative to -> Wasag-Gelit 2 and it is manufactured without any nitrous aromatic components DNT, TNT). 

Ammonium nitrate Physical properties Chemical and explosive properties Ihermal decomposition Explosive decomposition and stability Commercial product... 

Ammonium nitrate-based explosives account for about 97% of total U.S. industrial explosive consumption. Coal mining in the United States formed about 65—68% of the demand for explosives in 1991. The remaining uses were quarrying and nonmetal mining, 15% metal mining, 10% constmction, 7% miscellaneous uses, 3—4%. The properties of ammonium nitrate are given in Table 18 (173,239—242). 

S. R. Brinkley and W. E. Gordon, "Explosive Properties of the Ammonium Nitrate-Fuel Oil System," in Proceedings of 31st Inst. Congress of Industrial Chemisty, Liege, Belg., 1958. 

Physical and Chemical Properties. Ammonium nitrate is a white, crystalline salt, df = 1.725, that is highly soluble in water, as shown in Table 3 (7). Although it is very hygroscopic, it does not form hydrates. This hygroscopic nature compHcates its usage in explosives, and until about 1940, was a serious impediment to its extensive use in fertilizers. The soHd salt picks up water from air when the vapor pressure of water exceeds the vapor pressure of a saturated aqueous ammonium nitrate solution (see Table 4). 

Exothermic Decompositions These decompositions are nearly always irreversible. Sohds with such behavior include oxygen-containing salts and such nitrogen compounds as azides and metal styphnates. When several gaseous products are formed, reversal would require an unlikely complex of reactions. Commercial interest in such materials is more in their storage properties than as a source of desirable products, although ammonium nitrate is an important explosive. A few typical exampes will be cited to indicate the ranges of reaction conditions. They are taken from the review by Brown et al. ( Reactions in the Solid State, in Bamford and Tipper, Comprehensive Chemical Kinetics, vol. 22, Elsevier, 1980). 

This base is used to the minimum possible extent in the final explosive as the water it contains does not contribute to the power and indeed requires energy for its evaporation. All slurry explosives therefore contain further ammonium nitrate in solid form and also a fuel for combustion. The ammonium nitrate is usually in dense form similar to that used in nitroglycerine explosives as this gives the best physical properties. However, it is common practice to mix the explosive hot so that much or all of the solid ammonium nitrate results from crystallisation during cooling. 

Further properties which a detonating fuse should have are the ability to initiate blasting explosives (tested with suitable relatively insensitive mixtures usually of TNT and ammonium nitrate) resistance to low temperatures without cracking on flexing and to hot storage without desensitisation and toughness to prevent damage from stones, etc. The fuse must always be waterproof and must often withstand diesel oil, which can separate from ANFO. 

According to an O.S. amendment sheet, the procedure as described [1] is dangerous because the reaction mixture (dicyanodiamide and ammonium nitrate) is similar in composition to commercial blasting explosives. This probably also applies to similar earlier preparations [2]. An earlier procedure which involved heating ammonium thiocyanate, lead nitrate and ammonia demolished a 50 bar autoclave [3], TGA and DTA studies show that air is not involved in the thermal decomposition [4], Explosive properties of the nitrate are detailed [5], An improved process involves catalytic conversion at 90-200°C of a molten mixture of urea and ammonium nitrate to give 92% conversion (on urea) of guanidinium nitrate, recovered by crystallisation. Hazards of alternative processes are listed [6],... 

Nitrotetrazole is readily prepared from the diazotization of 5-aminotetrazole in the presence of excess sodium nitrite and is best isolated as the copper salt complex with ethylenediamine. The salts of 5-nitrotetrazole have attracted interest for their initiating properties. The mercury salt is a detonating primary explosive. The amine salts of 5-nitrotetrazole are reported to form useful eutectics with ammonium nitrate. ... 

The physicochemical properties of explosives are fundamentally equivalent to those of propellants. Explosives are also made of energetic materials such as nitropolymers and composite materials composed of crystalline particles and polymeric materials. TNT, RDX, and HMX are typical energetic crystalline materials used as explosives. Furthermore, when ammonium nitrate (AN) particles are mixed with an oil, an energetic explosive named ANFO (ammonium nitrate fuel oil) is formed. AN with water is also an explosive, named slurry explosive, used in industrial and civil engineering. A difference between the materials used as explosives and propellants is not readily evident. Propellants can be detonated when they are subjected to excess heat energy or mechanical shock. Explosives can be deflagrated steadily without a detonation wave when they are gently heated without mechanical shock. 

Before anything else can be said about IEs, some rudimentary chemistry is needed. From a cookbook perspective, all explosives (be they military, commercial, or improvised) require the same chemical building blocks, which consist of a fuel and an oxidizer. Some explosives have the fuel and oxidizer as part of the same molecule, such as trinitrotoluene (TNT), and some explosives are comprised of mixtures of separate fuels and oxidizers, such as ammonium nitrate-fuel oil (ANFO). The oxidizer employed by the vast majority of explosives tends to be the NO2 (nitro) group. It is so predominant as an explosive ingredient that the primary focus of detection methods traditionally has been to look for nitro-derived properties. IEs tend to utilize a more diverse range of oxidizers. Table 3.1 gives a list of the numerous oxidizer possibilities. 

Chretien and Woringer [34] described the preparation of silver cyanamide from calcium cyanamide by the action of silver nitrate and also described its explosive properties. Montagu-Pollock [35] described a method for growing large crystals of the salt from its aqueous solution in the presence of ammonium nitrate, ammonia and a surface active agent. Bowden and Montagu-Pollock [36] and Montagu-Pollock [35] studied the slow decomposition of the crystals when heated at temperatures from 150 to 360°C. The course of decomposition was studied by electron microscope. 

The explosive properties of mixtures with ammonium nitrate depend on the quantitative relationship between the oxidizing agent and the explosive or combustible substance. According to Parisot and Laffitte s [9, 47] investigations the explosive properties of mixtures of aromatic nitro compounds with ammonium nitrate vary with the change in composition of the system in an almost rectilinear manner. The graph in Fig. 69 shows how the rate of detonation depends on the composition of mixtures of tetryl or picric acid with ammonium nitrate. T. Urbanski et al. [48] also obtained a rectilinear relationship for nitrostarch mixtures with ammonium or sodium nitrate (Fig. 71, p. 265). 

The explosive properties of nitrostarch mixtures (containing 12.7% of nitrogen) with ammonium or sodium nitrates have been studied by T. Urbanski et al. [48]. Values for rate of detonation of mixtures with a density of 1.0 are given in Fig. 71. They conform to Laffitte s rule that the variation in rate of detonation with the composition of mixtures with ammonium nitrate is almost rectilinear. 

Ammonium powder (formerly termed amide powder) was obtained in attempts to increase the power of blackpowder. One of the causes of the relatively low power of blackpowder lies in the fact that on explosion it produces a great quantity of solid matter, but only a relatively small volume of gas. In working for an increase of the volume of the gaseous products in the middle of the nineteenth century, attempts were made to substitute ammonium nitrate for potassium nitrate. The observation of Reiset and Millon [29] that a mixture of ammonium nitrate and charcoal has explosive properties and explodes on being heated to 170°C was the starting point for this work. 

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