Plastisol propellants nitrocellulose

Table I gives a range of typical ingredient types and percentages for potentially useful nitrocellulose plastisol propellants.

Table I. Typical Ingredients for Nitrocellulose Plastisol Propellants...

The advanced applications for nitrocellulose plastisol propellants require that they be integrally bonded to the motor case. Successful case bonding for the multiyear storage life of a rocket calls for special adhesives and liners which are completely compatible with these highly plasticized propellants. Best results have been obtained with a combination of an impervious rubber liner and a crosslinked adhesive system with a limited affinity for the plasticizers used in the propellants. Examples of effective liners are silica-filled butyl rubber and chlorinated synthetic rubber. Epoxy polyamides, isocyanate-crosslinked cellulose esters, and combinations of crosslinked phenol-formaldehyde and polyvinyl formal varnishes have proved to be effective adhesives between propellant and impervious liners. Pressure curing of the propellants helps... 

Camp, A.T. (1969) Nitrocellulose plastisol propellants, in Propellants Manufacture, Hazards and Testing, Advances in Chemistry Series 88 (ed. 

The key to the successful application of high performance, pourable nitrocellulose plastisols lies in a reasonably priced, high quality source of fine-particle, at least partially colloided, spheroidal nitrocellulose. Here we are speaking of particles much finer than the well-known ball powder, produced by the Olin Mathieson Chemical Co. for small arms for over 30 years (7). Actually, particles on the order of 5-50/x diameter appear to be required to assure a reasonable continuum of uniformly plasticized nitrocellulose binder in a propellant containing 45% or more of combined crystalline oxidizer and powdered metal fuel. Such a continuum of binder is necessary to assure acceptable mechanical properties and reproducible burning characteristics of the finished propellant. Preincorporation of a certain content of the water-insoluble solids within the nitrocellulose microspheres is an effective means of helping to assure this continuum of binder and alleviates the requirements for extremely small ball size. The use of a total of 45% or more of crystalline oxidizer and (generally) metal fuel is essential if the propellant is to be competitive with other modern propellants now in service. 

During the past 10 years great strides have been made in the development and service application of highly loaded, synthetic rubber-base and interstitially-cast double-base composite-modified propellants. Largely for this reason and for economic and logistic reasons as well, the slurry-cast nitrocellulose plastisols have been relegated to a secondary role. 

The first successful static firing of plastisol propellant took place late in 1950 as part of a broad program conducted by Atlantic Research Corp. to investigate and evaluate plastisol propellants and methods for their manufacture (16). Major attention was directed to poly (vinyl chloride), cellulose acetate, and nitrocellulose, although other polymers were tested for their suitability (17). Patent applications were filed for plastisol propellant compositions and manufacturing processes, based on poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) (19) and on nitrocellulose (18). The commercial availability of dispersion grade PVC enabled work with this resin to advance rapidly. The balance of this paper is devoted to a discussion of PVC plastisol propellants and their manufacture. 

A new description of slurry-cast propellants ( Plastisol Propellants ) has been given by Camp (44]. Fine particle spheroidal nitrocellulose is the base of the... 

J.Reinhart et al of NOL, "Nitrasol Propellants -Composite Propellant Formulations Based on a Plastisol-Nitrocellulose-Pentaerythritol Trinitrate Binder (U), Bull of the 14th Meeting of the Joint Army-Navy-Air Force Solid Propellant Group, Johns Hopkins University, Silver Spring, Md(1958)(Conf)(Not used as a source of info) 1)... 

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