Nitroglycol—

One could go on endlessly expounding the points in favor of recommending nitroglycol, but there is no need to go into such detail. By knowing the major advantages of nitroglycol, the reader will be able to make his own informed choices. 

The first and foremost advantage of nitroglycol is that it is less sensitive than nitro. It requires three or four times the force to set it off. This should be very reassuring to all the timid hearts contemplating entering the explosives manufacture field. On the serious side, this difference in sensitivity becomes very important when large amounts of the pure liquid explosive are being, handled. 

Another good point about nitroglycol is that it has better storage qualities than nitro does. Nitroglycol is much better able to withstand a sloppy purification job. This is because traces of acid left in the product will not bring nitroglycol to as rapid a ruin as nitro. This should not be interpreted as an endorsement of sloppy purification methods. It just means that with nitroglycol, there is more room for error. 

Finally, nitroglycol is very easy to use. It can be used in all the ways that nitro can. It forms gelatins with guncotton much more easily than nitro does. No warming or addition of acetone is required to get a gel to form. 

This is a minor drawback. A much more serious difficulty is that the starting material for making nitroglycol, ethylene glycol, is not available directly off store shelves. This complication would be very frustrating were it not for a couple of ways around it. 

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Nitroglycol maybe made by nitration of ethylene glycol [107-21-1] with mixed acid with a yield of ca 93%. The demand for both NG and nitroglycol has been gready decreased (115,116). 

Operating characteristics of the Gyttorp injection nitrator are production 500—650kg NG/hr acid consumption 2600—3400kg/hr glycerine consumption 216-281kg/hr and the yield of NG-nitroglycol mixt is 231—232.5kg of expl oil, ie, 93.9-94.5% of theoretical... 

Fig 28 Safety diagram of acidic nitroglycerine, according to Oehman et al (Ref 56). For comparison, nitroglycol is also indicated... 

Oxinite (Oxinita in Spanish). An expl mixt of Nitroglycol and Dinitrodiglycol prepd by Ohman in Sweden in 1936 directly from ethylene by an electrolytic method... 

Attempts to replace nitroglycerine partly or wholly by nitroglycol had little success due to... 

CA 78, 161665 (1973) A math analysis of the theory is presented on the basis of the combustion rate, the thermal conductivity, the heat capacity, the surface temp of the proplnt grains, and other factors. Expts were made to determine the relation of the combustion rate to acceleration for various proplnts. The rate of combustion at 70 atm was compared with the initial rate. The. relation of the critical pressure of transitional laminar combustion to acceleration, and the dependence of the combustion rate of nitroglycol to the pressure at various acceleration rates were determined. Exptl observations were compared with results of theoretical calcns... 

The effect of dinitrogen pentoxide in a dichloromethane solution on diethyl ether at a temperature lower than 20°C caused a detonation. It was explained by the decomposition of nitroglycol formed as follows ... 

Nitroglycerine /nitroglycol TNT Ammonium nitrate Sodium nitrate Cellu- losic Alumin- ium Oil Nitro- cellulose Other... 

Kylin, B., A.Englund, H.Ehrner-Samuel, and S.Yllner. 1966. A comparative study on the toxicology of nitroglycerine, nitroglycol and propylene glycol dinitrate. 

Nitroglycol (NGC) has similar physical and chemical properties to those of NG. However, its vapor pressure is too high to permit its use as a major component of propellants and explosives. NGG is used as an additive to reduce the freezing temperature of NG and to formulate explosives. However, the shock-sensitivity of the resulting NG-based explosives is much higher than that of other types of explosives. 

Hogstedt C, Axelson O Nitroglycerin-nitroglycol exposure and mortality in cardio-cerebrovascular diseases among dynamite workers. 7 Occup Med 19 675-678, 1977... 

NGc(Nitroglycol) or EGDN (Ethyleneglycol Dinitrate) See GcDN (Glycoldinitrate) ... 

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