Noniso-thermal analysis of C4 bonded explosives containing different cyclic nitramines

The thermal behavior and decomposition kinetics of C4-bonded PBXs based on some attractive cyclic nitramines were investigated by means of nonisothermal TG and DSC techniques. It has been shown that only a single decomposition process has been observed for RDX-C4 while an obvious two-step process for mixture of BCHMX-C4 CL-20-C4, and HMX-C4. The onset temperature of the exotherms were observed at 216.3, 238.7, 279.2 and 236.7 °C with the peak temperatures of 235.1, 279.0, 231.2 and 233.7 °C for RDX-C4, BCHMX-C4, HMX-C4 and CL-20-C4, respectively. Their corresponding exothermic decompostion processes were covered by energy changes of 1749, 1938, 1213 and 2639 J g−1, which are lower than that of their pure cyclic nitramines. It was also proved that C4 matrix has significant effect on the activation energy distribution of RDX, BCHMX and CL-20, whose initial autocatalysis effect was inhibited or weakened. With regard to HMX-C4, the activation energy of its initial step is much lower than that of the second step.

► The thermal behavior of plastic bonded explosive (PBX) by C4 binder containing attractive cyclic energetic compounds have been firstly investigated using non-isothermal TG and DSC techniques.
► Their decomposition kinetics for overlapped two-step decomposition process have been calculated by modified Kissinger–Akahira–Sunose (KAS) method.
► It was found that C4 matrix has significant effect on the activation energy distribution of pure cyclic nitramines, whose initial autocatalysis effect was inhibited.