Assessment of Thermal Stability and Detonation Performance of 4‐Amino‐1,2,4‐triazolium Nitrate as compared to 2,4,6‐Trinitrotoluene for Melt‐cast Explosives

Abstract

4‐Amino‐1,2,4‐triazolium nitrate (4‐ATN) is an energetic and non‐sensitive ionic liquid, which was introduced as a good candidate in previous works for the replacement of 2,4,6‐trinitrotoluene (TNT) in melt‐cast explosives. Since previous studies used pure nitric acid for nitration of 4‐ATN, the effect of the use of low price industrial nitric acids (50 %, 70 % and 98 %) is investigated on the percent yields of 4‐ATN. The thermogravimetric and differential scanning calorimetry (TGA/DSC) are done on the synthesized 4‐ATN with impure nitric acid at a heating rate of 10 K·min–1 by the vacuum system. The obtained TGA/DSC curves confirm decomposition of 4‐ATN involving melting and dissociation. Derivative thermogravimetric (DTG) curves of 4‐ATN at various heating rates are applied to obtain activation energy of thermolysis by several model‐free techniques. The calculated activation energies are in the range 78.7–87.7 kJ·mol–1, which are about 10 kJ·mol–1 more than the reported activation energy of industrial TNT (purity 98.2 %), i.e. 66–70 kJ·mol–1. Assessments of detonation performance of 4‐ATN are also compared with TNT, which show higher detonation performance of 4‐ATN. Thus, 4‐ATN can be used with nitramine compounds as melt‐cast explosives with higher thermal stability and detonation performance than corresponding nitramine compound/TNT explosives.