Effects of content and particle size of cenospheres on the detonation characteristics of emulsion explosive

Abstract

ABSTARCT Cenospheres are the main component of industrial waste of fly ash and taking full advantage of them has good economic and environmental values. In this paper, cenospheres sensitized emulsion explosive was prepared by adding cenospheres into the emulsion matrix as the sensitizers. The effects of content and particle size of cenospheres on detonation performance of emulsion explosives were studied, and the optimum formula was determined by comparing its detonation performance with glass microspheres (GMs) sensitized emulsion explosive. The optimum content and particle size of cenospheres were 12 mass% and 83 μm, and the brisance and detonation velocity were 18.34 mm and 4970 m/s, respectively, which were close to the maximum values of the traditional GMs sensitized emulsion explosive. Air blast experiments indicated that the influence of particle size of cenospheres on the work capability of emulsion explosive was consistent with its explosion power. Shelf-life test and optical microscope results showed that cenospheres sensitized emulsion explosives had good storage stability. Therefore, cenospheres could be a promising physical sensitizer for emulsion explosives.