Kinetic Spraying Deposition of Reactive-Enhanced Al-Ni Composite for Shaped Charge Liner Applications

Abstract

Liners used in shaped charges (SC) must possess good penetration ability and explosive power. Producing the reactive layer (i.e., the Al-Ni composite) on a well-penetrating liner (i.e., Cu) via spray coating is a novel method; the exothermic reaction of this reactive layer can be enhanced by controlling the structure of the feedstock material. However, preceding studies have been unable to completely succeed in achieving this goal. There is still an opportunity to improve the performance of reactive layers in SC liner applications. In order to address this problem, a reactive Al-Ni composite powder was produced via arrested reactive milling (ARM) and deposited by a kinetic spray process. Afterward, the deposition state and self-propagating high-temperature synthesis (SHS) reaction behavior of the ARMed Al-Ni deposit were investigated. The deposition state was degraded by the ARM process due to the remaining solid lubricant and the strain-hardening effect, but the practically estimated bond strength was not poor (~40 MPa). No SHS reactions were induced by the ARM and kinetic spray process, which resulted in the quantitative maximization of the exothermic reaction. It is noteworthy that the initiation temperature of the SHS reaction was highly advanced (~300 °C) relative to preceding studies (~500 °C); this change is due to the additional mechanical activation initiated by the kinetic spray deposition.