Effects of aluminum particle size on metal acceleration for CL-20-based aluminized explosives

The addition of aluminum (Al) powder to CL-20 significantly enhances the overall energy of mixed explosives. Nonetheless, the metal acceleration ability of explosion after Al addition shows unpredictable behavior due to the unclear reaction characteristics of Al in CL-20 detonation products. This study utilizes a plate push test employing CL-20-based aluminized explosives to acquire the reaction degree formulation for Al powder with varying particle sizes in a CL-20 detonation environment. Moreover, it elucidates the reaction mechanism of microsized Al particles during the initial phase of afterburning. Additionally, this reaction formulation enhances the equation of state (EOS) for CL-20-based aluminized explosives. Subsequently, the new EOS is implemented in LS-DYNA to simulate the metal flyer acceleration process. Consequently, the impact of Al particle size on the metal acceleration capability of aluminized CL-20 is examined. The results indicate that for CL-20-based aluminized explosives with 15 % Al content, an optimal Al particle size of 34.12 μm exists when the particle size exceeds 10 μm. This optimum increases the speed of the driving metal plate by 7.4 % compared to CL-20/LiF explosives.