Mechanical properties of plastic‐bonded explosive binder materials as a function of strain‐rate and temperature

Abstract

Compression measurements were conducted on three explosive formulation binders, extruded Estane, plasticized Estane, and plasticized hydroxyl‐terminated polybutadiene, as a function of temperature and strain rate. The mechanical response of the Estane was found to exhibit the strongest dependency on strain rate and temperature and higher flow strength for similar test conditions of the three materials tested. Plasticized Estane was less sensitively dependent on strain rate and temperature, followed by the plasticized HTPB. The visco‐elastic recovery of all three binders is seen to dominate the mechanical behavior at temperatures above the glass transition temperature (Tg). There is a pronounced shift in the apparent Tg to higher temperatures as the strain rate is increased. Two distinct behaviors are observed in the binders below the Tg. At low strain rates, the binders exhibit a yield behavior, followed by a drop in the flow stress, which may or may not recover. At high strain rates, the load drop does not occur and the flow stresses either gradually increase, as in plasticized HTPB, or it levels out as seen in the Estane‐based binders. POLYM. ENG. SCI., 46:812–819, 2006. © 2006 Society of Plastics Engineers

Investigating deformation and mesoscale void creation in HMX based composites using tomography based grain scale FEM

“…Observations from Cady et al [11], and results of this present investigation, suggest plastic deformation of the binder is required to accommodate the plateau of macro-scale displacement observed in the experimental tensile test results. Thus separable elastic and plastic strains, i.e.…”

“…5,6,7,8,9] and polymer binders [e.g. 10,11,12,13,14]. In addition to knowing individual constituents' behavior, the adhesion between constituents is known to affect mesoscale delamination behavior [15,16,17].…”

High Strain Rate Mechanics of Polymers: A Review

“…Materials which have been well-studied in the literature are silicone elastomers [13,66,151], plasticized PVC [152,153] and polyureas [39,40,72,[154][155][156][157][158][159] and polyurethanes [160][161][162]. The rate dependence of these materials depends strongly on the glass transition, and in particular whether this transition affects the room temperature response at strain rates of interest.…”

Dynamic Mechanical Properties of Hydroxyl-terminated Polybutadiene Containing Polytetrahydrofuran as a Plasticizer

“…Some researchers have reported the viscoelastic behaviors of HTPB. [33][34][35][36][37] However, these characteristics have not been thoroughly revealed, and no other detailed studies of the viscoelastic behavior of the HTPB/PTHF blend have been conducted. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the dynamic mechanical properties of cured HTPB containing PTHF as a plasticizer.…”