Ecofriendly energetic oxidizer-hydrazinium nitroformate (HNF) and propellants based on HNF

Limited research work carried out at HEMRL has made it possible to obtain high purity hydrazinium nitroformate (HNF) by adopting an innovative synthesis approach of usage of specific surface active agent and following the methods reported in literature. The morphological characteristics of HNF were modifted by sulfo-succinate class of surfactant and crystals akin to processing in propellant binder matrix were obtained. HNF was fully characterized by applying instrumental techniques including UV/FTIR/H-1 NMR/SEM. A defect-free castable CMDB formulation was made, as a combined effect of purity and morphology of HNF as well as making use of physicochemical characteristics of double base matrix in place of commonly used polybutadiene binders. The formulation studied is capable of producing I-sp of 270 s (theoretical) with higher burning rates than current systems. Thermal studies carried out by applying DSC, revealed interaction between two-stage decomposition products of HNF and single-stage decomposition species of double base matrix. This may be attributed to the involvement of exothermic surface/near surface decomposition of HNF at temperatures lower than that of double base matrix. HNF intermixed with high energy materials having high decomposition temperature (thermally stable explosives) like cyclotetramethylenetetranitramine (HMX), hexanitrohexaazaisowurtzitane (HNIW), triaminotrinitrobenzene (TATB) and tetranitrodibenzotetraazapentalene (TACOT) did not influence their decomposition behavior. Both HNF and thermally stable energetic explosives decomposed independently.