High Velocity Impact Sensitivity of Commercial Slurry and Emulsion Explosives

The phenomenon of high velocity impact initiation of commercial explosives was modelled numerically by means of a reactive hydrodynamic code in conjunction with the Forest fire model. Coefficients for the Forest fire model were determined from the Pop plots resulting from a series of wedge tests for each explosive investigated. Data for the reactive hydrodynamic code include the HOM equation of state parameters and Hugoniots. Predicted results for projectile impact were compared with the experimental results obtained for the same explosive compositions. For a given projectile the agreement between the predicted values of impact velocity beyond which detonation would occur and the observed experimental values was good.