Analysis of Stability of Naturally Aged Propellant: Assessment of Ammunition Lifetime

This book presents a set of experimental achievements on the topic of studying ammunition propellants. It presenting the fundamental bases of the prediction lifetime processes of propellants and ammunitions. Through the topics of each chapter of this edition, new experimental data and descriptions of achieved phenomena are described. Chapter 1 describes the defects on unstable naturally aged propellant using modern chemical methods. Chapter 2 describes the monitoring of stabilizer content as one of the reliable methods used to control chemical stability and predict the lifetime of a propellant. The aim of this topic was to evaluate the chemical changes of single base propellant induced by natural aging at ambient conditions during up to 55 years of storage. In Chapter 3, the use of Thin Layer Chromatography for the purpose of predicting the lifetime of naturally aged propellant is discussed. In Chapters 4 and 5, the possibility of using High Performance Thin Layer Chromatography for the qualitative and quantitative determination of different stabilizers and predicting the lifetime of naturally aged propellant are discussed. In Chapter 5, the Application of Vacuum Stability Test for propellant testing is described. This topic examined the effect of temperature on the rate of gas discharge from propellants for the purpose of lifetime prediction of naturally aged propellants.