Ferrocene grafted hydroxyl terminated polybutadiene: A binder for propellant with improved burn rate

Abstract

In this work, iron containing hydroxyl terminated polybutadiene (Fe-HTPB) based binder cum burn rate catalyst has been developed without altering the crucial physical properties of HTPB. Ferrocene, the source of Fe in the Fe-HTPB, has been grafted at the terminal carbons of HTPB to ensure no alternation in microstructure of HTPB which in turn helped in retaining physical properties of pristine HTPB. The structure and the presence of ferrocene as the end cap groups of the Fe-HTPB were confirmed by solid-state NMR and MALDI-TOF-MS analysis. Control over the viscosity and Fe content of the Fe-HTPB was achieved by varying the grafting reaction recipes and conditions. The Fe content, as measured by inductively coupled plasma - atomic emission spectroscopy (ICP-AES) in the Fe-HTPB varied from 0.06% to 0.165% (by weight) and found to be responsible for increasing viscosity of Fe-HTPB from 5857 mPa S to 11,890 mPa S. Non aluminized composite solid propellants (CSPs) with 86% (wt%) ammonium perchlorate loading were prepared using Fe-HTPB as a binder for studying the burn rate efficiency. Burn rates of CSPs made from Fe-HTPB binders were found to be enhanced by ∼125% compared to CSPs of pristine HTPB. At 40 bar pressure, the burn rate of CSPs made from Fe-HTPB and pristine HTPB binders are 20.56 and 9.07 mm/s burn rate, respectively. In addition, all the CSPs made from Fe-HTPB were found to be very stable as their pressure index is less than 0.5.