synthesis, characterization and analysis of thermal properties and burning rate of zr/bacro4 mixture

In this work, nanoparticles of the metal fuel zirconium (zr) and nanoscale oxidizer bacro4 are synthesized considering their unique nanoparticle characteristics like mixing homogeneity and high surface/volume ratio. using the synthesized fuel and oxidizer, the pyrotechnic mixture of zr/bacro4 was developed under 4 different conditions and analyzed in terms of the thermal behavior and burning rate. in the synthesis stage, the oxidizer nanopowder bacro4 was developed through precipitating barium nitrate and chromate potassium in the vicinity of dodecyl benzene sulfonate sodium (dbss) stabilizer. also, zr nanopowder was prepared using direct reduction of zr (no3)2 by n2h2 and was coated by a 4% collodion. then, the pyrotechnic mixture zr/bacro4 was charged and pressed in the constructed combustion chamber. the burning rate of the mixture was captured by the direct footage of the combustion process using digital cameras with 60 frame-per-second capabilities. the fastest burning occurs when both the fuel and the oxidizer are nano-scaled. the thermal behavior of the mixture was studied using the simultaneous thermal analysis (sta) machine within the temperature range of 25 to 1000 °c. results of the thermal analysis show that the thermal decomposition temperature of the zr/bacro4 mixture in the micron size is higher than in the nano size and the amount of destruction is lower. increasing the concentration of zirconium in the nano-size from 10 to 50% leads to a decrease in the decomposition temperature from 565 to 437 °c, while the pyrotechnic mixture destruction rate increases from 39% to over 63%.