Determining shock reponse of PETN-based explosives with grain-scale simulations

The shock initiation of heterogeneous solid explosives, such as binderized PETN-based explosives, is governed by mesoscopic processes. However, there is a scarcity of direct measurements probing these phenomenon so we employ modeling to improve our understanding of them. Here we perform grain-scale simulations in the multi-physics code, ALE3D, to investigate the shock response of explicitly resolved energetic grains and pores following planar impact. Non-reactive simulations are used to calculate an unreacted equation of state (EOS) for the heterogeneous explosive and constituent ingredients. These calculated EOSs are compared to historic models. The effects of pore size and distribution on the non-uniform temperature and pressure fields within the shocked material is investigated. These studies are important because they provide insight on mesoscopic processes and form the basis for new morphology aware explosive models.