Rock Fragmentation by Blasting – Sanchidrián (ed)

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Properties of alternatively fueled ammonium nitrate explosives

C. Hurley, V. Petr & S. Liu

Department of Mining Engineering, Colorado School of Mines, Golden, CO, USA

J. Banker
Dynamic Materials Corporation, Boulder, CO, USA

ABSTRACT: This paper presents the results of testing the use of alternative fuels and crushed indus-
trial quality Ammonium Nitrate (AN) as explosive material. By changing the fuels in an explosive mix-
ture, the oxygen balance of the explosive may also change affecting the total amount of energy released
as well as detonation velocity. Thus it is necessary to characterize the effects of alternative fuels regarding
composition and grain size on detonation velocity and critical diameter for detonation. This paper covers
the initial testing of sugar and coal dust as alternative fuels in ammonium nitrate based explosives used
for explosive welding.

1 INTRODUCTION The procedure for calculating oxygen balance

An explosive may consist of either a chemically
pure compound, such as Nitroglycerin, or a mix-
ture of an oxidizer and a fuel, such as ANFO
(Ammonium Nitrate and Fuel Oil). Oxidizer is a
substance that in a chemical reaction contributes
atoms of one or more oxidizing elements, in which
the fuel component of the explosive burns. Varying
the properties of these components will alter the
chemical and physical properties of the explosive.
1.1 Calculating weight ratios using oxygen
balances
Oxygen balance is defined as the amount of oxygen,
expressed in weight percent, liberated as a result of
complete conversion of the explosive material to car-
bon dioxide, water, sulfur dioxide, aluminum oxide,
etc. (Akhavan 1998). The compound is said to have
a positive oxygen balance if it contains more oxy-
gen than is needed and a negative oxygen balance
if it contains less oxygen than is needed. Changing
the oxygen balance of an explosive has an impact
on both the available energy and the production of
harmful gasses. Negative oxygen balances will pro-
duce greater quantities of CO and positive oxygen
balances will produce more NOx gasses.
In order to maximize an explosive’s energy poten-
tial, the oxygen balance of explosive needs to be
approximately zero, with slightly negative balances
being preferred over slightly positive ones. Slightly
fuel lean mixtures have a greater detonation energy
and produce fewer NOX gasses than a similarly fuel
rich mixture will.
of a given explosive material is to determine the
number of Mole Units of oxygen that are in excess
or deficient for the compound.
−1600
OB % = × ( 2X + (Y / 2 ) + M − Z )
Mol . wt. ofcomponents
(1)
where X = number of atoms of carbon, Y = number
of atoms of hydrogen, Z = number of atoms of
oxygen, and M = number of atoms of metal (metal-
lic oxide produced). (Cooper 1996).
This methodology will be used to calculate the
oxygen balance of the alternative fuels in a later
section.
2 EXPERIMENTAL PROGRAM
For this experimental program, two alternative fuels
were investigated, sugar and coal dust. These were
selected as fuels on the basis of cost and accessibil-
ity. Oxygen-balanced ammonium nitrate and fuel oil
(ANFO) was used as the control mixture to validate
the test results. No additional materials were added
to the mixtures to control the detonation. The par-
ticle size was controlled for both components for
proper mixing and a strict 50% passing a 75-mesh
sieve standard was implemented. Particle size anal-
ysis was performed on each sample before and after
mixing to ensure all tests passed these criteria.
Test boxes were constructed to maintain
consistent repeatability of sample dimensions and
allow the explosive to reach steady-state detonation.

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The dimensions of the test boxes and layout are
intended to minimize edge effects at the fiber
optic probe locations. The forms were built using
8 mm particle board to minimize the potential
for the box to produce fragments during testing.
A schematic diagram of a typical experimental box
is shown in Figure 1. The height of the wood box is
36 cm. Figure 2 shows a photograph of the manu-
factured box with explosive and fiber optic probes.
A metal base plate was placed under the layer of
explosive. The orange booster can be seen on the
left side of the box. Also visible are the fiber optic
cables (black lines) inserted into the booster and a
spacer. The remainder of the box will be filled with
containment sand (∼20 kg).
The densities of the manufactured explosive Figure 2. Box being used in testing.
were measured on site during each test, using a
5 gallon bucket to calculate mass with known vol-
ume. The respective densities of sugar and AN
(ANCHO), coal dust and AN, and crushed ANFO
were measured as 0.862 gram/cm3, 0.836 gram/cm3,
and 0.803 gram/cm3, respectively. Using these den-
sities and the area of the wood forms, explosives
quantities for a given thickness were calculated. Figure 3. Schematic of fiber optic spacer.
Detonation velocities (VOD) with not less than
18 cm of sand confinement of the alternative fuel
mixes were compared with similarly confined indus- Table 1. Oxygen balance for explosive mixes.
trial quality crushed ANFO. The critical thickness
of ANCHO was also tested and was experimen- Component %
tally established to be approximately 2.4 cm, which Fuel Coal
is the same as the crushed ANFO. Mixes AN oil dust Sugar OB %
A fiber optic system was used to measure VOD.
The fiber optic cables were set a known distance ANFO 94 6 – – −1.18
apart as shown in Figure 3 and Table 1, and wired ANCHO 84 – – 16 −1.12
to an amplifier connected to an oscilloscope. As ANCoal 92 – 8 – −0.16
the reaction passed by each cable, the light pulse
was detected by oscilloscope, which would then
record the time of the passage of the shockwave 3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
as a voltage spike. A cable on the booster triggered
the oscilloscope. Knowing the time between spikes 3.1 Oxygen balance calculation
and the distance between fiber optics, VOD can for the alternative fuels
then be calculated using the following equation:
Oxygen balances for each composition were cal-
VOD = ΔL/ΔT (3) culated based upon the oxygen balances for the
individual components. The oxygen balances of
where ΔL is the distance between cables and ΔT is the various ingredients are given in Tables 1 and 2.
elapsed time between cables. Notice that the oxygen balances of the explo-
sives are all slightly negative, indicating that the
explosives are all fuel lean.

3.2 Grain size of solid fuels

An important parameter to consider when using
solid fuels is the grain size of the fuel. When using
fuel oil, the grain size of the fuel is essentially zero,
allowing maximum intimacy between the fuel
and the oxidizer. Solid fuels must be crushed to
Figure 1. Top view schematic of box for ANFO testing. maximize the surface area available to react with

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the oxidizer. Store bought powdered sugar was
used for this testing. The AN and the coal were
ground at CSM. As seen in Table 3 and the fol-
lowing figures, the commercial powdered sugar
has a much smaller grain size than we were able
to achieve with the coal dust. We found that our
grinding equipment was unable to produce large
quantities of sufficiently fine coal dust. Most of it
was lost as airborne dust. A power plant has been
found as a source of ultra-fine coal dust and full
scale tests on coal dust and AN will be conducted
in the future. We also see that there is substantial
particle size variation in the crushed AN. PSA data
is summarized in Figures 4–7.

3.3 Testing of detonation velocity

and critical thickness Figure 4. Sieve size vs % retained, crushed AN and
average value line.
Detonation velocity (VOD) and critical thickness
are the primary parameters that determine the
suitability of an explosive compound for explo-
sive welding. Critical thickness is the minimum
thickness at which an explosive will experience
steady state detonation. This testing program was
designed to determine first the VOD, then critical
thickness.
A total of three compositions were tested for
VOD in this program. Crushed ANFO was used

Table 2. Oxygen balances for

components.

Component OB %

AN 0.2
FO 3.33
Coal dust −2.32 Figure 5. Sieve size vs. % retained, crushed AN+ sugar
Sugar 1.12 (ANCHO) and average value line from two samples.

Table 3. Particle size distribution for crushed AN and

ANCHO. Values are percentage of total mass.

Sieve size

20 40 75 100 200 pan

Crushed AN particle size analysis

Test # 1, 2 0 8 32 12 18 25
7 0 4 23 32 28 2.3
8, 9 0 2 11 34 39 12
Average 0 5 22 26 28 13
ANCHO particle size analysis
Test # 10 0 4 30 8 37 20
11, 12 0 7 27 9 41 14
Average 0 5.5 28.5 8.5 39 17

Values given as % of material retained by % passing the Figure 6. Sieve size vs. average % crushed AN retained
given screen size. and % sugar retained.

137
 are shown in Tables 5 and 6. VOD results are sum-
marized in Figure 9.

3.4 Cost analysis

The goal of these studies was to demonstrate the
feasibility of these alternatively fuel mixtures for
industrial scale explosive welding applications. The
final part of this was rough cost analysis. Local
costs were used for AN, fuel oil, and powdered
sugar. Coal dust is typically a waste product that
can be obtained for free. Transportation costs were
not taken into account. The results of this analysis
are shown in Table 7.

Figure 7. Sieve size vs % AN and coal dust retained.

Table 4. Explosive masses for VOD testing.

AN Fuel Fuel Uncompacted

Composition (g) (g) (%) ρ (g/cm3)

ANFO 5443.1 409.4 6 0.803

Coal Dust + AN 5443.1 473.1 8 0.836
Sugar + AN 5443.1 1036.4 16 0.862

as a baseline. The second and third compositions

were crushed AN + coal dust and crushed AN
with powdered sugar. The amounts of each of the
explosive mixtures are reported in Table 4. Figure 8. Comparison of VOD between crushed
The above quantities were chosen to give a ANFO, ANCHO, and AN + coal dust.
3.5 cm thick explosive layer; 3.5 cm was decided on
a safe minimum thickness for steady state detona-
tion in all compositions. Table 5. Explosive masses for critical thickness testing.
Results of VOD testing are summarized in Test AN (g) Fuel (g) Fuel (%)
Figure 8 and Table 6.
Critical thickness testing was performed on the 2 cm ANCHO 3613.4 688.2 16
ANCHO and AN + coal dust compositions. Previ- 1.5 cm ANCHO 2710.2 516.2 16
ous testing has set the critical thickness of crushed 2 cm AN + coal dust 3107.2 248.6 8
ANFO at 2 cm. This was used as a starting point 1.5 cm AN + coal dust 2787.6 242.4 8
for testing the alternative fuel mixtures. Tests were
planned for 2 cm and 1.5 cm thicknesses of each.
In order to maximize the potential for successful Table 6. Explosive mixes results for VOD and critical
detonation during this testing, booster orientation thickness tests.
was changed from vertical (as seen in Figure 1) to
horizontal. This was done to maximize the amount Average VOD (m/s)
of energy being transferred from the booster to the
charge. 3.5 cm 2 cm 1.5 cm
Both mixes experienced successful detonation
at 2 cm thickness. ANCHO failed to detonate at ANFO 4140 3950 –
ANCHO 3218 3169 –
1.5 cm, but AN + coal dust detonated successfully. AN + coal dust 2349 2399 2314
Explosive quantities and VOD results for each test

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Figure 9. Comparison of VODs for various thicknesses
for alternatively fueled AN explosives.
Table 7. Cost analysis for 1 kg charge.
AN AN Fuel Fuel Total cost
(kg) ($/kg) (kg) ($/kg) ($/kg)
consistency. We would also like to note that no
work was done to find the Deflagration to Deto-
nation Transition (DDT) distance in either alterna-
tive fuel mix.
Based on preliminary cost analysis, AN + coal
dust could find applications in areas that waste coal
dust is readily available. Its economic competitive-
ness with ANFO is dependant on transportation
costs and the current price of fuel oil. ANCHO is
not economically feasible due to the high cost of
sugar and high quantity required. The potential
economic advantages of AN + coal dust will lead
to future study.
Despite the economic advantages of AN + coal
dust from the materials perspective, the applications
of it will be limited due to the difficulty achieving
homogenous mixing using the solid fuel. This will
increase the total cost of use for this explosive.
Future study of AN + coal dust will focus on the
influence of particle size, coal quality, and moisture
content on VOD and brisance. As the properties
of this material become better quantified, studies
on diluents will be preformed to lower the VOD to
optimize it for certain processes.

ANFO 0.94 $1.32 0.06 $1.21 $1.31

ANCHO 0.84 $1.32 0.16 $6.00 $2.07
AN + coal dust 0.92 $1.32 0.08 $0.00 $1.21
4 CONCLUSIONS
This testing confirmed the potential of sugar
as alternative fuel in Ammonium Nitrate based
explosives. Coal dust also showed potential, but
further testing needs to be done to classify its prop-
erties. When detonation is successfully achieved,
these compounds have a lower VOD than ANFO
(3150 m/s for ANCHO and 2300 m/s for AN +
Coal Dust compared to the 4140 m/s of ANFO).
Grain size of both the fuel and oxidizer was found
to be a critical parameter. Grinding procedures
need to be refined to produce a more consistent
AN product. The use of an outside supplier for
coal dust will greatly improve its particle size and
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This project was supported under the Colorado
School of Mines, AXPRO Group consortium
Project (08/2007-05) supported by Dynamic Mate-
rials Corporation. The authors acknowledge and
appreciate the assistance of Ray Johnson and
Doug Aho from the CSM Mining Engineering
Department during the sample preparation and
testing. We would also like to thank Roy Hardwick
for suggesting the use of sugar as a fuel for AN-
based explosives.
REFERENCES
Akhavan, J. 1998. Chemistry of Explosives. Tyne, UK:
Royal Society of Chemistry.
Cooper, P. 1996. Explosives Enginering. New York: Wiley-
VCH, Inc.

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