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Picratol is a high explosive mixture, comprising 52% 'Explosive D' and 48% TNT. It has a detonation velocity of approximately 6,972 metres per second. Picratol has no civilian applications. It was exclusively intended for military use and was in use in the US during the Second World War.
Two basic advantages of Picratol is its insensitivity to shock and ability to be loaded into ammunition by pouring a melted sludge. As a result, it proved useful as the main explosive filling in armour-piercing aerial bombs. The main application was the American 2000-lb semi-AP bomb M103.
Picratol is an obsolete explosive and is therefore unlikely to be encountered, except in the form of legacy munitions and unexploded ordnance.
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RDX (abbreviation of "Research Department eXplosive" or Royal Demolition eXplosive) or hexogen, among other names, is an organic compound with the formula (CH2N2O2)3. It is white, odorless, and tasteless, widely used as an explosive. Chemically, it is classified as a nitroamine alongside HMX, which is a more energetic explosive than TNT. It was used widely in World War II and remains common in military applications.
An explosive is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An explosive charge is a measured quantity of explosive material, which may either be composed solely of one ingredient or be a mixture containing at least two substances.
Trinitrotoluene, more commonly known as TNT (and more specifically 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, and by its preferred IUPAC name 2-methyl-1,3,5-trinitrobenzene), is a chemical compound with the formula C6H2(NO2)3CH3. TNT is occasionally used as a reagent in chemical synthesis, but it is best known as an explosive material with convenient handling properties. The explosive yield of TNT is considered to be the standard comparative convention of bombs and asteroid impacts. In chemistry, TNT is used to generate charge transfer salts.
A thermobaric weapon, also called an aerosol bomb, or a vacuum bomb, is a type of explosive munition that works by dispersing an aerosol cloud of gas, liquid or powdered explosive. The fuel is usually a single compound, rather than a mixture of multiple molecules. Many types of thermobaric weapons can be fitted to hand-held launchers, and can also be launched from airplanes.
Pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), also known as PENT, pentyl, PENTA, TEN, corpent, or penthrite, is an explosive material. It is the nitrate ester of pentaerythritol, and is structurally very similar to nitroglycerin. Penta refers to the five carbon atoms of the neopentane skeleton. PETN is a very powerful explosive material with a relative effectiveness factor of 1.66. When mixed with a plasticizer, PETN forms a plastic explosive. Along with RDX it is the main ingredient of Semtex.
A bomb is an explosive weapon that uses the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations inflict damage principally through ground- and atmosphere-transmitted mechanical stress, the impact and penetration of pressure-driven projectiles, pressure damage, and explosion-generated effects. Bombs have been utilized since the 11th century starting in East Asia.
ANFO ( AN-foh) (or AN/FO, for ammonium nitrate/fuel oil) is a widely used bulk industrial high explosive. It consists of 94% porous prilled ammonium nitrate (NH4NO3) (AN), which acts as the oxidizing agent and absorbent for the fuel, and 6% number 2 fuel oil (FO). The use of ANFO originated in the 1950s.
Bomb disposal is an explosives engineering profession using the process by which hazardous explosive devices are disabled or otherwise rendered safe. Bomb disposal is an all-encompassing term to describe the separate, but interrelated functions in the military fields of explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) and improvised explosive device disposal (IEDD), and the public safety roles of public safety bomb disposal (PSBD) and the bomb squad.
A car bomb, bus bomb, van bomb, lorry bomb, or truck bomb, also known as a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED), is an improvised explosive device designed to be detonated in an automobile or other vehicles.
An improvised explosive device (IED) is a bomb constructed and deployed in ways other than in conventional military action. It may be constructed of conventional military explosives, such as an artillery shell, attached to a detonating mechanism. IEDs are commonly used as roadside bombs, or homemade bombs.
Potassium chlorate is the inorganic compound with the molecular formula KClO3. In its pure form, it is a white solid. After sodium chlorate, it is the second most common chlorate in industrial use. It is a strong oxidizing agent and its most important application is in safety matches. In other applications it is mostly obsolete and has been replaced by safer alternatives in recent decades. It has been used
Acetone peroxide is an organic peroxide and a primary explosive. It is produced by the reaction of acetone and hydrogen peroxide to yield a mixture of linear monomer and cyclic dimer, trimer, and tetramer forms. The monomer is dimethyldioxirane. The dimer is known as diacetone diperoxide (DADP). The trimer is known as triacetone triperoxide (TATP) or tri-cyclic acetone peroxide (TCAP). Acetone peroxide takes the form of a white crystalline powder with a distinctive bleach-like odor when impure, or a fruit-like smell when pure, and can explode powerfully if subjected to heat, friction, static electricity, concentrated sulfuric acid, strong UV radiation, or shock. Until about 2015, explosives detectors were not set to detect non-nitrogenous explosives, as most explosives used preceding 2015 were nitrogen-based. TATP, being nitrogen-free, has been used as the explosive of choice in several terrorist bomb attacks since 2001.
A tandem-charge or dual-charge weapon is an explosive device or projectile that has two or more stages of detonation, assisting it to penetrate either reactive armour on an armoured vehicle or strong structures.
A time bomb is a bomb whose detonation is triggered by a timer. The use or attempted use of time bombs has been for various purposes including insurance fraud, terrorism, assassination, sabotage and warfare. They are a frequent plot device in thriller and action films as they offer a way of imparting a dramatic sense of urgency.
ROF Chorley was a UK government-owned munitions filling Royal Ordnance Factory. It was planned as a permanent Royal Ordnance Factory with the intention that it, unlike some other similar facilities, would remain open for production after the end of World War II; and, together with ROF Bridgend, would replace the Royal Filling Factory located at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich. It was built largely in Euxton, but was known as ROF Chorley.
A nuclear explosion is an explosion that occurs as a result of the rapid release of energy from a high-speed nuclear reaction. The driving reaction may be nuclear fission or nuclear fusion or a multi-stage cascading combination of the two, though to date all fusion-based weapons have used a fission device to initiate fusion, and a pure fusion weapon remains a hypothetical device. Nuclear explosions are used in nuclear weapons and nuclear testing.
Composition H-6 is a melt-cast military aluminized high explosive. H-6 was developed in the United States.
The Disney bomb, also known as the Disney Swish, officially the 4500 lb Concrete Piercing/Rocket Assisted bomb was a rocket-assisted bunker buster bomb developed during the Second World War by the British Royal Navy to penetrate hardened concrete targets, such as submarine pens, which could resist conventional free-fall bombs.
In military munitions, a fuze is the part of the device that initiates its function. In some applications, such as torpedoes, a fuze may be identified by function as the exploder. The relative complexity of even the earliest fuze designs can be seen in cutaway diagrams.
A contact fuze, impact fuze, percussion fuze or direct-action (D.A.) fuze (UK) is the fuze that is placed in the nose of a bomb or shell so that it will detonate on contact with a hard surface.