Effect of aluminium in propellant composition on acoustic emission parameters (Short Communication)

Abstract

The study reports the variation in acoustic emission signals acquired during combustion of typical propellants with varying aluminium and ammonium perchlorate content. It was observed that when propellant strands having the same composition undergo combustion under similar conditions, they produce consistent acoustic emission signals. To study the effect of variation of aluminium content in the propellant composition on the acoustic emission produced during combustion, the aluminium content was varied from 6 per cent to 18 per cent in a HTPB-based composite propellant with 86 per cent solid loading. Experiments were carried out with propellant strands under the same conditions for a comparative study. Acoustic emission parameters, such as peak amplitude, ring-down counts, average frequency, hits and energy were studied as functions of time. Among these parameters, only energy ring-down counts and frequency varied significantly with aluminium content. The effect of cumulative values of energy, frequency and ring-down counts, the effect of burn rate and theoretical specific impulse against the aluminium percentage variation, and the variation of specific impulse against acoustic energy can all be correlated. The clear trend is indicative of possible prediction of propellant performance parameter like specific impulse from acoustic emission parameters.