Gun Propellant with Low Temperature Coefficient

One of the most important objective of gun propellant research is to increase muzzle kinetic energy and system performances (enhanced rang, hit probability and terminal effectiveness on target). Researches show that the solid propellants for barreled weapons are used in several temperature conditions. For example, when a weapon is fired, the propellant is submitted to temperatures ranges of - 40 °C to +50 °C. The main result is a loss in the shoot precision due to the material degradation. In the case of conventional propellants (single base, double base and triple base), ballistic parameters (as chamber pressure and muzzle velocity) are highly dependent to the temperature variation. In these propellants, there is a great change in chamber pressure and muzzle velocity by variation of temperature in a specific range. Therefore by reducing or eliminating the temperature coefficient of propellant, performance of propulsion system increases significantly. In This kind of novel propellant named low temperature coefficient (LTC) gun propellant, there is a reduction in temperature coefficient by change of formulation. In this paper meanwhile introduction of this new propellant and investigation of adjusting factor of temperature coefficient, we have compared ballistic performance and safety parameters of this new propellant with conventional propellant.