Facile Preparation of a Lightweight Energetic Composite µAl/NGO and Its Catalytic Effect on Thermal Decomposition of Ammonium Perchlorate

The application of lightweight carbon materials and their composites in solid propellants, especially graphene and its derivatives as combustion catalysts in the combustion performance regulation of propellants have attracted attention in the field of aerospace propulsion. The energetic composite µAl/NGO was prepared using nitrated graphene oxide (NGO) and micron-aluminum powder (µAl) as raw materials by solution method. The structure and morphology of the composite was characterized by elemental analysis, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy. The thermal properties of the composite were analyzed by TG-DSC test results. The results show that µAl is uniformly distributed on the surface of NGO, and the crystal structure of µAl is not changed. In the temperature range of 300–450°C, µAl/NGO explodes, and it is a rapid exothermic reaction with a peak temperature of 364°C. In this temperature range, the decomposition of NGO and the oxidation of µAl occurred simultaneously by TG results. Compared with the enthalpy of oxidation exothermic process of the pure µAl at 557°C (2274 J/g), the enthalpy of decomposition and oxidation exothermic processes of µAl/NGO is increased to 10484 J/g, which is nearly 5 times higher than that of the pure µAl. The result of μAl/NGO catalytic behavior on the thermal decomposition of ammonium perchlorate (AP) indicate that μAl/NGO has little effect on the low temperature thermal decomposition of AP, but the peak of high temperature thermal decomposition advances from 404 to 364°C. The kinetic analysis results show that the activation energy of the high-temperature exothermic reaction of AP is increased by nearly 100 kJ/mol.