Electrospinning Preparation of NC/GAP/Submicron-HNS Energetic Composite Fiber and its Properties

[Image: see text] In this work, novel three-dimensional nitrocellulose/glycidyl azide polymer/submicron-2,2′, 4,4′, 6,6′-hexanitro-stilbene (NC/GAP/submicron-HNS) composite fibers were prepared by the electrospinning method. As-prepared NC/GAP/submicron-HNS fibers were continuous and possessed a large specific surface area. The structure of fibers was characterized by energy-dispersive X-ray, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (IR). The results showed that HNS submicron particles were uniformly loaded on the surface of NC/GAP fibers and incorporated with it. Thermal analyses were performed. Such NC/GAP/submicron-HNS fibers showed a low activation energy of 204 kJ·mol(–1) and large rate constant of 1.74 s(–1), indicating high reactivity and fast reaction rate. The result of TG-IR analysis revealed that the main decomposition products of NC/GAP/submicron-HNS were CO(2), CO, H(2)O, N(2)O, few NO, and fragments such as −CH(2)O– and −CH–, which were low-signature gases. An evaluation on the energy performance disclosed that the standard specific impulse (I(sp)) of NC/GAP/submicron-HNS fibers was 2032 N·s·kg(–1), which was higher than 2014 N·s·kg(–1) of NC/GAP. This meant the addition of HNS submicron particles to the NC/GAP fiber was favorable to the improvement of energy performance. Additionally, introduction of submicron-HNS made the energetic fibers becoming very insensitive to impact action. It was expected that as-prepared NC/GAP/submicron-HNS membranes were promising materials applied for solid rocket propellant.