• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.30 no.5
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• pp.591-596
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• 2019

A recently developed propellant, ammonium dinitramide (ADN, $NH_4N(NO_2)_2$ is stable and safe at an ambient condition. However, it requires high purity for practical applications. A very little quantity of foreign impurities in ADN may cause clogging of thruster nozzles and catalyst poisoning for the use of a liquid propellant. Thus, several purification processes for precipitated ADN particles such as repetition extraction, activated carbon adsorption and low-temperature extraction were presented in this study. The purifying methods helped to improve the chemical purity as evaluated by FT-IR and UV-Vis spectroscopy in addition to ion chromatography (IC) analyses. Among the purification processes, adsorption was found to be the best, showing a final purity of 99.8% based on relative quantification by IC. Thermal analysis revealed an exothermic temperature of $148^{\circ}C$ for the synthesized liquid monopropellant, but rose to $188^{\circ}C$ when urea was added.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.397-401
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• 2016

A new solid oxidizer, pyridinium dinitramide (Py-DN) is a low toxic energetic material which can be utilized as a HPGP (high performance green propellant). In this work, Py-DN was synthesized using various starting materials including potassium sulfamate, pyridine hydrochloride, strong nitric acid and sulfuric acid. Physical and chemical properties of the Py-DN were characterized using UV-Vis, FT-IR and a thermal analyzer and their properties were compared to those of previously prepared salts including ammonium dinitramide[ADN, $NH_4N(NO_2)_2$] and guanidine dinitramide[GDN, $NH_2C(NH_2)NH_2N(NO_2)_2$] in our lab. Endothermic and exothermic decomposition temperatures of Py-DN were $77.4^{\circ}C$ and $144.7^{\circ}C$, respectively. The combustion caloric value was 1739 J/g, which is thermally more sensitive than that of conventional dinitramides. It may enable to lower the decomposition temperature, which can reduce preheating temperature required for satellite thruster applications.