L-244 Resonantacoustic® Mixing: Processing And Safety

New processing technologies are allowing researchers, industry and academia to probe new materials space not previously achievable. These technologies include additive manufacturing and ResonantAcoustic® Mixing (RAM) which are being demonstrated to reduce processing times, environmental impact and of course cost. With the introduction of any new technology it is imperative that users, managers and national bodies provide the resources and time to determine, understand and provide guidance associated with the safe operating envelope. Combining the RAM with energetic materials requires numerous steps and iterations to generate the required knowledge.

Several international and national organisations have taken a proactive approach to share experiences within the field. MSIAC has been working with the community to review the steps taken to provide the safety assurance and, more recently, providing a forum for energetic materials qualification discussions; a separate paper will be published in another international conference on this topic. This paper is divided into three parts; the first provides a comparison of existing process technologies for energetic materials and how the community has approached using RAM for each of the energetic material sectors. The second part of the paper provides a summary of a review on how RAM users had provided safety assurance in using the technology with energetic materials. The third part covers how the community is using fundamental and applied research to continue in understanding the technology and where the benefits may lie. It is noted that this field is young therefore information contained herein will change in the future.