O-050 Outline of the NIMIC Workshop on Small-scale Testing and Modelling (January 2000)

Member nations of NIMIC expressed the desire to reduce the amount of full-scale testing associated with IM assessment. As a spin-off, any improvement in IM assessment techniques would also be of assistance to those with the responsibilities for safety and suitability for service and hazard classification assessment.

The purposes of the Workshop are to improve the understanding of the mechanisms of initiation of deflagration and the prediction of the response of munitions to thermomechanical threats by using small scale testing and modelling information. This will be accomplished via presentations and workshop discussion.

The workshop includes an initial period of scene-setting and the presentation of a number of papers intended to ensure that all participants have the same information basis. The attendees will be divided into groups interested in modelling or testing in order to discuss, respectively, what small-scale tests are available and what data are required by modellers to develop improved models. The results of these discussions will be presented at a second plenary session and then the attendees will be split into groups of thermal modellers and testers and mechanical modellers and testers in order to take advantage of interactions in answering such questions as, “what do modellers require?”, “what can testers offer?” and “what new tests and models need to be developed to meet the shortfall?”

The final session will receive the reports from these groups and agree a set of conclusions. The whole of the meeting will be recorded for later publication by NIMIC staff for distribution to NIMIC nations.