Experiment guided simulation of multi-fragment impact into PBXs

Multi-fragment impact of energetic materials can provide the impetus initiation and growth to detonation when shockwaves from these discrete fragments collide. The Sandia hydrocode CTH is used with reactive burn modeling to identify relationships between spherical fragment separation distances, variable fragment arrival timing, and initiability in energetic materials. This work demonstrates that detonation is most likely to occur is when multiple fragments collide with a surface simultaneously, because of the cumulative pressure rise of two equal colliding waves compared to the colliding waves generated by fragment impacts offset in time.