Formable Reactive Metal Composites with Tailorable Energy Release Properties

Structural reactive materials (SRM) are materials that define the strength and structure and have an added benefit of exothermically reacting with properly initiated. This class of materials has been manufactured and studied for more than a decade with emphasis on higher strengths and higher density materials. This work will focus on fabrication of a low-strength and high-elongation metal composite with the objective of creating an SRM that can be formed and extruded. Extending from Lockheed’s ICEPK technology, EMPI will fabricate metal composites with higher concentrations of ductile metal alloy binders. The goal is not to achieve maximum reaction energy, but to achieve maximum utility of the final SRM by create similar mechanical properties to other sheet and wire metals such as aluminum. A matrix of formulations will be fabricated and tested for formability, tensile strength, compressive strength, exothermic energy density, reaction onset temperature, and activation energy.