nitramine?

[Terry Collins]

Anyone seen the movie The Italian Job? They use this high explosive gel and paint it on the ceiling to get to the safe above. They call it nitramine.
Now, I know there's often a big difference between movies and reality (not to say that it is often a load of bullshit you get to see, with a few exceptions).
But I was just wondering if such an explosive exists and is used commercially or military wise: a gel that they put/paint in small layers on an object and detonate it.
I know that with sheet explosives you need a certain thickness to be able to detonate it, I think about a 1/2 ". And there are certainly explosive gels (or foams: I was just thinking about the LEXfoam which can be used in the same way but it has to be sprayed on very thick and hasn't a great detonation velocity).
So has anyone some information on paintable explosive gels?

[peterthesmart]

It does exist, I haven't found too much info on how its made yet. Whatever it is, the military seems to have some problems with groundwater contamination from it. Here are some links.
http://www.clu-in.org/conf/tio/explosives_082801/Determ.pdf

http://www.uxoinfo.com/uxoinfo/ordfillers.cfm for this one go down to where is says Trinitrotoluene and it'll mention nitramine being used as a high velocity detonator.

[vulture]

Nitramines are a class of compounds.
The name comes from nitro-amine, having the following general structure: N-NO2

The H of the amine (or imine) has been replaced by a nitrogroup.
Well known representatives of this class are HMX and RDX.

[Madog555]

here is something relateing to NH2-NO2
http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=950

i did a few searches on google about nitramine and didnt find anything

there must be something on it in COPAE but i havent looked yet, i only have the PDF and its a pain

[Madog555]

i just looked in COPAE, hahaha

page 369, argh, it explodes on contact with concentrated H2SO4! nooooooo

not a very stable substance, decomposes at 72-73C

[zeocrash]

isn't nitramine another name for tetryl (picrylnitromethylamine)
IIRC tetryl is very expensive so isn't used very much

[Cyclonite]

Well im not sure if your looking to use such an explosive in an application as you have seen in the movie, if you are it wont work (on a thick floor such as the one in the movie). Having the explosive spread out over a large area will produce a good amount of stress though. If its enough stress the floor will simply fracture and fall under its own weight. Explosive sheets can be made quite thin, less than 1/2". Im sure there’s something you could add to NG to make it more of a paste and to be able to hold its own weight though. You would want an explosive with high brisance for this application.

[FireFly]

As Vulture said in an earlier post, nitramines are simply a class of compounds, some of the explosives in this class are, Tetryl, Methylene dinitramine, Ammonium dinitramide, Potassium dinitramide, et cetra. There is a second class of nitramines, the "Cyclic nitramines" in which Composition B, RDX, C4, C3, Tetramine, HMX, and many more explosive compositions fall under. Maybe this could be of some help. This information came from "The Preparatory Manual Of Explosives"

[Mr Cool]

Oh no no no.
The A, B and C series of compositions (ie, the Comp B and C3, C4 you mentioned) are not nitramine explosives. They are mixtures that are based on a nitramine explosive, RDX.

[FireFly]

Originally posted by Mr Cool
Oh no no no.
The A, B and C series of compositions (ie, the Comp B and C3, C4 you mentioned) are not nitramine explosives. They are mixtures that are based on a nitramine explosive, RDX.

Thanks for the correction, sorry about the mix up.

[Terry Collins]

So nitramine is a whole class of compounds and not a name for a specific explosive. That's part of my question answered, thanks.
But still I would like to know wether there are 'paintable' explosives.
I mentioned LEXfoam and sheet explosives (RDX based), so there might be a chance it really exists.

[knowledgehungry]

NC/AP in Acetone should be paintable, Just need to get the ratios right.

[vulture]

I guess octanitrocubane polymer would make a nice paint/moldable explosive, but it's already taking a large chunk out of some defense budgets, so you can basically forget it...

[nbk2000]

PETN is used in scabbling, which is shock fracturing concrete, to remove nuke contaminants from reactor shields.

ETN is similar to PETN, and even more shock sensitive, and much more readily made to boot, so it would seem like just the thing for using in this kind of application. :)

[cutefix]

"This information came from "The Preparatory Manual Of Explosives"
Preparatory manual of explosives?
Don’t bother…..
The information there although in some areas chemically detailed implies the author has no actual or practical experience in explosives…
:p

I do not think that there is such thing as directly paintable explosives..
Indeed there exist these so called foam explosives that can be spread with a scraper or a palette knife in the same way a painter may do his oil paint in the easel.I think that was you are thinking about.
LEXFOAM IIRC is not a nitramine based explosive but made from nitromethane mixed with propellant to be suitable of spraying for demining purposes. But this is a low velocity explosive due to its highly foamed consistency ( low density) so would not be practical for cracking sturdy safes or even penetrating surfaces as shaped charges explosive.
The most practical way would be using the explosive with ( the adhesive coating) a sheeted explosives containing 68% RDX and the plasticizer may be nitrocellulose or an inert plastic and sticking that detaflex type nitramine explosive on the target area.

I have not seen that movie anyway so I cannot comment about the veracity of the claim.
I guess octanitrocubane polymer would make a nice paint/moldable explosive, but it's already taking a large chunk out of some defense budgets, so you can basically forget it...
That difficult to synthesize HE as paint moldable explosives?
It may take years for this material to be of practical value for the military and would take more time (ages )if it ever it would to be of use to civilians.
Think about TNT it has been a military explosive for about 140 years but where in civilian application was it used, seldom. It may have been used as sensitizers in certain ammonium nitrate industrial explosives but never in significant quantities if compared to other cost effective explosives.
Going back to ONC….
The crooks can earn more money if they will sell such exotic and presumably very expensive explosives( if it already exists) than using them for the simple purpose of stealing something.
;)

Just remember these movie making folks want to stun the audience and what they describes can be mostly pure gimmicry.,, similar to James bond stuff…
;)

[knowledgehungry]

It's possible to have paintable explosives, alomst anyone will do i would think, you just need a suitable solvent and plasticizer.

[nbk2000]

The crooks can earn more money if they will sell such exotic and presumably very expensive explosives( if it already exists) than using them for the simple purpose of stealing something.


And who would they be selling it to? Other crooks who'd be using it for the simple purpose of stealing something. ;)

Though if the crim was sophisticated enough to be brewing up HNIW or ONC, then they probably wouldn't be dealing with fucktards who'd be going after "simple" things, more like BIG things. Oh, and wouldn't the feds be interested in finding someone who's selling state-of-the-art military explosives on the street? :p

You'd be better off using it yourself, one less person in the loop to rat on you.

And I doubt that it's simple to make any explosive paintable. There's the problem of minimum thickness needed to propagate the shockwave, the gurney value, binder compability, etc.

[cutefix]

Though if the crim was sophisticated enough to be brewing up HNIW or ONC, then they probably wouldn't be dealing with fucktards who'd be going after "simple" things, more like BIG things. Oh, and wouldn't the feds be interested in finding someone who's selling state-of-the-art military explosives on the street?
If the creator of this explosive Octanitrocubane Dr Phil Eaton remarked that it is too expensive to synthesize to make a practical military explosive.
He even said that striking it with a hammer does not initiate it( which is unlike many explosives) which makes it very attractive material for the military in their quest of powerful insensitive high explosives.(IHE) in the same line as TATB but of much better explosive performance.
So that is why if its that costly to make and difficult to initiate why would somebody waste ( and risk of being unsuccesful)it to do a certain job that can be done much better and surely reliable and cheaper alternative) ….
;)

He would be comfortable using the well known sheeted explosives based on PETN and RDX.
If I am that person(doing such safecracking work) I would not dream of getting such exotic material for my hasty explosive application.
And if supposing it came into my hands out of sheer luck and recognized about its uniqueness I would not use of sell it either but keep it.
:D

I do not believe there is such a crook that exist that would use such sophisticated explosive for common safecracking work. And if you purposely planned to make such explosive
Knowing the complex process of manufacturing such materials:
Then you must be have a good chemical background( a real chemist maybe) to synthesize such technically complex explosives HNIW and ONC in reasonable good quality and quantity..
. Then what are you doing stealing a safe when you can have a stable job in the explosive industry.
And if you are crooked enough and really have a mercenary mind you can sell your technical talents to the well known enemies of democracy.
:p

[tarvos]

First off it isn't nitramine it is nitramon. (You can read the can.) Nitramon was developed in 1934 by DuPont. Typically it is 92% ammonium nitrate, 4% dinitrotoluene, and 4% paraffin wax. Some grades contain metallic ingredients such as aluminum and ferrosilicon. It does come in cans, as shown, but usually they are used whole or stacked. As for it's ability to be poured and painted I can't tell you anything about that. It is difficult to detonate though, det cord, commerical blasting caps, small caliber ammunition or shock and friction will not set it off. It needs quite a large primer to do anything. Nitromex is similiar but much stronger because it contains TNT and a metallic ingrediant. Both however have been largely replaced by water gels (at least in mining applications). But it made for a great movie.