Manganese Heptoxide / Xylene

[Axt]

As you may know, contact between Mn2O7 and xylene results in a violent explosion. The plan here was to spread a cloud of xylene followed by a cloud of Mn2O7 resulting in an "FAE" type explosion.

2KMnO4 + H2SO4 --> Mn2O7 + K2SO4 + H2O

Two small jars were setup, first containing xylene, second KMnO4/H2SO4. To spread the explosive cloud the jars were simply placed one in front of the other and shot.

I cant say for sure what happened, whether the Mn2O7 simply detonated when struck by the bullet or it was in fact spread into a cloud, but the vapour cloud seems to have ignited all at once.

Anyway. view the movie (http://geocities.com/roguemovies2/) and judge for yourself.

Hardly practical , but amusing.

[DBSP]

At least it lookes really good. Do you have any idea of the power of the cloud if it had any at all?

What ammounts of chems where you using? and with what did you shoot the container with?

And how large was the fireball? Is it a brick that is located in to the left in the movie? if it is I have quite a good idea of the size of the cloud.

[Axt]

No noticeable power, though there was nothing in its vacinity to gauge it (the plant in foreground is on opposite side of gully).

About 60ml xylene to 25g KMnO4 / 15ml H2SO4 (wasnt measured). So the explosive reaction beteen Xylene/Mn2O7 was only used in multiple ignitions in a FAE cloud rather then giving power in itself.

The bottles used hold 60ml with the bullet (.25-06) coming in at about 4 o'clock from camera. Its not a brick but close enough in size for comparison.

[nbk2000]

Tiny amounts in the open isn't going to do much noticable damage to anything.

However...if you were to set off a kilo of this in a room...then you'd have a nice thermobaric effect that should blow it all to hell. :)

It went from sitting in the bottle to fully burnt in one frame (1/30th second). That's fast enough to create a shockwave if there's enough of it burning. Two bottles, one inside the other, with a central burster would get the two chemicals together fast enough to create the explosion.

[Madog555]

today after seeing that video i decided to react Mn2O7 with xylene.

i put a few drops of xylene on a piece of wood, held an eye dropper above it and dropeda drop of Mn2o7 onto it.

it detonated on contact. causeing my ears to ring. the flash was orange and about 3cm x 3cm

[Flake2m]

If the MnO7 and Xylene creates a violent explosion you could use the reaction as an initiator to an FAE.
I would avoid keeping the two compound together any longer then was nessecary. However since only 15ml of MnO7 was capable of creating a fireball then maybe you'd only need that amount to ignite 1L of xylene.
If 15ml of MnO7 is all thats needed to set off 1L of xylene then once it has reacted with the xylene the fireball creating from the reaction would allow the rest of the Xylene to react with the surrounding air.
This method would not need a secondary charge to ignite the Xylene only a priamary charge to disperse the Xylene, this would make the device easier to construct.

SWIM could test the pressure of the device by having several props made of different materials and at varing distances away. After the device was tested SWIM could detirmine the power of the charge by the number of props knocked over and any damage done to them by such things like heat and how intact they are.

[Axt]

The original idea was an FAE if you read the first paragraph. Reason being that you would need 14x more Mn₂O₇ then xylene for complete combustion - impossible/stupid to try making that much heptoxide, therefore you make use of the atmospheric oxygen in an FAE.

Youll note from the movie that it started to decompose before it was shot, probably due to an exothermic reaction, I wouldnt try to isolate/confine it.

You may be able to improve on the FAE effect in larger charges by diluting the xylene with another hydrocarbon or simular so the clouds/air can mix well before igniting, just an idea but I dont think you will find a practical yet safe way of utilising it.

That safest route may be to find a flamable liquid that will disolve a large amount of KMnO4, and disperse this liquid with concentrated H2SO4, creating the Mn2O7 in the cloud rather then in the device. I dont know of any fuel that would allow this but . :(

[ALENGOSVIG1]

Recently i've been thinking of making an FAE using KMnO4 and H2O2. A mix of acetone/H2O2 (35%) would be poured into a bottle, and a length of det cord inside a larger tube filled with KMnO4 would be inserted in the neck of the bottle.

Upon detonation the KMnO4 would mix with the H2O2 creating a cloud of O2 and acetone vapour. :D :cool:

[simply RED]

I have tried it with acetone and it does not work well. Acetone mixes with the water and the resaulting mixture does not evaporate fast enough.
The best resault was achieved using "greasy paint" solvent. AKA "koreselin".
It also works with gasoline or other fast evaporating oil fraction.

I don't have place to try 2,3 liters of this in enclosed space.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

Gas isn't miscible in acetone and that would decrease the effectiveness of the device greatly. Besides, why would it matter if the fuel doesn't evapourate quickly? It's going to be atomized by a charge of high explosives. :D

I do think higher concentration H2O2 would be more suitable as it would be more space efficient and would make the device much more effective.

But I don't have access to high conc. H2O2 and I don't want to concerntrate it so oh well. :(

[vulture]

"Bind" the water by adding H2SO4 to your H2O2 solution... :D

[GreenCoat]

Cool video. I don't have much to add here. Mn2O7, as you know, is produced by adding finely powdered KMnO4 to cold concentrated H2SO4. It is recommended that the sulfuric acid sit in an ice/salt bath as you are adding the KMnO4 and swirling the H2SO4 as you are doing so to help keep any 'hot spots' from developing. When you've added the stoichiometrically correct amount of KMnO4, if you want to isolate Mn2O7, ice-cold distilled water is added drop-wise. The key is to keep the temperature as low as possible. Mn2O7 will separate as a dark red oil at the bottom of the test tube because of its high density of 2.4 g/ml. If 'hot spots' did develop, then some of the oxide decomposes to O2 and MnO2 and the heptoxide will have a more brown/red color to it. The Handbook of Chemistry and Physics (72 Ed.) lists the melting point of Mn2O7 as 5.9*C, but the reaction is exothermic enough that the temperature will stay well above the melting point. The temperature of decomposition is 55*C and the purple vapor you see is purportedly Mn2O7 as it's decomposing according to Mellor's if I recall correctly. Explosive decomposition occurs at 95*C.

All this to say that you may fare better by keeping the reaction cooler, isolating the oxide, and then removing it from an ice bath right before experimenting.

FAE devices that use both a fuel and oxidizer, other than atmospheric O2, are notoriously difficult to design and implement for practical purposes. The ones used currently by the military only rely on atmospheric O2 as the oxidizer. But one purpose of using a FAE device is to *use up* the surrounding oxygen, so a fuel-oxidizer combination may not be the ideal system anyway. I think we can at least all empathize with the difficulty in making these systems work.

[Desmikes]

There was a thread about accidents and I was too embarraces to share this story but it seems to fit here. So.. Back in a day I decided to see if I can make some colored AP and perhaps get a better Oxygen ballance if I were to add KMnO4 to the mix. I dissolved as much KMno4 in the acetone as I could and started adding ice-cold 35% H2O2 but every drop reacted with the catalyst and produced a lot of gas. Soon I realized that that was getting me nowhere and decided to at least watch a match burn in access of O2 (I figured that those must be H2O and O2 gas inside the icebath). I got a loud BOOOM and lost my hair in the process. Some acetone must have evaporated as well b/c the thing was boiling. But the point is that it didn't just burn like a plastic bag full of propane + air, it detonated in the open.:eek:

[xyz]

Just acetone vapour and pure oxygen, nothing too special.

[YayItGoBoom!]

If you don't mind me asking I have a few questions about Xylene. I have not heard of it that much, I have heard it called dimethylbenzene, Megalomania turns up nothing. I found out it is used as a paint solvent, I have some Klean Swipe brand paint thinner, it has that kind of sweet paint thinner smell (is this xylene?). Is yours commercial, or did you synthesis it yourself? I am interested in creating a simple, economic, yet effective thermobaric device (NOT k3wl bomb).

[Axt]

I cant tell you much more then I buy it in the hardware store, in the cement section in a container marked "Xylene" though it isnt common.

Paint thinner could be any mix of hydrocarbons, they all smell too simular to differentuate with typed words. Xylene seems to be the most energetic in contact with Mn2O7, but doesnt mean other fuels wont work equally as well for your purpose.

Wonder if there is another powerful oxidizer that ignites in contact with a fuel? could H2O2 or HNO3 at near 100% be used to ignite an FAE cloud? with what fuel?

[xyz]

I am not sure if they could be used, but they can both ingite flammable substances on contact.

I wonder how hellhoffite (HNO3 and nitrobenzene) would fare if dispersed as an FAE, an excess of nitrobenzene would probably help.

[Axt]

I know they can ignite flammable things, though I dont know of a particular fuel that ignites readily in combination with them. Ideally you would have two miscible liquid fuels with one igniting too fast and the other too slow, by varying the ratio of fuels you vary the delay time before ignition. Its not without its problems, notably temperature, but its a fun concept to think about.

Concentrated H2O2 probably has the most promise ... but what fuel is the question?

HNO3/nitrobenzene being a binary explosive in its own right I wouldnt think would gain much from dispersal and ignition, actually it would probably detonate as your trying to disperse it if its as sensitive as HNNM.

[GreenCoat]

Originally posted by Axt
I know they can ignite flammable things, though I dont know of a particular fuel that ignites readily in combination with them. Ideally you would have two miscible liquid fuels with one igniting too fast and the other too slow, by varying the ratio of fuels you vary the delay time before ignition. Its not without its problems, notably temperature, but its a fun concept to think about.

Concentrated H2O2 probably has the most promise ... but what fuel is the question?

HNO3/nitrobenzene being a binary explosive in its own right I wouldnt think would gain much from dispersal and ignition, actually it would probably detonate as your trying to disperse it if its as sensitive as HNNM.

If you're interested in this topic, you would enjoy the book Ignition: An informal History of Liquid Rocket Propellants by John D. Clark, 1972 by Rutgers University, ISBN: 0-8135-0725-1. In the development of liquid rocket propellants, the ideal combinations included those that were hypergolic (igniting on contact with or without a delay). Because of other constraints such as thrust requirements, stability, storability, etc. they came up with some interesting combinations. HNO3 or N2O4 + N2H4 comes to mind. H2O2 is simply too tempermental, especially when handling larger quantities. HNO3 (fuming) will ignite turpentine and furfuryl alcohol on contact.

[Axt]

Steering clear of the exotics like N2O4 & N2H4, what do you mean by H2O2 being temperamental? too unstable at high concentrations? delay too variable with temperature? all of the above and more?

What concentrations of H2O2 are hypergolic, it can be frozen to 62%, heated to ..........? (someone fill that in) so maybe if it is too unstable at 95+% it could be used in lower concentrations then HNO3?. Ive tried mixing HNO3/turps but nothing happened, HNO3 at ~90% (weighed) doesnt seem to be enough unless its only hypergolic as a mist.

I dont know what im talking about here, im just typing out sentences so someone can correct them.

Try not to quote entire posts, people will jump on you for it, especially if your replying to the immediately prior post.

[GreenCoat]

To clarify:

H2O2 decomposes exothermically, whereas HNO3 does not. 35% to 90%+ concentrations (H2O2) are stable sitting in a plastic bottle. But many organic substance, metals and metal oxides will catalyse its breakdown. Agitation or contact with rough surfaces will also accelerate its decomposition. In the higher concentrations, this occurs explosively. This is why phosphoric acid is added as a stabilizer in small amounts (a few percent)--it reacts with any metal oxides and renders them catalytically inert as phosphates.

I can't explain why your HNO3/turpentine didn't work. 90%+ is more than enough concentration for the turpentine to ignite in the liquid state.

In the Ignition book I referenced above, the author goes into detail about HNO3, H2O2 and many other oxidizers. Get the book through inter-library loan. I haven't found it on the net except for very expensive used copies. After reading it, you'll see that it will have answered just about all the questions you may have had on the topic.

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Quote:Try not to quote entire posts, people will jump on you for it, especially if your replying to the immediately prior post.
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So noted.

[vulture]

Piranha fluid, 4 parts 98% H2SO4 to one part 35% H2O2, will ignite most flammable substances upon contact. Mixing with HNO3 might improve performance, but I don't dare to say anything about stability.

EDIT:

A very interesting mixture might be the following: Mix acetone and KMnO4 in a bottle, piranha fluid in another one and mix when ignition is desired...

Should be spectacular....