Molecules: You'd better learn to live with them.
Ethylene glycol dinitrate is simply the dinitrate ester of ethylene glycol - putting glycol under the same reaction conditions that yield the primitive nitro explosives, like nitroglycerin or TNT, yields this compound. Why's it important? It has a decent vapor pressure.
The volatility allows the compound to be detected by dogs and those machines they use at the airport. While it's explosive, it has nowhere near the destructive power of what it's mixed with. Manufacturers add it (and similar compounds, lately) to their explosives as a so-called "taggant." It doesn't affect performance, but it does make it easier to detect them. Think of it like mixing stinky thiols with natural gas.
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Comments
Actually EGN is just as powerful as nitroglycerin. It was a popular additive in dynamite ecplosives, added sometimes in considerable amounts to lower the freezing point of NG. The disadvantage over NG is the higher vapor tension (= more headache upon inhalation)
Posted by: milkshake | November 14, 2007 11:09 PM
You mean higher vapor pressure? Maybe I've just not heard that terminology before...
Posted by: Vince Noir | November 15, 2007 11:44 AM
Small molecule with a healthy dose of nitro groups with a flexible ether chain should be good as a plasticiser in a mix with other things, whilst not lowering the oxygen balance too much.
Posted by: Cybernautix | December 28, 2007 8:43 PM