Stability control and evaluation for Homogeneous Solid Propellant (HSP) are of paramount importance for securing ammunition storage warehouses and weapon systems. In the current work, a new procedure for the stability control of HSP was established by combining spectral, thermal, and chemometric tools. Analyses were performed on three similar HSPs naturally aged up to 31 years and subjected to artificial aging (during 12 months at 338.65 K with sampling every 2 months). FTIR analysis showed a decrease in the intensities of the characteristic bands with natural/artificial aging progress. Vacuum Stability Test (VST) experiments carried out at five isothermal temperatures (333.15 K, 343.15 K, 353.15 K, 363.15 K, and 373.15 K) highlighted three degradation stages during HSP aging. Two kinetic approaches, viz , model‐fitting and model‐free have been applied to VST data in order to evaluate the kinetic parameters. The activation energy for the HSP degradation reaction was found to decrease with natural/artificial aging progress. Furthermore, the application of the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to FTIR spectra allows classifying efficiently the samples according to their stability properties. Moreover, the loading plots pointed out the most influenced bands by aging processes. A model, which connected the mean intensity of these bands to the activation energy of the sample, was established. Furthermore, the limit of propellant stability was estimated based on the prediction of the storage lifetimes. The relative error on the activation energy associated with the obtained model was found to be less than 2 % during natural aging up to 20 years and 6 % during artificial aging up to 12 months.

中文翻译：

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结合真空稳定性试验，FTIR和PCA的均质固体推进剂稳定性控制新方法

均质固体推进剂（HSP）的稳定性控制和评估对于确保弹药储存仓库和武器系统至关重要。在当前的工作中，通过结合光谱，热学和化学计量学工具，建立了HSP稳定性控制的新程序。对天然老化至31年并经受人工老化（在338.65 K下的12个月内，每2个月采样）的三个类似的HSP进行了分析。FTIR分析表明，随着自然/人工老化的进展，特征谱带的强度降低。在五个等温温度（333.15 K，343.15 K，353.15 K，363.15 K和373.15 K）下进行的真空稳定性测试（VST）实验强调了HSP老化过程中的三个降解阶段。两种动力学方法，即，模型拟合和无模型已应用于VST数据，以评估动力学参数。发现用于HSP降解反应的活化能随着自然/人工老化过程而降低。此外，将主成分分析（PCA）应用于FTIR光谱可根据样品的稳定性对样品进行有效分类。此外，加载图还指出了老化过程中影响最大的频段。建立了将这些条带的平均强度与样品的活化能联系起来的模型。此外，基于储存寿命的预测来估算推进剂稳定性的极限。