Critical temperatures for the thermal explosion of liquid organic peroxides

Abstract

Abstract A procedure is presented herein to calculate the critical temperature for the thermal explosion (hereafter symbolized as T c ) of an arbitrary quantity of thermally unstable liquid placed in an arbitrary container, by measuring experimentally the rate of heat transfer from the container as well as the rate of heat generation of the liquid sample in temperature increments of 1.25 K. The T c values of ten liquid organic peroxides are then calculated in accordance with the above procedure for the practical situation arising when the liquids are either in a Dewar flask which is used in the BAM (Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und ‐prüfung, Berlin) heat‐accumulation storage test or in a 5‐ or a 10‐L polyethylene container which are used by the peroxide manufacturing company for carrying 5‐ or 10‐kg quantities of liquid organic peroxides to the users. For the Dewar flask, the corresponding measured values were available, and they showed good agreement with the calculated ones. The new findings introduced in this article are that there is a prospect that one can predict the result of a BAM test by calculation for a solid as well as for a liquid; in addition, for liquids, there is also a possibility that one can calculate the T c value of an arbitrary quantity of liquid placed in an arbitrary container.