A Review of the Application of Al/PTFE Reactive Materials in Damage and Defense Applications

Reactive materials (RMs), or impact-initiated energetic materials, as one of the energetic materials (EMs) possess higher mechanical strength, energy, and safety. In addition, RMs can be initiated under high dynamic loads or high static loads and induce multiple-mechanism damage including both kinetic energy damage and additional explosion or deflagration damage, which has a clear advantage to damage fuel tanks, covered charges, and metal plates. Among all the RMs, the Aluminum/Polytetrafluoroethylene (Al/PTFE) was the most representative and has received extensive attention from various aspects, such as the shock-induced reaction (SIR) mechanism, static and dynamic mechanical behavior, impact energy release properties, the application of space debris shield structure, and so on. It is interesting that the Al/PTFE reactive materials can not only be used in the shaped charge as the reactive jet to improve kinetic energy penetration and chemical implosion combined with damage ability but can also be used in protective structure or Semi-Energetic Reactive Armor (SERA) against the impact from hypervelocity debris due to its shock-induced properties. To make a long story short, the relevant research contents in recent years are summarized in this work to promote the wide application of Al/PTFE in the military field in the future.