Explosives: “the concept behind explosives revolves around the volume change which occurs when a component in solid or liquid form changes into gas form. Explosives of decent quality in solid form will change into gas form in a very short amount of time. In mines ammoniumnitrate mixed with diesel oil is used”*
*) Not using proper chemistry terms, no.
For example in mines they use ammoniumnitrate (NH4NO3). 25 kgs of NH4NO3 results in something like 70 m³ of “gas” (N2, O2, H2O), though this is a presumption based on the temperature of the resulting gasses reaching ~450 C. During a more powerful detonation the released gasses can reach several thousand degrees, at which point they generate a shock wave spreading faster than the speed of sound.
(This all is more or less copied and poorly translated from my chemistry book — I just thought it was kind of amusing that they went into such amount of detail over explosives. And noMrBushImNotOutToGetYou.)
