ANFO


Ammonium
Nitrate
Fuel
Oil

Want to see some kick arse explosives in action eh? Well you've come to the right place.

All blokes love things that go bang don't we?
If you don't and call yourself a bloke, well all I can say to you is get your fat arse back to the kitchen, fetch me a beer and cook my dinner bitch!

Real blokes, read on:

As the name suggests ANFO is a mixture of Ammonium Nitrate (referred to from here on in as 'AN' or 'prill') and Fuel Oil (or diesel).
It is the most manufactured explosive in the industrialised world primarily because:
a) It's cheap
b) It's powerful
c) It's stable

It's main application is for blasting in mining and quarrying applications, where one requires a sizable chunk of rock / dirt / land to be fragmented for easy handling by your machines. Can you imagine a machine trying to chip away at an expanse of bedrock? Very time consuming and costly. Enter ANFO.

All you need to do is get yourself a drilling rig, drill some holes in a calculated pattern (I wont go into pattern drilling and fragmentation calcs here, that's a whole course in itself) load the holes with ANFO, set a primer charge of high explosives for detonation, let it rip then stand back and enjoy the show!

How do I make some ANFO?
Well I'm glad you asked. Just got to get yourself some prilled AN (Prilled means little balls around 1/16" - 1/8" in diameter) and some diesel. Easy huh? But you DO need to get your ratios correct.
The ideal weight proportions are:
94.5 % AN
5.5 % Diesel
In practice one uses 94% and 6% which assures you of an efficient chemical reaction with only little carbon monoxide and some nitrogen oxides as a by product.

So how do I mix my ANFO for removing my stubborn tree stump?

Well you really need to mix your ingredients uniformly and consistantly, poorly mixed ingredients will yield a low detonation velocity and the reaction may die leaving you with a misfire (shudder! and your mates will call you a silly bugger because you stuffed it up and wrecked the "removing of the stump" barbecue you put on for the boys on Sunday afternoon.)

Well now you've drilled your blast holes (anything over 2" diameter is cool, the bigger the better) tip your bags of AN down the hole and pour your diesel over it. 1 gallon of fuel for every 100 lbs of AN.
Using this ratio, tip a bag, pour the required amount of diesel in, tip another bag, pour the required amount in etc. etc. etc. the diesel should disperse amongst the prill quite nicely. Or on the other hand the most common and effective method is to soak the prill in 8 - 10 % of its weight in fuel oil and after draining for about 30 minutes the prills will have absorbed the correct amount of diesel.

Oh, and you'll need to get some high powered detonators.

Remember, it's not a crime to know how to manufacture explosives, but it is a crime to do it and really, stuffing around with ANFO can be extremely harmful or fatal and is best left to the professionals.

Like to see ANFO doing it's thing?

Simply click on the download link below to see it in action (1.2Mb).

Note on the right of the blast how the 'pre-split line' charges are detonated first followed up by detonations of the main charge columns. The pre-split ensures a clean cut line of rock fragmentation and is usually drilled at 15 degrees so you have stable face after you've dug out the fragmented rock.

Only half of this drill pattern was blown, with the other half to follow some time later. Oh and you should feel the seismic activity created from a blast of this magnitude. mmmmmmm...... sweeeeeeet!



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