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WE are concerned with the numerical calculation of the combustion fi eld supported by heterogeneous propellants that consist of ammonium perchlorate (AP) particles embedded in a fuel binder. Although a great deal of important work has been done on this problem, a signifi cant obstacle has been the lack of a model of the propellant morphology. Recently, however, a random packing algorithm has been used to pack spheres of various sizes in cubes, periodicallyarranged, and it has been suggested that these structures can be used for that purpose. 1; 2 Whereas it is true that AP particles are not spherical, the algorithm can be used to generate packs for which the size distribution (the number fraction of particles in any diameter range) and the packing fraction (the volume fraction of the cube occupied by the AP) are the same as those for industrial propellant packs.

An example is shown in Fig. 1. This is a Miller …