The craft of preparing the TNT for loading in munitions has relied on human judgment for generations. Operators gauge the look of a slurry, the sound of a mixer, even the feel of molten explosives thickening in the kettle to the consistency of oatmeal.
That’s how they know it’s ready to be poured into shells — when it looks like thick oatmeal. It is a craft passed down like an oral tradition, with little more than intuition and hard-earned judgment holding the line between success and disaster.
That tacit knowledge has kept production safe and steady at U.S. arsenals, but it now teeters on the brink of disappearing. Veteran operators who can “read” a kettle are retiring, and too few newcomers are willing to take their place in such a high-stakes environment.
New civilian hires walk into the facility, confronted with the risks and the steep learning curve, and too often walk right back out.
That’s why innovation in TNT preparation matters so much. Two MxD pilot projects at Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey — one focused on advanced sensors, the other on building a digital twin — are quietly revolutionizing this old, dangerous, and indispensable craft.
The fact that this is happening at Picatinny is itself important. It’s a research and test facility. What gets successfully prototyped and perfected there then transfers to the Army-wide to its mass production facilities.
“We’re changing the process of TNT preparation from a qualitative operation based on human judgment to a data-driven one,” said MxD’s Tony Del Sesto, Senior Technical Fellow. “That makes it easier to teach, train and transfer and, thus, easier to scale across the Army’s mass production facilities.”
A New Set of Eyes and Ears
The first project is deceptively simple: bring modern sensor technology into a process. Existing thermometers are often inaccurate — an infuriating weakness when temperature dictates the safety and success of an entire batch. When the readings can’t be trusted, operators are forced to lean over vats of molten TNT with manual thermometers, getting closer than anyone would wish.
The soon to be installed sensors do far more than measure heat. They pick up sonic velocity and other variables, building a layered picture of what’s happening inside the kettle. Add to that a new camera system capable of artificial intelligence-driven visual analysis, and suddenly, the “sixth sense” of a seasoned hand on the line doesn’t vanish when that operator retires — it’s digitized, analyzed, and made available to the next generation.
“It’s no longer acceptable — for the safety of our workers — to do things the way they’ve always been done,” said Cody Johnson, Industry 4.0 Lead, Energetics & Warheads Directorate, US Army DEVCOM Armaments Center, which is headquartered at Picatinny Arsenal. “And it’s been wonderful to work with the team at MxD, which has far more experience with sensor technology, than our TNT mixers.”
Capturing the Intuition
The second innovation being piloted: a digital twin of the entire TNT-melting process. Think of it as a living, learning simulation that doesn’t just mirror what’s happening in the kettle, but predicts how each batch will behave.
TNT is not uniform; its properties shift from supplier to supplier, lot to lot. Veteran operators know how to adjust — when to add more time, when to nudge the heat, when to discard a bad batch.
A digital twin will codify those instincts, letting new operators see in advance how different inputs will play out. It’s a training tool, a troubleshooting guide, and a safeguard for process knowledge all at once.
In time, it could even flag maintenance problems before they become failures — transforming energetics manufacturing from a reactive process into a predictive one.
“The digital twin ensures a consistent process, allowing the Army to quickly scale production uniformly across lines and facilities,” said Berardino Baratta, CEO of MxD. “Because, after safety, the next priority is speed at a time when we are supplying ammunition regularly to our allies who are at war.”
Why It Matters
Both projects are still in their early days. The sensors should be fully deployed this fall, and the digital twin is expected to be operational next spring. But the implications stretch far beyond Picatinny.
If successful, these technologies will spread across the Army’s Organic Industrial Base, into contractor facilities, and across the broader Defense Industrial Base.
“This isn’t just about new gadgets or software,” Baratta said. “It’s about securing the future of a capability the military cannot afford to lose. Without TNT filling, there are no shells. Without shells, there is no munition. And without the expertise to safely and consistently run the process, production grinds to a halt.”
By capturing the instincts of today’s experts and embedding them into data and models, Picatinny is showing what digital transformation can look like in one of the most unforgiving corners of defense manufacturing.
The artistry of the veteran operator isn’t being erased — it’s being preserved, translated into a form that can be taught, scaled, and sustained. And in a world where modern warfare still depends on the reliability of munitions, that preservation might be as vital as the TNT itself.
