Used by
United States Army and
Marine Corps to destroy vehicles, artillery barrels, captured
enemy weapon systems, fuel caches, and munitions, the AN-M14 TH3 is about the size of an
aluminum soda can and weighs 2 lbs.
The main component of the grenade is 600 to 800 grams of thermate, a variation of thermite created by the addition of barium nitrate, which burns for 40 seconds at 2200°C, is capable of melting through 1/2 inch homogeneous plate steel and will also burn underwater. It does not require an outside source of oxygen as it produces its own.
The fuse of the AN-M14 is an M201A1 which is also used with the AN-M83HC white smoke grenade and the M18 colored smoke grenade. The M201A1 has a straight safety lever which rests flush against the body of the cylindrical shaped grenade. The time delay element is a powder train requiring 1.2 to 2 seconds to ignite the main charge. As the firing time for this system is extremely short and it does not explode like an M67 fragmentation grenade, the device is not intended to be thrown long distances to its target, but instead activated and dropped, or set in place before the cotter pin is pulled.
The body of the system is flat gray and the markings, AN-M14 INCEN TH, are violet, but the standard color code for an incendiary grenade is light red with black markings, making its intended purpose easily recognizable.
As thermate burns at such a high temperature, looking directly at an ignited incendiary grenade can cause severe damage to the retinas.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hand_grenade
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m14-th3.htm
US FM 3-320.30 Dec, 1988
Thanks to rootbeer277 for the info on barium nitrate!