Black Powder - with Willow Charcoal and Carbonized Peas!
Retrieved: January 25, 2014
Last Post: January 03, 2007
...Sporting Rifle Gunpowder
The residuum is of an oily nature that lubricates the bullet, insuring accurate and continued firing without the necessity of cleaning in the meantime... I'll be darned!
Dutch Bill
December 28, 2006
The willow charcoal was charred to yield the maximum amount of creosote retained in the charcoal.
The carbonized peas were used to slow the powder down for use with heavy elongated bullets.
Put another way.
How do you slow down a sporting burn rate powder for use in guns firing large heavy bullets? Use a sporting powder charcoal but tone down the burn rate without destroying the "moist-burning" property of the fast burning charcoal.
This powder was developed when the Brits went to bp cartridges.
Willow charcoal is not as fast as the buckthorn alder used in the very fast, very hot-burning sporting powders. But behind heavy projectiles it still produced gas temperatures high enough to produce baked fouling in the bore. Use a small percentage of a charred starch and you "temper" the combustion a bit.
Charred peas, or any other starchy material, and you have a charcoal that can be ground to an extremely fine particle size that produces almost no ash (mineral content). You could do essentially the same thing with charred potatoes.
John Boy
December 28, 2006
Bill, thanks for the relationship purpose of the ingredients - especially the peas.
I locked into the 'oily' foul from the willow charcoal but the use of carbonized peas drew a blank in my mind.
Would you happen to know if Lafkin & Rand ever put this type of formulation into production?
Dutch Bill
December 29, 2006
I have never heard of that being used by any late 19th century U.S. powder producers. According to my source it was played with by C&H at one point in time.
How about a powder can label showing the Jolly Green Giant sort of singed and smoking.
Another horrible thought. I could see the add wars on the merits of charred peas versus charred potatoes.
TAKAHO KID
December 29, 2006
How about this one using soap stone.
"Does not foul the barrel... requires no lubricant"
US418552.pdf
http://www.google.com/patents?vid=USPAT418552&id=avs-
AAAAEBAJ&dq=gunpowder&jtp=1
John Boy
December 29, 2006
Kid, this formulation sounds great... fulminate of mercury (don't shoot up wind) - soapstone to scrub out the bore and arabic-gum for bubbles at the muzzle end!
Dutch Bill
December 31, 2006
When I saw the fulminate of mercury and soapstone BP sub I laughed.
The instructions were that the ingredients were kneaded into a paste or putty like mass.
The Mad Hatter came to mind in working with mercury in any form.
Then there is the soapstone. What the patent actually refers to is talc. Talc usually contains some asbestos. A technical grade of talc as we once used in the tire plant can be 5 to 10 percent asbestos. Then the talc is a magnesium silicate.
Sort of made the PVC plant look safe.
Lucky Ed Pepper
December 31, 2006
Elephant brand powder used a charcoal with a high starch content(Ive read somewhere).
I also was very moist burning and had a lower MV than other powders.
Dutch Bill
December 31, 2006
The woods used traditionally in Europe and the U.S. are trees that store sugar and sugar-based resins in the wood.
From what I could see the Imbauba wood used by the plant in Brazil stored starches in the wood rather than sugars. This might have something to do with the ants in the tropics.
When I would do water extractions on GOEX, KIK and WANO the extractions would smell very sweet as I boiled off the water. When I did the first extraction on the Elephant powder and boiled it down the wife sticks her head in the kitchen and asked if I was cooking pasta.
I then started playing with adding small amounts of sugar to charcoal samples to see what would happen. The powders burned a bit faster and cleaner.
That sort of explained something. Back in the 19th century the powder companies harvested the wood for their charcoal in the spring of the year. Right after the ground thawed and the sap rose up in the tree. But before the tree would set out the leaves. It was stated that when harvested at that time of the year it was easy to peel the bark from the wood with a minimum of effort.
Then I started to do a little looking closer. Using Black alder cut on a buddy's farm north of Harrisburg, PA.
Moisture in the wood was close to 30%. The sap rising from the roots contained about 5% sugar by weight of sap.
One old source stated that wood cut at other times of the year was inferior to wood cut in early spring.
That was part of a project I was working on for my buddy in Australia. Could we take weeping willow and add things to it to make it perform like black alder or buckthorn alder charcoal in a bp formulation. We could but for most powders it would be cost prohibitive. Sugar no problem. Finding a source for real wood charring retort creosote would be almost impossible. But for a true moist-burning powder there are other ways to go rather than some nasty chemical like wood creosote.
Lucky Ed Pepper
January 01, 2007
I had a thought that the new Goex Express might be using a modified charcoal of some type.
I see added carbohydrates, that is the only place in the reaction to produce water.
Goex had their substitute Clear Shot (or Clean Shot), I get those two mixed up, my buddy and I used it for a while and were pleased with it.
Then my friend using it in BPML shotgun was getting misfires after some sporting clay practice and lo and behold a syrup type of fouling had crystallized in the nipple area decisively prevented ignition after firing 4 or 5 caps extra!
That was the end of that.
Lucky Ed Pepper
January 01, 2007
My theory on why Goex Express burns "more moist".
According to gunpowder experts, not me, the moist properties come from the natural sugars (carbo hydrates) and creosote (carbohydrates) when the wood is cut in the correct season.
It is the only ingredient (carbohydrates) in the gunpowder mixture that can produce water.
Finally my theory the carbohydrate poor charcoal previously used has been enhance by addition of a caramelized sugar (carbohydrate).
My question is also if this enhancement (i.e., toupee, silicone implant, etc.) is true would it be real gunpowder or a blackpowder substitute?
TAKAHO KID
January 02, 2007
Creosote is one of the keys. IF the wood was harvested at the right time and IF the wood was charred correctly and if the wood was of the proper species then creosote will release moisture.
However, in spite of the hyperbole the only black powder on the market today that does produce moisture is Swiss. They use the correct wood - Buck thorn Alder and are fanatical in regards to their charcoal. (Goex uses Beach or maple I can't remember which) however, as charcoal goes the consensus is it will only make a musket or rifle grade powder. I also doubt that thier supplier is as fanatical as the Swiss.
When producing charcoal its imperative that absolute consistency is followed from the diameter of the sticks to the moisture content before it goes into the retort. The ideal temp. is between 300 and 320 degrees. As the temp. rises above 320 the creosote begins to flash-off. By the time it reaches 350 its pretty much all gone. - solid carbon does not produce moisture.
Another factor is the amount of potassium carbonate in the fouling. Potassium carbonate readily absorbs moisture when the relative humidity rises above 30%. it only stands to reason that if the percentage of potassium carbonate in the fouling is increased then the amount of moisture absorbed in a given time will increase as well. However, if your shooting in a arid dry region - well your out of luck.
I personally have a hard time believing GOEX's moist burning claims. As I have said before. If your charcoal is supplied by the same folks that made the biquetts my steaks cook over then I seriously doubt their claim. In addition if they are not using high quality charcoal produced under strict controled conditions then why is the price of GOEX Express so high compared to their other products that use exactly the same ingedients?
Dutch Bill
January 02, 2007
The claim that GOEX's Express Powder is a "moist-burning" powder is utter nonsense.
The ingredients used in the Express Powder are the same ingredients used in the regular production powder. In the U.S. there is no source for a charcoal better than what GOEX already uses. But it is certainly not up to the standards of the charcoal produced in-house by the Swiss.
When GOEX first sampled selected shooters with the experimental batch of what became the Express Powder the reports came back that the fouling produced by the Express was soft and more easly hydrated (moistened) by the use of a blow tube.
With the Express Powder the charcoal and sulfur are ground in the ball mill for a longer period of time, compared to the regular production. I should point out that when GOEX first purchased the old Moosic, PA BP plant from Du Pont one of the first things they did was to cut the amount of time that the charcoal and sulfur were ground in the ball mill. So in the Express Powder we see something of a return to Du Pont production methods in the pre-batch preparation of the charcoal and sulfur mixture prior to their actual use in a batch of powder.
In the wheel mills the Express Powder is run for a bit longer time compared to regular production.
The combination of the increased time in the ball mill and the increased time in the wheel mill reduces ingredient particle size.
In theory this should give less batch to batch and lot to lot variation in the Express Powder compared to regular production. The increased milling time also speeds the burn rate of the powder a bit more.
The finer ingredient particle size also changes the type of fouling produced in the gun. A little different combustion chemistry. The powder's combustion residue is more readily soluble in water and more easily moistened by the use of a blow tube or just shooting it in humid weather.
How the shooter views this Express Powder will depend on what he is shooting it in. In cartridges of small caliber and light boolits the Express will not come up to Swiss powder velocities. In larger calibers with bullets heavy for their length the Express may match Swiss velocities or even slightly exceed them.
In burn rates the Express Powder, in my patched ball rifles, was about mid-way between Swiss and regular GOEX production. The Express was a noticeable improvement in bore fouling compared to regular GOEX production lots from the previous 2 years production. No tarry residue on a damp cleaning patch.
I had hoped that GOEX would price the Express reasonably and not price it the way they have. They have the idea that this Express Powder is every bit as good as the Swiss powder. That is the case in a limited range of loadings with bp cartridges only.
TAKAHO KID
January 02, 2007
There is indeed a big diffrence between easily softened with a blow tube versus moist burning.
To be fair this is what they claim on thier website:
Quote
"softer fouling performance"
other adverts claim "moist fouling".
Dutch Bill
January 02, 2007
From around 1972 until 2000 GOEX purchased potassium nitrate from the Vicksburg Chemical Company.
If you look at the old 1974 copyright edition of the Lyman Black Powder Handbook you see GOEX screening their potassium nitrate before using it to make powder. Screening it to remove "sticks and stones".
So I bought a 40 pound back of Vicksburg Chemical Company "saltpeter" to have a closer look. Specifically looking at the "sticks and stones".
Turned out that the sticks were pieces of the cyprus wood storage tanks.
The stones turned out to be something akin to soapstone.
I would take a kilo of the saltpeter and dissolve it in water and then filter it off. The filter cake then went into an oven to dry. Found in the product was very fine clay and little "pebbles" that when dried in the oven came out looking like cotton balls.
The potassium nitrate (saltpeter) came in little beads known as prills. Inside these beads one would find the clay and little stones. Fresh, the stones were a medium grey color.
Vicksburg Chemical claimed that this product was technical grade at 99.5% purity. The amount of sticks, pebbles and clay laid that figure to rest.
Now for the but part.
The Vicksburg Chemical company product contained about 0.5% of sodium nitrate. That made the finished powder a bit more hygroscopic than it really ought to be. But the little bit of sodium carbonate then found in the fouling made the fouling a bit more hygroscopic. Easier to hydrate in the gun with a blow tube.
The thing about BP manufacturing these days is that a company is often at the mercy of the suppliers of the required ingredients. It would be exceptionally costly for a bp manufacturer to work up ingredients to ideal standards. So you end up looking at what you can get at what price and what are the trade offs.
Lucky Ed Pepper
January 02, 2007
I guess the finer the particulate residue is, the more surface area to absorb moisture.
Thanks Bill for the education.
I don't know if Goex Express has a "diamond like" appearance that Swiss has that supposedly reduces the burning rate.
John Boy
January 02, 2007
Bill: Rdnck has stated that Express has 'more processing time and loss of product.'
The Swiss run their wheel mill for sporting powder - 1200 revolutions per batch.
Any speculation how long (turns) Goex is running their wheel milling for Express vs. their regular sporting powder batches?
A greater number of turns then regular production would coincide with the 'loss of product' (smaller grain size) statement when they run the cake through their sliding steel grates for corning and then through the screening process.
Without a set of sieves, when I compared Express grain size, it looked to be in the FFg range.
TAKAHO KID
January 02, 2007
Bill correct me if I am wrong but I think the term "loss" would be a bit misleading. The way I understand it there is no loss at the wheel. Its all green mill cake. (unless they let it run dry then they have a lot of other problems to deal with) Yes at the corning mill there would be some loss but wouldn't that simply be turned back into the next batch at the wheel? Or at the very least become re-enactor powder?
John Boy,
I am not sure what RPM they are running at. However a direct comparison with the Swiss wheel mill would not be accurate. The Swiss use a heavier wheel mill. Even if they were running the same speed the diffrence would be significant.
Lou Graham
January 02, 2007
Well, I fell for the Express ads. Threw in a coupla pounds to make the case when I was getting main match powder. I couldn't tell any difference (except the price) from regular Goex cartridge in my Trapdoor. Accuracy, fouling and cleanup -- no difference.
Dutch Bill
January 03, 2007
GOEX Express is not polished to the degree that is seen in this powder.
That shows up in the weight to volume relationship. GOEX's Minden plant production has ranged from 0.99 g/cc to a maximum of 1.05 g/cc. With Swiss the range is normally in the range of 1.08 to 1.10 g/cc.
Dutch Bill
January 03, 2007
I do not have a degree in chemistry.
I did spend 37 years in the chemical industry in QC and R&D work.
The compounding of explosive compositions such as black powder and its substitutes is little different than compounding rubber of various man-made synthetic polymers. The basics are the same. Grinding stuff to reduce particle size and maximizing dispersion of the materials.
For a good bit of that time I was the only non-degree type in a bunch of engineers and PhDs. Techno-talk was the order of the day.
Dutch Bill
January 03, 2007
Regarding the claim of "loss" with Express Powder production.
My gut feeling is that this comment is an attempt to justify their pricing of the powder.
The difference between regular production and the Express Powder is a few more hours running time in the ball mill and maybe a half hour longer in the wheel mill. Simply put. More machine time goes into the Express powder.
As far as a physical loss of material. I think not.
I was shocked when I saw the price of the Express Powder.
The longer wheel milling time would drop their pounds per man hour figures. I doubt that the extended ball milling time slowed production in any way. But the extra wheel mill time might reduce the number of batches out of the wheel mills in a week's production.
So any loss would not be a physical loss of powder. More on the order of a "loss" in the plant's productivity as measured in pounds per man-hour.