Gunpowder

[Nerdlock]

I have two questions about gunpowder.

 

1. I have read GP and BP are the same, but my GP says its sulfur free. I know you need sulfur to make BP so what is the difference between BP and GP.

 

2. Why does it get warm whenever it comes in contact with water?

[jacob]

I assume you mean Golden powder and Black powder, they are quite diffrent, GP is a mix of

 

60% Potassium Nitrate

40% Ascorbic Acid/Vitamin C

 

BP is a mix of

 

75% Potassium Nitrate

15% Charcoal

10% Sulfur

 

Both combined in diffrent ways and there are threads for both here.

 

Which one gets warm with water? I know BP shouldn't and I'm pretty sure GP shouldn't either.

[Nerdlock]

I have never heard of golden powder. Searched the forum/google and found nothing about it. Here is the gunpowder I am using. In the FAQ on thier website I read this

 

Q. I shoot patched round ball. Should I wet my patch or load it dry?

 

A. As American Pioneer™ Powder creates its own moisture when burning, it is not necessary or desirable to wet down the patch. If it is tight, you can 'spit patch' the first one, but you should find that reloads don't even need that.

[Mumbles]

Black powder is a specific composition. Gun powder, I suppose could refer to any charge being used in guns to propel a bullet. It could include blackpowder, but also pyrodex(what you likely have), or smokeless powders or a few others. The two can be the same, but are not neccesarily the same as you can see.

 

As for why it gets warm when it gets wet, I can't help you there.

[jacob]

Oh duh, I didn't even realize GP=Gun powder, here's the thread on Golden powder, I've never made it.

 

Not sure what that FAQ means but as Mumbles said Gun powder could be almost anything used to shoot something out of something.

[Nerdlock]

How I came to find out pyrodex gets warm.

 

When I knew almost nothing about pyrotechnics my friend wanted to make aerial shells. We got a pound of pyrodex and shaved some pieces magnesium from a fire starter. Trying to make stars we used water as a type of binder. A few days later we were trying something much more stupid: a river, a glass bottle , and some pyrodex. Thankfully it never ignited. Never will I do anything this stupid again.

 

I don't need to know why water makes it warm. Just thought it was odd.

[jacob]

Heh heh, if I understood you correctly water didn't make your pyrodex heat up, the water made the Magnesium shaveings heat up, Magnesium is very reactive and will do stuff like that, and I'm sure the pyrodex didn't help.

 

I'm sure you know this by now but just in case it's usually a very bad idea to just do (or mix) things without knowing all the possibile consequences (or reactions).

[flying fish]

Even batches of aluminum stars can heat up while they are wet (which can become especially dangerous in larger batches where it is harder for the heat to dissapate). And Magnesium of course is far more reactive. Magnesium actually is pretty scary stuff. In pyrotechnic compositions it is coated to prevent spontaneous reactions from taking place...and I don't think it is common to even bind Mg stars with water in the first place (although I admit I don't really know). I would suggest that you not store anything made with your magnesium...don't want to be burning anything down.

 

It looks like what you have there is a smokeless powder, black-powder substitute (not blackpowder). Well, a blend of smokeless powder that is specifically formulated to work in BP firearms (which would blow up if you tried to use any other type of smokeless powder). There is (or was) also such a thing a "sulfurless black powder" which merely contains Potassium nitrate and Charcoal, but it is not as effective or ignightable...as they found out back in the day. But modern substitutes for standard blackpowder (for shooting) are things like pyrodex which are not fuel/oxidizer mixes at all, but rather compounds like nitrocellulose which rapidly produce gasses by decomposing upon ignition.

Edited August 10, 2008 by flying fish