Colonial era blackpowder vs today's black powder.

[Dphar1950]

Powder at the time of the American Revolution was incorporated with a stamp mill. About this time in Europe they started to use wheel mills for this which makes a much better powder. Todays powders are wheel milled. A lot (most?) of powder at the time of the Revolution was not "press cake" powder. The wet mixture was simply pushed through screens, by hand, to set the granule size. Today's powder is pressed after milling. The amount of pressure used to make the "press cake" can effect but rate and fouling. The cake is then broken, sieved to set the granulation then polished in a cloth lined drum as it is dried. If graphite is used its applied in the polishing/drying phase. The longer its polished the moreslick it will be. Some of the still liquid saltpeter with migrate to the surface and give a hard shiny surface. This is what you see on Swiss BP. Graphited powders are usually not all that well polished. The Graphite provides he shine. Lots more to it really. So the powder at the time of the Revolution was not very good by modern standards.

 

[Dphar1950]

P.S. Dupont was not the best powder in the US by the 1850s and certainly not by the 1870s. Its never mentioned in writings by target shooters or recommended for reloading that I have seen. Hazards was much better as were several others. DuPont however, made a lot of powder for the US military so they were "in the money" and Goex still does. In the late 1890s/early 20th c DuPont bought all the powder making, black and smokeless, in the US. Shut down all the BP plants but theirs at Moosic, killing off some REALLY superior powders. They then controlled ALL the powder making, but were soon forced to divest and at least 2 other smokeless powder companies, Hercules for one, were set up. G-O-I and then Goex made the same stuff DuPont until, after several apparent attempts, they finally blew the place so bad parts of it landed in town. They did not seem to understand safety as it pertains to powder making/storage. They now make press cake with a roller press at an old military plant in Minden, LA. Faster but its does not make as good a powder as a press and there is more poorly pressed powder along the edges to recycle or sell to re-enactors.

 

[Rudyard]

Very interesting run down on US powder history & bears out Ned Roberts views .Excellent survey. Regards Rudyard

 

[Felix the Cat]

Interesting thread..

I have some textbooks of explosives written at the start of the 1914 war. In UK, Gunpowder was still in use for some classes of gun, charge boosters and fuzes. Production methods were essentially the same as in the 19th C.

British Rifle powder used charcoal made from Alder Buckthorn (Frangula alnus) whereas cannon powder was made from Willow (Salix Alba). This seems to have been the major factor in the performance of the powder. As has been noted, charred straw was used to make "cocoa" powder in an effort to slow the burning rate for the very large guns that were being made at the end of the 19C. Brown coal (lignite) was also used in europe for this.

Saltpeter is formed naturally by the action of bacteria on urea and similar waste products. It can be obtained by processing the soil from stables and dungheaps. In Europe, "saltpeter men" were licenced to enter buildings and dig up floors. They were widely hated and the source of many threats and bribery. Large deposits of Guano were discovered in South America, and much of the European supply came from here, although it was sodium nitrate that was obtained which had to be converted to potassium nitrate by treating it with potash (you can make gunpowder from sodium nitrate, but it is very hygroscopic).

Britain obtained all its requirements from India from the 18th C onwards. Saltpeter was found to be created naturally in dry areas of the continent such as Bihar, and was extracted on a regular basis. Much of this was milled on the south coast of England around Faversham, however the Royal Gunpowder Mill still exists near Enfield at Waltham Abbey north east of London. The mills are no longer in use, but have been preserved and should be visited if you get the chance.

Gunpowder, being a mechanical mixture rather than a chemical compound, will not deteriorate provided it is kept dry and not agitated. I have (remotely...!) split open shell from the 19th C and the powder was as good as the day it was made.. ( and shot extremely well!). Please remember this if you should excavate any remains from the war between the states.. just because it is old does not mean it is harmless!

 

[Dphar1950]

The Alder that C&H got from Spain was critical to the making of their Diamond Grain powder. Cut only at one time of the year. When the Spanish Civil War cut off the supply they stopped making this powder. By the end of C&H production. By the end of production C&H was not very good powder and was basically a blasting (slow) grind made in the C&H blasting powder plant in Scotland, working from memory here. If we look at the velocities in Lyman's first BP Manual we see its very poor in velocity levels even at very heavy charge levels compared to the G-O used. And G-O was not a true sporting grind powder either. The Diamond Grain was similar to today's Swiss. It was milled longer to produce a finer particle size in the charcoal. Was pressed to the proper level and it was a "fast" powder chemically. Having a few more percentage points of Saltpeter compared to other powders. There were some high grade American powders similar to Swiss and Diamond Grain, Hazard's "Kentucky Rifle" was one from my reading, but these all died when DuPont and smokeless powder destroyed BP making in the US and Dupont supplied it all from their Gov't fuse powder plant at Moosic. While they still sold powder to the public the real money was in gov't contracts for fuses and boosters in various explosive devices and as a booster for ship board and land based artillery propellants.

 

[robes]

The Foxfire book #5 has been brought up in this forum from time to time over the years. It has a section on selfmade black powder, and several vintage photos of the method of making BP from cave droppings. 15 bucks on Amazon. Many people have the whole series.

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=foxfire+5&crid=APDE4HGVOTDX&sprefix=foxfire,aps,148&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_4_7

 

[ugly old guy]

Confederate powder was mostly sh-t, literally.
Joseph LeConte, a professor of chemistry and geology at South Carolina University, wrote a pamphlet for the Nitre Bureau on the process for the manufacture of saltpeter in 1862 from liquid manure, such as urine, dung-water, water of privies, cess-pools, drains, &c.

Ummm … Where do you think the Union got its saltpeter?
The Union used the same sources for saltpeter.
"Human" urine is as good a source of saltpeter as horse/livestock urine is.
Back in the day, all saltpeter came from urine or bat poo. It don't matter if the urine is from a "human" critter, or some other critter.

 

[Felix the Cat]

The Alder that C&H got from Spain was critical to the making of their Diamond Grain powder. Cut only at one time of the year. When the Spanish Civil War cut off the supply they stopped making this powder. By the end of C&H production. By the end of production C&H was not very good powder and was basically a blasting (slow) grind made in the C&H blasting powder plant in Scotland, working from memory here. If we look at the velocities in Lyman's first BP Manual we see its very poor in velocity levels even at very heavy charge levels compared to the G-O used. And G-O was not a true sporting grind powder either. The Diamond Grain was similar to today's Swiss. It was milled longer to produce a finer particle size in the charcoal. Was pressed to the proper level and it was a "fast" powder chemically. Having a few more percentage points of Saltpeter compared to other powders. There were some high grade American powders similar to Swiss and Diamond Grain, Hazard's "Kentucky Rifle" was one from my reading, but these all died when DuPont and smokeless powder destroyed BP making in the US and Dupont supplied it all from their Gov't fuse powder plant at Moosic. While they still sold powder to the public the real money was in gov't contracts for fuses and boosters in various explosive devices and as a booster for ship board and land based artillery propellants.

In a similar fashion to what happened in the US, gunpowder mills were bought and sold several times in the early 20th Century. The last dedicated black powder mill in Scotland was in the village of Roslin, south of Edinburgh and closed in 1954. Originally begun by the partnership of Hay and Merrick, the mill was part of Curtis's and Harvey's for some time before being incorporated into the Nobel division of Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI). After the closure, the incorporating mills were relocated to Ardeer on the Ayrshire coast and kept working for another ten years or so, mostly producing meal powder for safety fuze manufacture.

Curtis's and Harvey's premium black powder was known as Diamond Grade, not Diamond Grain! I have some, and it is indeed similar to the Swiss Aubonne powder.

The old Roslin mills were demolished by the local council about fifteen years ago, although an incorporating mill building still stands by the side of the river. The site is less than half a mile from Roslin Chapel, which featured in the closing scenes of the Da Vinci Code. Dolly the Sheep was also created in the village (..although I'm not sure that is relevent!)

 

[CPurcell]

A good book on black powder is Gun Powder by Jack Kelly. It covers from who most likely invented it. The Chinese or some German Monk and all the way through the DuPont powder wars after the Civil War. He explains how important saltpeter was and the extraordinary measures the Europeans and especially the British did to acquire it.

 

[springfield art]

The powder in the Colonial era was terrible by modern standards.

It wasn't until 1802 that Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours, a refugee to America from the French Revolution, built his first powder mill. He brought with him the secrets of how the French made their black powder which was often considered the best in the world at the time.

Before his coming, the typical black powder was weak and dirty. Perhaps somewhat like "Elephant" brand powder that used to be sold in the US before that Brazilian company went out of business a few decades ago? I used to shoot Elephant powder and it was nasty stuff.

Maybe someone else will be able to give more precise comments about the black powder used back then?

Interesting. BTW, the Confederate powder mill at Augusta, GA, (some remnants remain along with an historical marker), made exceptional powder, due to the fellow who set it up and was the lead engineer. (Google it!). When Union forces came thru on the March to the Sea, they were only too happy to confiscate what was there. The DuPont powder works is in my area, Wilmington, DE. I think they have tours, but again, googling would tell.

 

[springfield art]

A good book on black powder is Gun Powder by Jack Kelly. It covers from who most likely invented it. The Chinese or some German Monk and all the way through the DuPont powder wars after the Civil War. He explains how important saltpeter was and the extraordinary measures the Europeans and especially the British did to acquire it.

The Confederacy had people digging up their latrines and outhouses to harvest the saltpeter; you know a gov't. is desperate when they have the populace doing that!

 

[springfield art]

Thanks, LD!

So that's why my No.2 pencils keep disappearing!

 

[spudnut]

Theres8 a few guys out there making their own, seems to work ok.

 

[springfield art]

Interesting thread..

I have some textbooks of explosives written at the start of the 1914 war. In UK, Gunpowder was still in use for some classes of gun, charge boosters and fuzes. Production methods were essentially the same as in the 19th C.

British Rifle powder used charcoal made from Alder Buckthorn (Frangula alnus) whereas cannon powder was made from Willow (Salix Alba). This seems to have been the major factor in the performance of the powder. As has been noted, charred straw was used to make "cocoa" powder in an effort to slow the burning rate for the very large guns that were being made at the end of the 19C. Brown coal (lignite) was also used in europe for this.

Saltpeter is formed naturally by the action of bacteria on urea and similar waste products. It can be obtained by processing the soil from stables and dungheaps. In Europe, "saltpeter men" were licenced to enter buildings and dig up floors. They were widely hated and the source of many threats and bribery. Large deposits of Guano were discovered in South America, and much of the European supply came from here, although it was sodium nitrate that was obtained which had to be converted to potassium nitrate by treating it with potash (you can make gunpowder from sodium nitrate, but it is very hygroscopic).

Britain obtained all its requirements from India from the 18th C onwards. Saltpeter was found to be created naturally in dry areas of the continent such as Bihar, and was extracted on a regular basis. Much of this was milled on the south coast of England around Faversham, however the Royal Gunpowder Mill still exists near Enfield at Waltham Abbey north east of London. The mills are no longer in use, but have been preserved and should be visited if you get the chance.

Gunpowder, being a mechanical mixture rather than a chemical compound, will not deteriorate provided it is kept dry and not agitated. I have (remotely...!) split open shell from the 19th C and the powder was as good as the day it was made.. ( and shot extremely well!). Please remember this if you should excavate any remains from the war between the states.. just because it is old does not mean it is harmless!

Good info! And most have read about the Civil War shell that exploded on the guy who was drilling into it to 'deactivate'; a classic case. But if the contents were "wet" over time, there's less chance of still being "live". Thanks.

 

[Felix the Cat]

Good info! And most have read about the Civil War shell that exploded on the guy who was drilling into it to 'deactivate'; a classic case. But if the contents were "wet" over time, there's less chance of still being "live". Thanks.

Provided the fuze has not rotted through, a shell is pretty much hermetically sealed. There is nothing in Black Powder to deteriorate provided water is not allowed to get it. Water will destroy the physical makeup of the material and dissolve out the nitrate.

Never drill into ammunition with a conventional twist drill. EOD uses a very slow trepanning drill with lots of coolant, and even then works it remotely..!

I have burned significant quantities of gunpowder in the past, and it is vital to wet the powder with water and detergent before burning it on a bed of wood chips. Forget burning gunpowder in trails like on the 1950s cowboy movies.. they always used nitro powder not gunpowder...!