Black Powder Rumors and Facts

[Eggman]

Possibly the greatest hazard to our sport isn't do-gooder liberals, but the misunderstanding of our life-blood, black powder, and the hazards thereof. A recent post in the tech secton about a revolver load using 4f reminds me that maybe some of the practitioners of the black powder sports may be unaware of how dangerous black powder can be. Back in the day a fellow named John Baird spent many sleepless nights trying to warn people about the dangers of misusing the stuff while at the same time publishing a series of articles on catastrophic black powder gun failures in his magazine "The Buckskin Report." I contributed two of these.
Two things EVERY black powder shooter MUST keep in mind at all times: black powder is extremely flamable and can be set off by a source as innocuous as static electricity. Safe handling and storage are essential. Second, black powder burns VERY fast (much quicker than smokeless) and creates a huge pressure curve the first few inches a bullet travels down a barrel. The pressure curve for 4f is extremely high and very very quick. It is a primer, not a propellant.
Remember all black powders, including 1f and 2f, are regressive, NOT progressive. That means as the powder grains burn they produce less and less gas/pressure because the round grains are becoming smaller and smaller as they burn. Commercial smokeless powders sometimes claim to be progressive, but they are lying. The cylindrical shapes most of these powders come in allow a more even burn than the round black grains, but at best they provide a "neutral" burn, i.e., about the same amount of surface area exposed, and therefore about the same amout of gas/pressure produced, throughout the burn.
There are progressive powders made -- for artillery propellant. These are large cylindrical grains (about a half inch long, with one or more perforations throughout each grain lengthwise. As these grains burn they keep exposing more and more surface area to the ignitor thus producing more and more gas/pressure.
Black powder guns can and will blow up. When the guy from Missouri said, "You can fill these guns up with black powder to the end of the barrel and fire them and nothing will happen," he was wrong. Adding more and more powder keeps raising the pressure curve, while the rate of bullet speed increase steadily declines.

[Timmeu]

I am confused about the static electricity issue. I found the following website and am looking for some reactions.

http://www.ctmuzzleloaders.com/ctml_...ks/sparks.html

I am not expecting to allow my powder to be exposed to static but am very courious about why all the widely varying thoughts and opinions.



A Courious Yankee......

[Greg Ogdan 110th OVI]

Marty, I would agree that static electricity PROBABLY won't set off black powder. HOWEVER we are all guilty of mishandleing black powder sooner or later and a stern reminder is a very good thing.

[Timmeu]

Hi Greg

I am not trying to create dangerous situations. I am as a college trained teacher concerned that at times old wives tales and urban legends make it into the world of fact. I have continued to look at several internet sites on this issue via a Google search and see statements that vary a great deal. In most cases documentation of fact would really be helpful in our handling of the Powder, caps and lead that we all use to take part the BP hobby and just isn't there.

I am curious to find out what research evidence is published about this issue and getting the correct data. Any one who wants to help out sure can.


I am still a curious Yankee

[Eggman]

I guess I was influenced by a fellow worker who at one time worked in the Rock Island armory. He said they would fill ordnance there -- nearly all artillery and other high explosive rounds in those days (50s,60s) used a black powder booster. He said black powder dust would accumulate in the rafters of the plant, and periodically it would "flash," or ignite, from static electricity, and scare the h____ out of everybody.
And of course there is a long litany of ammunition storage facilities detonating for seemingly no reason at all.
The cumulative affect is some of us get a little paranoid.

[Eggman]

I didn't comment on the experiments - most interesting. However------
the 20mm rounds fired from the Vulcan cannon are electrically primed.
Birds sitting on high power lines suffer no more ill affects than your powder granules, except when-- something about a proper ground.
Maybe we have an explanation now why Jaguars and Austin Healeys never seem to want to run.

[Edwin Flint]

This much I know: Dust does not need to be BP to be explosive. Ask anyone that has seen a silo explode, or the aftermath, due to grain dust. I have never understood precisely why this happens but something to do with the dust to air mixture as I understand it. Still I intend to be very careful with avoiding static discharge around BP.

[Ron/The Old Reb]

A number of years ago I visited the Citadel at Halifax Nova Scotia, a stone fort built by the British to protect the harbor. While there they took us into the magazine. In the magazine there were racks that they stored the kegs of power on. The guide said that they would every so often take the kegs off the rack and hand role them from one end of the magazine to the other to keep the power from getting hard and caking up. The guide also said that the men who did this wore clothing made out of flannel to prevent statci buld up and blowing up the magazine. So they were concerned about statci electricty and black power back then.

[Eggman]

As a line of research I would suggest Marty search through the archives of Pete Jorgensen's "The Artilleryman" magazine. Here he will find a number of interesting ways folks have found to use black powder to injure themselves. I understand this still may not satisfy Marty's college trained scientific eye. In that case he may want to join the reeactor from Georgia I met who was shooting 170 grains of 2f behind a large wad of Georgia sod to get a "really good bang," and begin scrapping the large "DANGER, EXPLOSIVE," and "DANGER, HIGHLY FLAMMABLE AND HIGHLY EXPLOSIVE" warnings from all their BP cans.

[Timmeu]

I am in now way trying to advocate doing dangerous things to anyone. I agree with eggman that many unfortunates in the blackpowder do many things that are potentially dangerous. What I would like to know is why we as a group make statements that make light of the Georgia or report hearsay stories as facts and totally ignore acurate information. I have had my share of near accidents over 45 years of shooting.

I still will be researching this issue and will hope to make available some actual fact. I am becoming more and more concerned with the many varying concepts and thoughts that folks put out. Each of use should be sure of what we say as once it appears here in the electronic world it can come back to haunt each of us.

Still a curious Yankee.