My homemade black powder

[Texantothecore]

Hi everyone. I'm back after several years hiatus. Real life kept me off the board. So Howdy to all!!!

[Texantothecore]

I have a lot of failures when grinding, I am getting dust when run through a Hario grinder and I am not completely sure why. Willow mix with 2% dextrin (out of frustration) is yielding powder. Dried in a very fast dessicator broken into pieces with a tile cutter and ground through the Hario.
Water content is probably an issue and I will be running tests to see if I can find right amount of water using lee dippers and will publish results here when I get results that are repeatable.
Will also be increasing the compression to determine whether my hydraulic meters are working correctly.
I thought I saw a reference to dippers and water on the thread but can't find it. Any help would be welcome. Thanks.

[Texantothecore]

I am using Fly's 2" die and compressing to supposedly 1800 psi. The Hario has been adjusted to be centered but still nothing useful. I use 1 oz batches which produces nice 1/4 " pucks.

[TheOutlawKid]

One way to add moisture to ur black powder and not overdo it is to place the powder into a very humid area for a short amount of timr...such as after a very hot steamy shower. I have a friend who at first would always spray his powder before making pucks but just couldnt get the right amount of water or spread it through out the powder equally...so one day he put his powder in his restroom while running a hot steamy shower. The powder naturallt absorbed the humidity. Once it had absorbed a bit he then poured it back and forth a few times between two plastic coffee cans. He said it absorbed the perfect amount of moisture and was able to make pucks without misting or worrying about using too much or not enough water. He lives in new mexico where its dry so thats why his pucks required moisture to help compress. I live in humid deep south texas and i dont have the problem he does...i dont need to add any moisture to my pucks.

[Texantothecore]

One way to add moisture to ur black powder and not overdo it is to place the powder into a very humid area for a short amount of timr...such as after a very hot steamy shower. I have a friend who at first would always spray his powder before making pucks but just couldnt get the right amount of water or spread it through out the powder equally...so one day he put his powder in his restroom while running a hot steamy shower. The powder naturallt absorbed the humidity. Once it had absorbed a bit he then poured it back and forth a few times between two plastic coffee cans. He said it absorbed the perfect amount of moisture and was able to make pucks without misting or worrying about using too much or not enough water. He lives in new mexico where its dry so thats why his pucks required moisture to help compress. I live in humid deep south texas and i dont have the problem he does...i dont need to add any moisture to my pucks.

Interesting. I live in Houston and it is consistently humid here so I will try that too.
One test I am going to run is to put an oz in a ziplock baggie, add water, smush it up and let it sit for a day so that the water is distributed to all the tiny little bits of black powder. Probably overthinking it.
I will test over the next few weeks with the shower.

[Texantothecore]

I hadn't thought of using no water but that deserves a test. I've two pounds of green meal so I can do a lot of testing.

[TheOutlawKid]

Be sure to run the shower very hot and steamy. He sometimes just puts it on the corner of sink while his wife or daughters shower due to them taking longer and very hot showers. Just remember to keep the vent fan off from sucking out the humidity in the air.

[Fly]

That is a great idea of running a hot shower to get the humidity into meal powder. I have a fireworks buddy that live in South Fla, & tells
me the Humidity where he lives is so high he does not have to add any spray when pressing pucks. When you posted the shower post I
remembered him telling me that. COOL! Tex a core is your meal fine enough? Some times when it has been pulled to early & not completely
ground fine enough it can do that.
Fly

[Texantothecore]

It is incredibly fine. I use 13 lbs of 3/4 ID copper pipe 1 inch long filled with lead, throw everything in without pregrinding for 24 yours. It is fine enough that it looks as if it has some of the characteristics of a liquid.

[Fly]

Well OK try the shower thing, that sounds like a winner. If you indeed do let us know how it did.
Fly

[Markopolo]

Not very scientific, but very simple. We all know simple is always best

[indian joe]

I have a lot of failures when grinding, I am getting dust when run through a Hario grinder and I am not completely sure why. Willow mix with 2% dextrin (out of frustration) is yielding powder. Dried in a very fast dessicator broken into pieces with a tile cutter and ground through the Hario.
Water content is probably an issue and I will be running tests to see if I can find right amount of water using lee dippers and will publish results here when I get results that are repeatable.
Will also be increasing the compression to determine whether my hydraulic meters are working correctly.
I thought I saw a reference to dippers and water on the thread but can't find it. Any help would be welcome. Thanks.

I had trouble with moisture - first off too much and then got spotting in the pressed pucks cuz I just couldnt get the low amounf of moisture to mix properly - I ended up where I make the meal into clumps by hand and then grate those clumps back through a 16 mesh screen into a fresh container to mix it properly THEN I load it into the die - that got me nice pucks with no excess moisture squeezing out in the press and no spots of damp and dry in em. Its one more little step but easy to do.

[Texantothecore]

I was thinking about balling the green meal and then grating them before loading them into the compression die. Will try that if nothing else works.

[Dirty Kurty]

What size screens does everyone use? I use 5 mesh then 12, then 16 then 20..what lands on 20 is my ffg. waiting for 30. I want to combined what lands on 30 and 20.. the better part of 2Fg SWISS goes through my 20..I REALLY NEED TO FINISH MY GRINDER> I have plenty of pass through to reclaim on 30.

[Dirty Kurty]

I will test against Swiss after MONSOON SEASON ENDS IN THE MIDWEST...rain rain rain...I wasnt even using a proper size 2f when I reported earlier. I was more likely aboot 0-1 f. Now i am ready to blast my shoulder away...

[TheOutlawKid]

Mr.dirtykurty, what state are you in if you dont mind me asking? I didnt know the midwest had a monsoon season. I know arizona, new mexico, and a small part of texas (Chihuahua desert area) have a monsoon season, but thats the only one i know of.

[Fly]

Outlaw we have this year in eastern Okla. The ark river has flooded every town along her banks. The lake I live on has been at flood stage
for weeks. We have more coming over the week end & next week.

Fly

[Dirty Kurty]

OhioPenn boarder. Our weather is the worst for predictability because of Lake Erie. I'm heading out now to test against the Swiss. That stuff is hard to beat.

[Dirty Kurty]

Not really monsoon season. I trecked to Lodi for Swiss. On the way back the interstate was down to a crawl. Too much rain recently.

[LAGS]

A week ago I flew to Kansas City, Tampa Fl. and then back to Dallas.
Kansas and Texas were both totally flooded.
I wish we could get some rain here in Az. , but hopefully our Monsoon will start in a couple of weeks.
But it is no where near the rain like I saw in the Midwest two weeks ago.