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Thread: My homemade black powder

  1. #1561
    Boolit Master
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    Where in east Okla do you live?

    Fly

  2. #1562
    Boolit Master
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    Quote Originally Posted by okshooter View Post
    But, the can is lined. Will this ruin the first batch of charcoal? Should I just plan on sacrificing the first burn to get that liner out?
    I didn't, and it worked ok.

  3. #1563
    Boolit Master
    Texantothecore's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by okshooter View Post
    I am one step closer to trying this in that I bought a one gallon paint can at one of the box stores today. I am going to make a TLUD. But, the can is lined. Will this ruin the first batch of charcoal? Should I just plan on sacrificing the first burn to get that liner out?
    Thanks guys. This thread has been an education.
    The plastic liner will burn at around 400 degrees so i wouldn't worry about it

  4. #1564
    Boolit Bub
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    Fly,
    I am north of Sand Springs. I got some black willow when the county knocked one down near the house and I got some cedar from a neighbor who has been running a load of lumber through a planer(sp?; joiner maybe?). So I have quite a bit of cedar chips to start the experiment.

  5. #1565
    Boolit Master
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    Great I live in Vian, by Lake Tenkiller. Sounds like you got it down. We have a lot of black willow here, & it is hard to beat.

    Fly

  6. #1566
    Boolit Bub
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    10-4. If Santa comes through, I should be able to give it a go early next year.

  7. #1567
    Boolit Buddy
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    You could alway try what what I did this year. I ordered myself (Stana Claus) a new Remmy and presented it to The Queen (Mrs Stana Claus) and told her she and the kiddos didnt have to shop for me this time. "Hide it til Christmas and I'll act surprised!"

    Worked like a charm!

    I had no choice see. I accidentally ordered 1500 caps in the wrong size from Powder Valley. NOTHING else I owned would take them, and I cant find my nipple wrench. (Ok, thats a streeeetch.) But dangit, Cabela's was having a 100 dollar off sale.

    See what I did there? Stana is nothing if not clever.
    Last edited by Whizzer; 11-24-2016 at 02:55 PM.

  8. #1568
    Boolit Master
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    Good deal! Those Remmy clones are tons of fun. I got my first one back in about '79.

  9. #1569
    Boolit Buddy fishingsetx's Avatar
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    Giving homemade BP a try for the first time. Had a buddy give me some air float charcoal, ground up potassium nitrate, some powdered sulfur, and a handfull of very hard lead balls. Ball milled the proper proportions (75, 15, 10) to mill and mix. Ran the mill out in the driveway well away from everything overnight.



    I dont have a press yet, so I bought a lb of corn starch and baked it for a few hours to make some dextrin.



    dumped in 1% by weight and milled for another 2 hrs to incoporate. added distilled water a little at a time until I had a good dough ball. Setup an old window screen for the initial screening. I had added just a bit too much water so I broke up the dough ball and let it dry for a while.



    pressed the dough pieces through the screen and they dropped into some diposable aluminum pans (my wife would kill me if I used her good pans!)





    now I plan to wait for the grated powder to dry and then screen it again to break up any clumps. I also bought a much finer strainer to sort out the grains fron the dust.





    After screening, I plan to rewet the too small powder particles, if there is a large amount, and process it again then test the powder!

    If everything works out, Im thinking of building a press die and try pressing cakes. Ive already milled some more potassium nitrate (stump remover)to powder and I plan to make some charcoal and mill it. I also have some decent chunks of sulfur that Im going to mill (I can get all I want as scrap from work). Hopefully it'll work out. Its quite a bit of work, but its interesting and rewarding!

    Anything you see im doing wrong? anything to make the process easier/safer?



    Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "Holy ****....what a ride!"

  10. #1570
    Boolit Master
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    Your on the right track. Remember that screen powder is much lighter then pressed. So forget the powder
    measure & weigh it. Say 30 grains is the load you want, weigh it instead of powder measure. If you used a
    powder measure at 30 grains it would most likely way say 20 gains. The screen still shoots good but burns
    a little dirty. When you get your press built I sell puck pressing dies. If you want a set just PM me.

    Fly

  11. #1571
    Boolit Buddy fishingsetx's Avatar
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    After drying and screening and doing a test burn (seemed to burn slower and dirtier than goex), I dumped 25 grains (by volume) into one of the cylinders of my new model army .44 and pressed in a patch and round ball. I figured 25 grains would be a safe test run, especially considering the fact it coukd be lighter than the 30 grains of 25 year old goex I normally run! walked across the back yard to the ditch (about 4' deep and the only safe direction to fire a gun is into the ditch). Capped the cylinder and gave her a test fire. BOOM!!! Didnt see the neighbors in their back yard 40 yds away due to the tree line and scared the hell out of them! After appologizing and explaining what I was doing, I ended up having to load another cylinder to demonstrate lol! We live in the country and everybody fires a test round or two into the same ditch occasionally so it wasnt a big deal. All in all, im impressed with my first go round producing black powder! I cant imagine how good it'll be after pressing!!

    Next batch will be as close to homemade as I care to get! homeade charcoal, sulfur milled from scrap from work (we get it by the truck load and they spill quite a bit so I scavenge it when needed), and salt peter from stump remover. Toss in a bit of homemade dextrin, mix it up, press it into cakes and hope it burns better than my last batch.

    Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "Holy ****....what a ride!"

  12. #1572
    Boolit Master
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    What kind of ball mill you using?

    Fly

  13. #1573
    Boolit Buddy fishingsetx's Avatar
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    Harbor freight dual drum rock tumbler and 1/2" diameter HARD lead balls. I already had the rock tumbler for SS pin polishing brass.

    Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "Holy ****....what a ride!"

  14. #1574
    Boolit Master
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    A little tip. One of the biggest problems new guys make is now loading drum with enough balls.
    I,m no different. I ask one of my fireworks buddys why my powder was not as fast as his at a
    event. That was his first question, did load the drum with enough balls. He told me to fill the drum
    almost 1/2 full.

    That seemed like a lot but he was right. My powder grinds much faster & much finer. Just something to throw
    out there.

    Hope this helps Fly

  15. #1575
    Boolit Grand Master GhostHawk's Avatar
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    BTW I just wanted to drop in and thank you guys.

    I figured that a coffee grinder good enough to last while grinding broken up pucks would probably be a pretty good grinder. So I bought the glass one recomended farther up this thread.

    Every morning for 5 months I get up, go crank the handle 70-80 times. Grounds go into an aero press some days. (paper filter does soak up some flavor, so I give it an extra 10-15 turns) Or it goes into a small round glass pitcher I have, and after steeping for a minute gets poured into one of these.



    Dang fine grinder guys, thanks for the tip. I be loving my coffee.

    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

  16. #1576
    Boolit Master




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    Save yourself a lot of trouble and just go to making pucks. In a limited capacity situation like a C&B revolver or cartridges you need the more energetic pressed powder. I went your route to start and the velocity in cartridges was 300fps less with the screened powder for the same volume.
    Here is the setup I use Not as good as a hydraulic press but it works.

    Bob
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Puck maker 002.jpg   Puck maker 001.jpg  
    GUNFIRE! The sound of Freedom!

  17. #1577
    Boolit Buddy fishingsetx's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Boz330 View Post
    Save yourself a lot of trouble and just go to making pucks. In a limited capacity situation like a C&B revolver or cartridges you need the more energetic pressed powder. I went your route to start and the velocity in cartridges was 300fps less with the screened powder for the same volume.
    Here is the setup I use Not as good as a hydraulic press but it works.

    Bob
    mailing the check off for a die set today. Im going to pick up an 8 ton bottle jack this week and fabricate me a small press. I just need to get the dimentions of the press die and the bottle jack.

    This was just my first run tinkering with it to see if I wanted to proceed. I went as cheap as possible. Now that I know I want to proceed, Im starting to upgrade some of my stuff.

    Where is the best place to purchase mill balls? Id like to get more. The ones I have are some kind of REALLY hard lead, but I dont have very many.



    Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "Holy shoot....what a ride!"
    Last edited by fishingsetx; 02-13-2017 at 02:46 PM.

  18. #1578
    Boolit Master
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    Get some 1/2 id copper tube at the hard ware store & cut it into 1 & 1/4 inch long pieces. Fill with lead & peen the edges over
    To whole the lead in. Works fine & is cheap.

    Fly

  19. #1579
    Boolit Buddy fishingsetx's Avatar
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    Time to pulverize some sulfur! scrounged a coffee cup full from work. Took all lf 30 seconds and I could have easily loaded up a 5 gallon bucket full and not even made a dent in the scrap.







    Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "Holy shoot....what a ride!"

  20. #1580
    Boolit Master




    Boz330's Avatar
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    I did what Fly recommended and it does a much better job of milling. I had a bunch of 1/2" scrap copper pipe from building my house that I filled with wheel weight lead.

    Bob
    GUNFIRE! The sound of Freedom!

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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check