My homemade black powder

[shaman]

Update:

The last of my sieves showed up last night, so I was out this morning doing my final steps. First, I tried some store-bought powder in the seives. My Swiss 3f went through the 40 mesh. my Goex 2F went through 20 mesh and was caught by the 40.

1) I broke up the big pieces into smaller ones using two wooden block, and serving with 4 mesh, and then 10 mesh.
2) I took what fit through 4 and kept crushing until it all fit through 10 mesh.
3) I took the 10 mesh and ran it through a ceramic coffee grinder as course as I could make it.
4) I too the resultant and sifted through 16 mesh and then ran everything that got caught through the grinder again on a slightly finer grind

Throughout this, I sieved each batch through the 20 and then the 40 mesh so I was not regrinding stuff that was already at the proper grain.

When everything I had either passed through the 40 mesh or been caught, I considered myself done.

What went through the 40 mesh is a mix of 3F( give or take) and fines.
When got caught by the 40 mesh is roughly 2F.

I tested both. They gave me a nice "FOOMPH!"

Should I order a 50 mesh sieve to get the fines out, or am I good to go?

[LAGS]

If you get a #50 ,
What holds on that will be your #3f.
Since I mostly shoot larger bores.
What stays on the #30 is my 2f
What doesn't pass thru the #40 is used as my 3f
Most of the fines and stuff that passes thru a #50 just get re processed , then re sifted later.

[indian joe]

Update:

The last of my sieves showed up last night, so I was out this morning doing my final steps. First, I tried some store-bought powder in the seives. My Swiss 3f went through the 40 mesh. my Goex 2F went through 20 mesh and was caught by the 40.

1) I broke up the big pieces into smaller ones using two wooden block, and serving with 4 mesh, and then 10 mesh.
2) I took what fit through 4 and kept crushing until it all fit through 10 mesh.
3) I took the 10 mesh and ran it through a ceramic coffee grinder as course as I could make it.
4) I too the resultant and sifted through 16 mesh and then ran everything that got caught through the grinder again on a slightly finer grind

Throughout this, I sieved each batch through the 20 and then the 40 mesh so I was not regrinding stuff that was already at the proper grain.

When everything I had either passed through the 40 mesh or been caught, I considered myself done.

What went through the 40 mesh is a mix of 3F( give or take) and fines.
When got caught by the 40 mesh is roughly 2F.

I tested both. They gave me a nice "FOOMPH!"

Should I order a 50 mesh sieve to get the fines out, or am I good to go?

The gauge of the wires in your screen will make a difference (quite substantial in the finer mesh sizes) I use a 40 for my final but it is heavy gauge Ag filter mesh. very little commercial FFFg goes through it --at the far end I use a fine nylon cloth from the fabric shop that measures about 100mesh so that 40 to 100 is my FFFFg (We have a couple of flintlocks and a buddy that uses our excess in a 357 magnum lever gun) I reprocess the mill dust
I'm not too fussed about correct sizing but I screen my stuff very diligently

[shaman]

SUCCESS!
I just got in from the porch. I am most proud to report that my first batch went KaBoom! in the Brown Bess.

It's a tad dirtier than the storebought. I used the fine stuff for primer, put a few grains of Swiss 3F down the bore and then 80 grains of the coarser stuff and topped it off with a fiber wad.

1) the coarse stuff that got caught by the 20 mesh will have to be ground a bit more. It does not measure well.
2) the fine stuff will need to go through the 50 mesh sieve I have on order. However, it seems to catch a spark well as is.

I don't think I'll hunt with it this year, but it certainly gives me plenty of other opportunities.

Thanks all for your help.

[StevenDJ]

Shaman,
My strategy is to use 12-16-24-45 mesh screens purchased from flEbay. These are 20cm lab screens. I also purchase a lid (not super useful) and a base (really useful).
Like your method, I only regrind the grains that are too large so initially this is all that sits on the 12 mesh screen.
The biggest change in efficiency for me was to move to a grain roller mill. Although the rollers don't have a lot of adjustment, rerolling grains through the same setting will still break down the course grains. When there is no more powder sitting on the 12 mesh screen I can call the process done. I end up with around 20% fines that fall through the 45 mesh and the remaining is close to evenly distributed. I'll probably buy another screen of 80-100 mesh to capture 4F, but for the moment I don't need it so it is reground.
Lastly, because it takes me no time, I throw all the F, FF and FFF back into an empty mill jar and polish for 12-24hrs before regrading.
It sound silly, but I love to look at my powders. The grains are hard and strong and there is no dust. I have never purchased any store baught powder but mine looks like it is a professional product. It certainly performs well to.
To make myself happy, I even made a label for my bottles (I'll upload a photo later) 🙂
I'm gad to hear another of the team is happy with their progress!
Steve

[MaLar]

I've been following this thread for some time now. Copied some of the information into a text file. Lots of good stuff here. I've gathered most of the stuff to start but have a question on some Potassium Nitrate I bought. What is it? See attached photo. I suck at chemistry so?
Don't know how it got turned sideways!
What's interesting is I added up the percentages and came up with
111.24 percent? I had to add it up a couple of times always the same answer.

[StevenDJ]

MaLar,

I would think what you have there is perfect. It may not be of a laboratory purity, however it is likely to be 98% minimum. It is harder to to test for the presence of other soluble impurities, but you could dissolve a teaspoon in a glass of water and observe if there is any sediment from insolubles.

In reality, I think that performance issues will come from other areas such as charcoal quality and milling efficiency before impurities in your potassium nitrate are a problem.

Glad to see someone else having a go. It is a fun journey.

Steve

[LAGS]

That does look like it will work well.
But it looks more like Stump Remover.
Just to be on the safe side.
You can purify it by boiling it in distilled water and letting it Re Crystalize.
Then just regrind it and use it in your powder.
That is what I do when I use to use Stump Remover for my KNO3.

[MaLar]

Thanks for the answers gentlemen.

[StevenDJ]

LAGS,

This is an embarrassing question given that I am a chemistry teacher... How difficult is the process of purification by crystallization? I guess I have always need able to access a range of chemicals of exceptionally high purity so I never needed to worry about learning the process.

Steve

[StevenDJ]

MaLar,

I just reread your label on my computer. It seems as though there is a high portion of potassium oxide present in your product. I think LAGS is right. Purification will be needed. It is just another step in the learning process. Don't be discouraged ��.

Steve

[LAGS]

Is Very Easy to Te Crystalize the KNO3.
Just put a metal pan on a stove.
Fill it about half way with water.
Tap water works , but distilled water just has no other chemicals in it just in case.
Get the water boiling.
Drop in a cup of your KNO3 and let it boil slowly for about 20 minutes.
Then let it cool down.
It will start turning into crystals very soon.
Let the crystals cool and dry , then grind them into powder almost air fly.
There are dozens of ways and things you can do to add to this process like dump the boiling mix into cold water to make the stuff crystalize quicker.
But I don't see that it helps that much.
Google this question on the net and see if there are even more complicated or easier processes.

[LAGS]

@ StevenDJ
I saw that you posted , that you put all your different grains in an empty mill and do the polishing for 12 hours.
I feel that you need to polish each grain size separate.
Polishing knocks off sharp corners of the grains of powder.
If you have fine powder mixed in with the larger stuff.
It acts as a buffer and softens the corners when they bump together.
That will cause them to take longer and buffs stuff into more fine powder.
Tumbling for less than an hour per grain size seems to work well for me

[MaLar]

I have 20lbs of this crap. What's the ratio of water to Kno3

[LAGS]

I think about a Quart of water to a cop on KNO3.
You just want the powder to dissolve in the water when hot.
So the powder just has to be surrounded by water.
The water is poured off once the water is cooled down.
So a particular Ratio is not needed

[lead chucker]

didn't no it was that easy to do. Learn something new every day.

[Swineherd]

Just to nerd out on this a bit, what's being talked about here isn't a purification, in the sense that you're not removing impurities from the potassium nitrate. Boiling the mix of chemicals is dissolving the potassium nitrate, which isn't changed at all in the process, and combining the potassium oxide and nitrate radical into more potassium nitrate. It's virtually the same process that is done when extracting nitrates from soil. There is complete potassium nitrate plus free nitrates in the human or animal waste saturated dirt. Those free nitrates are combined with potassium which is introduced to the mixture with the addition of wood ash. In that case, after the reaction, the solution is filtered for particulates and further purified when the KNO3 is precipitated into solid crystal form and the remaining water poured off.

[StevenDJ]

@ StevenDJ
I saw that you posted , that you put all your different grains in an empty mill and do the polishing for 12 hours.
I feel that you need to polish each grain size separate.
Polishing knocks off sharp corners of the grains of powder.
If you have fine powder mixed in with the larger stuff.

LAGS,
Thanks for this idea. I have removed the 'waste' powder before I tumble. I tumble the F, FF and FFF mixed together, but I am keen to try them separately as it does seem to take much longer than I expected. I was trying to be efficient
Steve

[StevenDJ]

Is Very Easy to Te Crystalize the KNO3.

There are dozens of ways and things you can do to add to this process like dump the boiling mix into cold water to make the stuff crystalize quicker.
But I don't see that it helps that much.

I really should give this a go, even if it is for the sake of just understanding the process. I like your idea of letting the crystals form slower. I would expect that a fast crystalisation would produce smaller crystals that would be harder to seive from the solution.

[StevenDJ]

Boiling the mix of chemicals is dissolving the potassium nitrate, which isn't changed at all in the process, and combining the potassium oxide and nitrate radical into more potassium nitrate.

Swineherd, I am not sure that boiling potassium oxide will convert it to potassium nitrate in MaLar's case. Maybe I am misunderstanding what you are describing in your post.

Tell me if I understand you correctly. Are you trying to say that there are other nitrate ions in the soil/manure that will dissolve along with the potassium ions present in wood ash that crystalize into the KNO3 when a solution is boiled.

Extracting the KNO3 from a natural source takes it to a whole new level of skill.

Steve