My homemade black powder

[indian joe]

LAGS, thanks for your reply.

The 3/8" dimensions of wall thickness will help when I try and find someone with a lathe to make me a better pucking die. I would prefer any of the metals you specified over steel for their non-sparking properties. My first pucks were made using 70mm aluminium with a 4mm wall, but that stretched faster than my current this steel die.

Brass balls would be nice. I have gone the ceramic route as one of the best bits about black powder is the smell. I would rather not have my powder contaminated with lead dust. I am fortunate that I can do all my milling well away from anything that could be damaged. I set it running at the farm on a timer, come back the following day to move the cows again, then collect my milled powder. One day I might come back to a blown up mill, which will be exciting but not dangerous. I have sandbagged the mill to direct the blast away from the shipping container I use for a storage building and to mount my solar for the electric fence (and the mill).

Has anyone reported a blown up mill when using ceramic media?

I am happy with the diameter and pressure I can exert using my press. My last pucks made using this die have given me a density of 1.85, 1.91, 1.87, 1.88 and 1.86 g/cm3.

Opps, I made a mistake in my formulation and mixed up the ratios of carbon and sulfur. The density above would be light on carbon and heavy on sulfur. It did not burn with the same WOOSH, that the correct formulation does. I will retest the density on a correct batch shortly.

scratch around the farm junk pile maybe you find something useful
my pressing die is a piece of schedule 40 PVC- then I found a heavy steel plate off an old cultivator - its an end bushing off a pivot beam and has a short piece of heavy tube welded to the face - my PVC die is a pretty neat slip fit in the steel tube - soon as I press it swells the PVC just a tad till the steel ring holds it - soon as the pressure is released it slips out - no contact with the steel so no contamination of the meal -
I would take a piece of 90 mm PVC schedule 40down the engineering supply shop and hunt for a heavy steel tube that it fits neat but not tight - only need a little piece three inches or so then load your meal into the PVC - you make a bottom piece from masonite or even a plastic disc - make some plastic dividers - can press 4 or 500 grams at the time in thin pucks - when its done push the whole column through the plastic die using a spacer under it (90mm DWV will do for that)

[Brimstone]

Terrible news gentlemen, there has been another incident involving pyrotechnics making this year. It would appear he was attempting to make gunpowder.

A resident of Macon County NC was critically injured on June 23 at about 1am according to news reports.
He has reportedly lost both hands and eyes in the blast.
FBI reportedly destroyed an assortment of containers of black powdery material.

He was taken to a hospital in critical condition.
My heart goes out to him and his family.

I don't know of any other community outside of the pyro community other than US Naval Aviators who critique each other's work so thoroughly as we but none the less I think maybe we might consider brushing up on this risky hobbies guidelines.

I'd like to remind everyone that use of threaded lids or caps is a safety violation. Threads such as PVC caps are regarded by everyone to be unsafe and a friction ignition point.
One should use clean rubber caps retained on the outside of the clean tube with a clean hose clamp.

Again. NO THREADED CAPS or PLUGS.

Remote dumping of the composition from the mill jar into a grounded bowl or wood box is very highly recommended by many as this ultra fine mill dust is the easiest to ignite with ESD and this has happened in the past.

Another safety guideline, DO NOT use marbles, glass aquarium bedding or hardened steel shot such as ball bearings.

Nothing that can shatter inside a mill. Shattering is often the result of stress within the material and this shattering produces heat that can ignite contents.

DO NOT STRIKE YOUR JAR. You shouldn't be that close to it to strike it. But striking the back to break clumped composition can cause media to impact with enough force to ignite composition. Many in the hobby regard it as two violations of guidelines, proximity and impact.

DO NOT use any form of enclosed metallic grinding implement for granulating or corning pucked composition. No meat grinder. No coffee grinder. These devices partially or completely enclose the composition and when the unfortunate day comes that it ignites, the components become shrapnel.


Quantity of material. The more you're manipulating, the greater the destructive effect. I've read that many pyros keep quantities to 100 gram batches.
There doesn't seem to be strong consensus on what is considered too much. I can only warn you that the more you create in one go, the greater the destructive effect of blast or fireball. You will not have time to react to accidental ignition.


Know your composition material! Potassium nitrate is the oxidizer. Sodium nitrate if you don't have the former.
For safety sake, there are no alternatives. I occasionally see the question asked about chlorates and perchlorates.
No. These only make shock sensitive priming compound. Very sensitive.
I mentioned that to lead into the next safety concern.
We're seeing an uptick in primer making. This almost always entails chlorate, meaning more and more hobbyists will have chlorate in their shop and may not have it labeled and stored separately from nitrates. It can be visually indistinguishable from nitrate.

For safety, if you're making primers too, store those components in a container clearly marked with appropriate warnings as to the toxic nature of the materials within and the danger of mixing them.

Everyone should periodically brush up on safety precautions and risk mitigation techniques.
Know that there is no 100% safe method of making pyrotechnic compositions and that you should never cut corners, never put off a risk mitigating method or practice merely because it is inconvenient or a component for your tool was not immediately available.

Personal Protective Equipment is recommended. A trifecta of distance, physical barriers and appropriate protective clothing between yourself and a fireball. Know that breathing in searing hot gasses will destroy lungs and is fatal. The first line of safety is distance.

It will be the difference between walking away from a startling flash or a tragedy.

[indian joe]

Terrible news gentlemen, there has been another incident involving pyrotechnics making this year. It would appear he was attempting to make gunpowder.

A resident of Macon County NC was critically injured on June 23 at about 1am according to news reports.
He has reportedly lost both hands and eyes in the blast.
FBI reportedly destroyed an assortment of containers of black powdery material.

He was taken to a hospital in critical condition.
My heart goes out to him and his family.

I don't know of any other community outside of the pyro community other than US Naval Aviators who critique each other's work so thoroughly as we but none the less I think maybe we might consider brushing up on this risky hobbies guidelines.

I'd like to remind everyone that use of threaded lids or caps is a safety violation. Threads such as PVC caps are regarded by everyone to be unsafe and a friction ignition point.
One should use clean rubber caps retained on the outside of the clean tube with a clean hose clamp.

Again. NO THREADED CAPS or PLUGS.

Remote dumping of the composition from the mill jar into a grounded bowl or wood box is very highly recommended by many as this ultra fine mill dust is the easiest to ignite with ESD and this has happened in the past.

Another safety guideline, DO NOT use marbles, glass aquarium bedding or hardened steel shot such as ball bearings.

Nothing that can shatter inside a mill. Shattering is often the result of stress within the material and this shattering produces heat that can ignite contents.

DO NOT STRIKE YOUR JAR. You shouldn't be that close to it to strike it. But striking the back to break clumped composition can cause media to impact with enough force to ignite composition. Many in the hobby regard it as two violations of guidelines, proximity and impact.

DO NOT use any form of enclosed metallic grinding implement for granulating or corning pucked composition. No meat grinder. No coffee grinder. These devices partially or completely enclose the composition and when the unfortunate day comes that it ignites, the components become shrapnel.


Quantity of material. The more you're manipulating, the greater the destructive effect. I've read that many pyros keep quantities to 100 gram batches.
There doesn't seem to be strong consensus on what is considered too much. I can only warn you that the more you create in one go, the greater the destructive effect of blast or fireball. You will not have time to react to accidental ignition.


Know your composition material! Potassium nitrate is the oxidizer. Sodium nitrate if you don't have the former.
For safety sake, there are no alternatives. I occasionally see the question asked about chlorates and perchlorates.
No. These only make shock sensitive priming compound. Very sensitive.
I mentioned that to lead into the next safety concern.
We're seeing an uptick in primer making. This almost always entails chlorate, meaning more and more hobbyists will have chlorate in their shop and may not have it labeled and stored separately from nitrates. It can be visually indistinguishable from nitrate.

For safety, if you're making primers too, store those components in a container clearly marked with appropriate warnings as to the toxic nature of the materials within and the danger of mixing them.

Everyone should periodically brush up on safety precautions and risk mitigation techniques.
Know that there is no 100% safe method of making pyrotechnic compositions and that you should never cut corners, never put off a risk mitigating method or practice merely because it is inconvenient or a component for your tool was not immediately available.

Personal Protective Equipment is recommended. A trifecta of distance, physical barriers and appropriate protective clothing between yourself and a fireball. Know that breathing in searing hot gasses will destroy lungs and is fatal. The first line of safety is distance.

It will be the difference between walking away from a startling flash or a tragedy.

some questions
1) do we know for sure this was a blackpowder issue ? - some of the stuff that pyros work with is many times more exciteable than basic black.
2) impact ignition - do you have a proper scientific reference that shows this - I have tried (unsuccessfully) numerous times to impact ignite small test quantities of basic blackpowder
3) threaded lids ?? every can of blackpowder I ever bought came with a threaded lid - how come that is ok? again do you have something concrete we can refer to?
4) ESD ? been a lot of trials on that too and absent the amperage available from an electrical mains circuit its unproven

One of my pet peeves is the mill motor - anybody using any other than a totally enclosed motor to drive their mill is treading on thin ice - that is a true double - enough heat in the sparking motor plus a fine film of mill dust ---nobody talks about this.

For my money this here is a blackpowder thread - not pyrotechnics - not cap making - those both involve significantly more dangerous materials.

[Brimstone]

We do not know for fact he was not messing with something else.

Threaded mill jar lids are a friction point. The threads will be contaminated with fine dust. Your call on that risk. The guy who was injured opening a threaded jar happened a long time ago. Probably 20 years. I'm not sure the forum or thread is around. I don't exactly keep a filing cabinet full of detailed incident reports.

The ESD ignition regarding freshly milled powder, a pyro who was burned had this happen as he emptied his mill jar into an ungrounded stainless bowl. I might dig around for the incident as it wasn't two decades ago.
Corned powder is not the same as milled powder. ESD will not set off corned powder. It can ignite powder dust suspended in air. Pouring from your mill jar into an ungrounded metallic or other plastic presents the danger.

Another incident, the guy was pounding the back of his mill jar and the media, type unknown is suspected of impacting or shattering, he was burned. I'll see if I can dredge up his post. It was on Ned Gorski's site IIRC. That might have been the ESD of freshly milled powder. It was one of the two.

I agree entirely with a sealed motor. There are reasonably priced motors from Grainger rated for explosive environments and must be utilized. You aren't saving much money using an unsealed non-rated motor, get the rated motor.
I stand by my warning regarding primer making compound. Some here are purchasing chlorate by the pound. Storing it well away from powder making supplies stands.

[HWooldridge]

This is bad news on multiple levels. Aside from the heartache and suffering by the unfortunate persons involved, it may bring a degree of undesirable oversight from government overseers. Wouldn’t surprise me if ATF decides to get involved and proclaim this as some form of bomb manufacturing, with new legislation coming forth after an investigation.

I make sure my equipment is grounded and I don’t use plastic bowls for processing but the stock motor on my tumbler isn’t explosion proof. I do store the finished BP in plastic containers - in 1 pound amounts. Maybe I should switch to metal cans.

I hope and pray the victim has the best recovery possible under the circumstances.

[Inebriated Eremite]

Also another good idea is wearing an anti-static wrist strap. Super cheap and just another layer of protection.

[LAGS]

My first thought about this reported accident was.
It was someone making Fireworks for the 4th of July.
But I don't know, and to make proper judgements , we need to find out as many details as we can to refine the true problem.
But this report of all the Safety Issues is great information and should be followed.
Brimstone.
I looked up the News report on that accident.
It seemed that the FBI found and disposed of Other Powder that they found in an Unrelated incident in NC.
So we can not assume that the FBI is jumping in on explosive incidents like making your own BP.
They also did not say that the accident victim Had his hands blown Off or actually lost his eyes.

[Trapper-Jack]

I realize that everybody has different schedules. Mine goes from about daylight to 5, 6, 7 o'clock in the evening, depending on what I have going. Other than that I'm either eating or sleeping. My first thought was why was he making powder at 1:00 in the morning? I try to be nonjudgmental but I have a gut feeling that all isn't as it's being reported.

[StevenDJ]

Brimstone,

That is some sobering news. I appreciate that everyone has different methods and different levels of risk, but we don't want to see anyone get hurt. I hope that even the bad guys (maybe bombs???) stay safe and that they turn their lives around.

I see your list as a pretty good list of things to consider as we strive to be safe. It is easy as a beginner to be unaware of the risk. As a chemistry teacher, I have made mistakes in the lab in the past even when I have completed a thorough risk assessment. The problem is that it is impossible to assess a risk you are unaware of.

From your list, I do wonder what methods you use (or propose) to corn/grind your compressed pucks. The only methods I recall reading about here are the things you recommend against. What do you think of the roller grain grinders shown below?


____

More broadly, I appreciate all the input of everyone who has contributed to this mammoth thread. It took weeks/months to read every page but it was worth the effort as the information contained allowed me to be successful in making my own powder. I also like that some guys, like Indianjoe, are trying to carefully recreate and test the scenarios that may create a disaster so that others can learn from their work.

[Brimstone]

DJ, I use that grain roller. Mine is modified with gears and additional adjustment but this is not necessarily needed.
After I posted my tool and explained it, several here realized that it doesn't take much effort to drive the passive roller.
A leather or rubber strip fed between the rollers will induce the desired effect.

See the passive roller will bind up on chunks of puck. The driven roller will then grind the stalled chunk to flour.
To avoid this, only a light motivation by the fingers makes it work but well....fingers get pinched.
I just went over the top with gears, turning new dials and shafts. Wasn't needed.

I'm glad it's gear driven but hindsight is usually 20/20 and the fine folks here pointed out the leather or rubber strap fix within a few hours.

The quantity rule still very much applies. Mine sits over a wood box and only a few pucks go in at a time.

[Tracy]

On the lead dust thing, my milling media is .45 caliber copper plated bullets. There is no bare lead.
Has anyone tried powder coating lead balls for grinding?

[LAGS]

Yep.
I tried PC 'ing lead balls for ball milling.
It worked Great.
Your BP will end up with little tiny flakes of the PC mixed in.
But it was worth a shot.

[indian joe]

We do not know for fact he was not messing with something else.

Thanks for the reply - I take your word on your sources

Threaded mill jar lids are a friction point. The threads will be contaminated with fine dust. Your call on that risk.
Mine has a wooden plug in the jar neck with an o ring - threads stay clean during the cycle - make sure I brush them clean when I refill

The guy who was injured opening a threaded jar happened a long time ago. Probably 20 years. I'm not sure the forum or thread is around. I don't exactly keep a filing cabinet full of detailed incident reports.

The ESD ignition regarding freshly milled powder, a pyro who was burned had this happen as he emptied his mill jar into an ungrounded stainless bowl. I might dig around for the incident as it wasn't two decades ago.
Corned powder is not the same as milled powder. ESD will not set off corned powder. It can ignite powder dust suspended in air.
Ok that makes sense

Pouring from your mill jar into an ungrounded metallic or other plastic presents the danger.
Setup is all on a 6x4 wooden table with an earth strap from the motor frame to ground
I only run the mill at night in the cooler months of the year (overnight temps under 15C) and I empty / recharge early morning (maximum humidity)

Another incident, the guy was pounding the back of his mill jar and the media, type unknown is suspected of impacting or shattering, he was burned. I'll see if I can dredge up his post. It was on Ned Gorski's site IIRC. That might have been the ESD of freshly milled powder. It was one of the two.
More likely glass or ceramic media -

I agree entirely with a sealed motor. There are reasonably priced motors from Grainger rated for explosive environments and must be utilized. You aren't saving much money using an unsealed non-rated motor, get the rated motor.

I stand by my warning regarding primer making compound. Some here are purchasing chlorate by the pound. Storing it well away from powder making supplies stands.

......

[indian joe]

I realize that everybody has different schedules. Mine goes from about daylight to 5, 6, 7 o'clock in the evening, depending on what I have going. Other than that I'm either eating or sleeping. My first thought was why was he making powder at 1:00 in the morning? I try to be nonjudgmental but I have a gut feeling that all isn't as it's being reported.

when was the last time anything anyplace was accurately reported? they lie so much and so often that some time in the future they will tell us the truth and nobody will believe (who was that dude cried wolf)

[Super Sneaky Steve]

On the lead dust thing, my milling media is .45 caliber copper plated bullets. There is no bare lead.
Has anyone tried powder coating lead balls for grinding?

That's not a bad idea. I use 40S&W cases with lead balls pressed into them.

My old way of coring was to use a wooden rolling pin with the chunks between two sheets of paper. Since then I've switched to a cast iron mill because it's faster but the story above is very sobering. I may have to go back to the rolling pin method for my cartridge and percussion pistol powder. Screened powder works just as good if not better in muzzle loaders and it's a whole lot safer to make.

[Super Sneaky Steve]

Check this out! A guy exploded his ball mill for science! He was using 600g or a little over a pound.

http://dave2.freeshell.org/ammo/bp60...ling%20jar.pdf

[Vettepilot]

"I am from the government and I'm here to help you."

Oh yeah...

Face it guys, sooner or later our BP activities will be disallowed. Count on it. The government must protect us from ourselves. (Please substitute "themselves" for "us" in that sentence for it to have more truth...)

Vettepilot

[Vettepilot]

Check this out! A guy exploded his ball mill for science! He was using 600g or a little over a pound.

http://dave2.freeshell.org/ammo/bp60...ling%20jar.pdf

I can't get that to connect or download, but would like to see it. Help?

Thanks,

Vettepilot

[DoubleBuck]

I can't get that to connect or download, but would like to see it. Help?

Thanks,

Vettepilot

It worked when posted, but is now a dead link, and that is probably a dead give away. I cleared my history, and don't have the ability to check if it was wiped out, or just delinked.

[Vettepilot]

Yeah, that's suspicious I'd say. Either he got nervous about it and took it down, or the nannies did, I would say.

It's curious that it was a ".pdf" file. Those are generally text files; not videos, though I suppose a video could have been embedded in the .pdf. What was it and what did it show?

Edit to add: Various other routes/methods to see this all lead to dead ends I've found. I found a reference to the "Experiment" on another forum found in a search, but those links are dead as well. (Different links from this one.) Curious...

Thanks,
Vettepilot