My homemade black powder

[Trapper-Jack]

Yes, the spruce was Colorado Blue Spruce. I'm thinking that any of these trees would be a good candidate for good powder.

[DoubleBuck]

Graysmoke;
Your results mirror mine, with the two types of TP charcoal I've produced. It is very light density and difficult (for me) to get it over 1.6 G/CC. You may find that even though the powder is light, it may produce equal or greater velocities, per grain of weight. It seems very energetic.

[Graysmoke]

DoubleBuck;
Tp char does shoot well, I milled for 10 hrs after 9 it kept wadding up on the side wall. Tapping the wall put it back down but I didn’t think it would get any better. Trapper-jack has good info, makes me think cedar would show a poi difference do to velocity drop. Well I will still have a good time burning it, still have 2 lbs of it.
Graysmoke

[dtknowles]

Graysmoke;
Your results mirror mine, with the two types of TP charcoal I've produced. It is very light density and difficult (for me) to get it over 1.6 G/CC. You may find that even though the powder is light, it may produce equal or greater velocities, per grain of weight. It seems very energetic.

I made balsa charcoal this past fortnight and the powder came out light but seems fast and energetic. Chrono is on the fritz or I would have data to share. Since I did not have a working chrono I shot it in my Rem #4 .32 RF and a .22 Stevens tip up pistol. I am kind of growing fond of this Rem #4 rifle, I shot it today with a variety of ammo all using .22 rf adapter cases. Some black powder and acorn blanks some with just nail sets. Some with round balls some with healed bullets. Black powder, the acorn blanks and outside lubed healed bullets seems just the ticket. In the Stevens tip up pistol I breach seated a .22 air rifle pellet, filled the chamber with fine BP and topped with the acorn blank.
Tim

[StevenDJ]

DoubleBuck;
... it kept wadding up on the side wall. Tapping the wall put it back down but ...
Graysmoke

Greysmoke,

Can you tell me what this type of clumping behaviour indicates. I run my mill out at the farm and don't always have the opportunity to come and tap the sides back in periodically. It often clumps. I use a 12 hour mill in a 4 inch diameter jar with 3/4 inch ceramic media.

I'd be interested in your interpretation of this observation.

Steve

[LAGS]

I take it that you only use the Ceramic Media for milling the Charcoal and not the BP ?
One suggestion for helping the stuff from lumping against the wall if the mill is to add a few balls of media that are not perfectly round.
The perfectly round balls will form a pattern and then roll in the same pattern.
That can push the powder against the wall of the mill and the balls just roll over it .
Mis shaped balls will bounce every once in a while allowing it to break up that material that is against the mill drum walls.
Just something you can try for your situation.

[HWooldridge]

I use bronze triangles. I poured some molten bronze into the inside of a piece of angle iron that had its ends closed then cut the resulting bar into 1” pieces. The corners have a good effect on mixing.

[Graysmoke]

StevenDj; LAGS is spot on. I think some dampness is involved some batches do this in as little as 6 hrs. I have also tried egg sinkers they waddle around in the mill this might help. Some have said on other sites that when it wads up its done, I kinda question that thinking. I offten wonder why some mill for 24 hrs seems excessive when I get good powder in 10. maybe I’m missing something.
Graysmoke

[dondiego]

I take it that you only use the Ceramic Media for milling the Charcoal and not the BP ?
One suggestion for helping the stuff from lumping against the wall if the mill is to add a few balls of media that are not perfectly round.
The perfectly round balls will form a pattern and then roll in the same pattern.
That can push the powder against the wall of the mill and the balls just roll over it .
Mis shaped balls will bounce every once in a while allowing it to break up that material that is against the mill drum walls.
Just something you can try for your situation.

Is there a problem with using ceramic media with BP?

[HamGunner]

Greysmoke,

Can you tell me what this type of clumping behaviour indicates. I run my mill out at the farm and don't always have the opportunity to come and tap the sides back in periodically. It often clumps. I use a 12 hour mill in a 4 inch diameter jar with 3/4 inch ceramic media.

I'd be interested in your interpretation of this observation.
Steve

I started drying my ingredients before mixing and tossing into the mill and I think extra dry ingredients helps a bunch to prevent clumping.

I imagine myself that an irregular shaped media might help reduce clumping as well. I always used .32, .38, .45, and 12 gauge round ball all mixed together, but since I also added some .380 conicals as well, what little clumping remained after I started using dry ingredients has about gone away.

I think the first thing I would do would be to prepare the ingredients to a really fine consistency, then dry at least your Potassium Nitrate in the oven prior to weighing, mixing, and milling. I forgot what the percentage of moisture that I drove off, but I measured it once and it was enough to throw off the formula by a few percent.

I have around 12 lbs. of media in a 15 lb. Thumblers Tumbler type mill with a hexagon shaped tub and using very fine dry ingredients I get good results without clumps in no more than 10 hours milling time. Probably done by 8 hours, but I shoot for 10 hours just to be sure.

About every 2 hours I will jerk the tub off the mill and shake it up a bit just to make certain that it is getting mixed well, but since it is not much wider than it is tall, it mixes well anyway. I suspect a really long tub would need a bit of help along the way to get perfect blending.

[LAGS]

I am not positive that Ceramic Media can spark enough to fire off your powder.
The round ceramic media should not spark. But if it chips , there is always that Minor Chance.
I just am not going to take that chance.
Using several sizes of ball media works better also, because it gets closer together.
But after hours of milling , the balls all work into a set pattern and don’t tumble , they just roll.
That can eventually cause the powder to stack against the wall of the drum.
Especially with moisture or humidity.

[DoubleBuck]

I'm with Ham and LAGS on the clumping. Every time I have experienced it, drying the ingredients has been the solution. Brown charcoal powder is hard to mill, because of the creosote left in it.
I bought 250 9mm 147 grain FMJ bullets and use 125 in each of my mill jars. It made a world of difference on the quality of my milling. I was using 69 caliber lead balls in them. The balls worked well, but I kept finding weight gain in my finished powder, and finally chased it down to the lead balls wearing into the powder.
I've seen powder absorb enough moisture from just high relative humidity, to clump in as little as 15 minutes.
Keep your powder dry.

[StevenDJ]

Is there a problem with using ceramic media with BP?

Oh dear, I said 'Ceramic Media' and opened the can of worms again.

Here is my take on the idea...
1 - Lead media adds lead dust to the powder.
2 - Lead is toxic and I don't want it in my powder. Handling lead is not toxic unless you lick your fingers, but breathing the dust is a known entry point to the body.
3 - Ceramic media is non-toxic and works efficiently as a milling media.
4 - I mill my powder on an 18 acre parcel of land and my milling is at least 3-400 metres from any building (I use a solar powered treadmill converted to a ball mill).
5 - Can ceramic spark? I am sure it could, but it comes down to probability, and I think (not a very scientific way of approaching the matter) that probability is low.

Really what I am doing is weighing a known risk against a potential and mitigating the potential risk by milling in a remote location.

My experience is little. I have only made about 3kg of powder in total. Maybe we should be taking our advice from the seasoned veterans of the group here.

AS FOR CLUMPING...

I have experimented with oven drying my KNO3 and found that it made some difference, but clumping still occurred. Hmmm, maybe this is all just part of the magic of the process.

HamGunner, I think your ideas on mill jar dimensions has some merit. My jars are probably 10" long and 4" diameter.

LAGS, maybe it is time for me to try adding a few random shapes to the mill jar.

Thanks for your input everyone!

Steve

[LAGS]

The Odd shape is probably why using full jacketed or plated bullets is good for milling.
Plus the elimination of the lead exposure.

[Sledgehammers_at_Dawn]

I compressed my first batch of black powder today. It is more grey than black. Is that normal?
I milled the charcoal and sulfur separately and the potassium nitrate and a little charcoal separately for 6 hours then combined it all and milled it for 5.5 hours. I’ll let it dry and mill it next weekend.
Lots of fun!

[DoubleBuck]

Grey is normal Sledge. Probably have a ring to them resembling ceramic when dinged. Best of luck!

[dtknowles]

Oh dear, I said 'Ceramic Media' and opened the can of worms again.

Here is my take on the idea...........

HamGunner, I think your ideas on mill jar dimensions has some merit. My jars are probably 10" long and 4" diameter.

LAGS, maybe it is time for me to try adding a few random shapes to the mill jar.

Thanks for your input everyone!

Steve

I think you are on to the solution. You drum is too much a tube should either be larger in diameter or shorter in length or both. Randomness would be your friend, is your media all the same, should have some variation and not be spherical.

Tim

[2TM101]

I use bronze triangles. I poured some molten bronze into the inside of a piece of angle iron that had its ends closed then cut the resulting bar into 1” pieces. The corners have a good effect on mixing.

I use washers, pennies, Some bronze round ball and a Frizzen that would not spark. I have a National Geographic rock tumbler I use for wet tumbling small amounts of cases and that's the same thing I put in there.

[Super Sneaky Steve]

I use 40 S&W brass that has no other good use. I press in a few 36cal pure lead boolits so I have good weight and density. I do have some brass balls, but they are very expensive. The 40 brass is free and only a few pennies worth of lead is consumed.

[Nobade]

I just ground up and screened my first batch of TP powder. You guys weren't kidding when you said it was light! 100 grains in my volume measure only weighs 86 grains. It sure does flash fast, I'm hoping to get to shoot some this weekend.