1 smokeless powder

Smokeless powder has properties similar to nitrocellulose and celluloid and has produced many accidents by spontaneous ignition, although many have not been disclosed because of requirements of military secrecy. Many explosions of magazines in warships in particular have occurred because of the spontaneous ignition of smokeless powder. However, in the famous novel Mutsu Sank by Explosion written by Akira Yoshimura, a documentary novelist, most warship explosions were mentioned as having been fictitious accidents. 

Studies on the stability of smokeless powder are currently being continued, the results of which are presented at the Conference on Chemical Problems Related to Safety of Explosives held every three years in Sweden. 

Sporting ammunition describes rifle and handgun ammunition for hunting and target practice. Commercial hunting bullets, ranging in size from around 6 to 12mm, may differ from the conical shape of military bullets in that they 

Artillery ammunition for guns, howitzers, cannons, and mortars ranges upwards in calibre from the 20mm limit that generally divides it from small-arms ammunition. Artillery ammunition is divided into three types  

Large-calibre artillery ammunition permits a more complex payload including high explosives, bursters, shrapnel, bursting charges, fuzes, incendiaries, etc. 

In addition to catalysts, stabilizers, opacifiers (to reduce heat radiation ahead of the flame), flash depressants, plasticizers, and binders, the main fuel and oxidizers for rocket propellants include 

While the term missile can apply to any projectile ammunition, guided missiles describes those rockets whose course or trajectory is controlled electronically by computers and communications equipment. 

---

Industrial Wastewater Treatment. Industrial wastewaters require different treatments depending on their sources. Plating waste contains toxic metals that are precipitated and insolubiHzed with lime (see Electroplating). Iron and other heavy metals are also precipitated from waste-pidde Hquor, which requires acid neutralization. Akin to pickle Hquor is the concentrated sulfuric acid waste, high in iron, that accumulates in smokeless powder ordinance and chemical plants. Lime is also useful in clarifying wastes from textile dyeworks and paper pulp mills and a wide variety of other wastes. Effluents from active and abandoned coal mines also have a high sulfuric acid and iron oxide content because of the presence of pyrite in coal. 

The estimated use pattern of ethyl ether during 1990 was as follows solvents and military production of smokeless powder, 35% chemical synthesis and solvent extraction, 35% diesel starting fluid, 30% (21). 

Typical applications include careful sizing of silica-glass sand, washing phosphate rock, sizing of abrasives, smokeless powder, sodium ahi-rninate, etc,... 

Chemical explosives detonate, or deflagrate. Detonating explosives (e.g., TNT or dynamite) rapidly decompose to produce high pressure and a shock front (travels faster than the velocity of sound). Deflagrating explosives (e.g., black and smokeless powders) bum fast, prodr er... 

DuPont in the U.S. developed about 1909, a smokeless powder from cotton of relatively low nitrogen that was quite soluble in ether alcohol. A small amount of diphenylamine was used as a stabilizer. After forming the grains and removing the liquid, a coating of graphite was added to make the smokeless powder that was used in the U.S. Other double-base types contain about 25% nitroglycerin. Cotton lint for nitration has been replaced by purified wood cellulose. 

Nature uses cellulose primarily as a structural material to impart strength and rigidity to plants. Leaves, grasses, and cotton, for instance, are primarily cellulose. Cellulose also serves as raw material for the manufacture of cellulose acetate, known commercially as acetate rayon, and cellulose nitrate, known as guncotton. Guncotton is the major ingredient in smokeless powder, the explosive propellant used in artillery shells and in ammunition for firearms. 

Munroe, Charles Edward (1849—1938). Leader in the development of expls in the USA. Inventor of the first American smokeless powder, Indurite (qv), and discoverer of the Munroe Effect (See Detonation, Munroe-Neumann Effect (Or Shaped Charge Effect) in Vol 4, D442-R to D454-L). Professor of chemistry at the US Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md, 1874—1886 chemist at the Naval Torpedo Station and Naval War College, Newport, RJ, 1886—1892 professor of chemistry at George Washington University, 1892—1917 and chief expls chemist of the US Bureau of Mines, 1919—1933. Author and co-author of numerous publications on expls Refs 1) H,W. Wiley, 1EC 15, 648-9 (1923)... 

Neonite. A fast burning, 30 grain, gelatinized smokeless powder introduced in 1907 by the New Explosives Co of Engl. It contains NC (insol) 73.0, NC (sol) 9.0, metallic nitrates 10.5, vaseline 5.9 moisture 1.6% (Ref 1)... 

Smokeless powders prepd by gelatinizing with a vol solvent, NC s prepd from such materials as corozzo, coconut shells, etc, together with Nitrostarch or Nitrodextiin 1888 Invention of Ballistite, the first successful smokeless powder contg NG, described in BritP 1471 of 1888 (Ref 1, p 51)... 

A cordeau detonant contg a compn prepd by thoroughly mixing NG or Nitrosugar with NC, mononitronaphthalene, dinitrobenzene, di- or tri-. nitrotoluene, K dichromate K femcyanide (FrP 237447 of 1894) (Ref 1, pp 158-159) 1894 Smokeless powders prepd by blending NC and Nitromannite, with or without dinitro-benzene (DNB), No 1 NC 60, Nitromannite 40 No 2 NC 60, Nitromannite 20, DNB 20 ... 

Patent Gunpowder. Smokeless powder based on Nitrolignin, manufd in the 1870 s at Clyn-Ceiriog, Wales. The expin of the ship Great Queensland in 1876 was attributed to impurities in this proplnt which caused spontaneous combustion... 

Some specialized uses of PETN are summarized below. Expendable cartridges for small arms are made by coating unglazed grains or single base smokeless powder with PETN, spraying with plasticized thermoplastic binder and compression molding to the desired shape (Ref 99). Tucker et al (Ref 85) describe a spark detonator without primary expls. Secondary... 

Peyton Powder. According to Daniel (Ref 1), this was a smokeless powder patented in Engl in 1895 and later manufd in the USA by the California Powder Co. It contd a jelly consisting of 40p of NC and 38p of NG (acet was used as solvent), blended with 22p of other oxidizer ingredients... 

It was found to be a good gelatinizer for NC, and for this reason was recommended as an ingredient of smokeless powders... 

Both Wasmer (Ref 4) and Ficheroulle (Ref 7) employed TNPEN as an ingredient in solventless smokeless powders (poudres SD)... 

Piobert s Law of Combustion. When a solid grain of a propint (such as smokeless powder) is ignited in air, each surface burns independently and progressively in parallel layers and at the same rate. Indeed, the process of burning is so... 

Ref J.B. Bernadou, Smokeless Powder, Nitro-ceUulose, a Theory of the Cellulose Molecule , 1 st Edn, J. Wiley Sons, NY (1901)... 

Potentita. A smokeless powder, prepd in the 1880 s by the Cotton Powder Co, Ltd of Engl by mixing wet NC (59 5% on a dry basis) with 40.5% K nitrate. It was also called Cotton Powder of Liverpool (Ref 1). Pepin Lehalleur (Ref 2) refers to Potentite as being an NC expl used prior to WW1 in demolition blocks, contg Guncotton 50, K. nitrate 50%... 

HI 17—34. Black Powder is no longer used as a proplnt, but it is still used in igniters for SP The next stage in the development of SP, namely the early development of single base smokeless powder, followed the discovery of Nitrocellulose (NC). We quote Urbanski (Ref 46a, p 528) ... 

In Russia, Mendeleyev (Ref 12) worked out a method for the manufacture of smokeless powder from pyrocellulose, i.e. relatively high-nitrated (12.5% N) nitrocellulose soluble in a mixture of ether and alcohol. In 1892 the manu-... 

Double base smokeless powder was first produced by Alfred Nobel. Again we quote Urbanski (Ref 46a, p 530) ... 

A,second type of smokeless powder, Ballistite, was invented by Alfred Nobel (Ref 9) in 1888. He took advantage of the ability of... 

The enormous consumption of smokeless powder during this war led to difficulties in producing a sufficient quantity of nitroglycerine. In Russia and Germany attempts were made to... 

Pyrocollodion Powder. A smokeless powder developed in Russia about 1891 by Prof. D.I. 

Pyrodex. Tradename of a close substitute for BlkPdr, invented by D. Pawlak and distributed by the Hodgdon Powder Co, Shawnee Mission, Kansas intended primarily for use with replica sporting firearms. It can be loaded volume-for -volume with BlkPdr, producing similar pressures and velocities. It smokes, smells and fouls somewhat like BlkPdr, and it is claimed that Pyrodex is actually safer to handle and store than modern smokeless powder (Refs 1 3)... 

Pyro Powder. A term used for smokeless powder prepd from Pyrocellulose... 

---