🚀 go-pugleaf

>Consult the Hazmat database, or the DOT classification schedule. Black
>powder is most definitely classed as an explosive while nitrocellulose
>propellant powder is classed as a flamable solid. You can ship smokeless
>gunpowder UPS, but black powder must be transported by special hazardous
>materials carriers licensed to transport explosives. There is only one

hmmm...  I am redirecting followups to rec.pyrotechnics where this discussion
should take place.

Black powder is used extensivly in firework because of its pressure to 
reaction curve is steep.  The more pressure the faster it "deflagrates" or
burns.  You ( anyone ) can order black powder and have it shipped in 25lb
containers ( that is the minimum order ) from a place called Coonies
Explosives & Black Powder located in Hobbs, NM without a federal license
shipped via UPS with a hazardus materials charge.  The same charge that is
applied for shipment of basic class C fireworks, many of which contain a lot
of black powder because they are not allowed to contain a lot of flash powder
which does come close to detonation ( stuff used in the class B grand finale 
fireworks called salutes).

Heck I can buy black powder locally at a gun store called The Powder Room
made by a company called GOEX in one pound cans.  BP is not explosive and it
will not detonate.  Are we talking about the same stuff here?  Black powder
is made with KNO3, Sulfur and Charcoal powder and there is no danger of
detonation, but it burns fast especially under preasure and that is why it is
good to launch firework shells etc.

>black powder plant in the US. It is completely remotely operated because
>of the extreme explosion hazard offered by black powder. That's the Hogdon
>Powder Works. In the 19th century, black powder mills were notorious for
>exploding from static electricity or other trivial ignition sources. There 
>were only two mining explosives, blasting powder (aka black powder) and
>nitroglycerin in the 19th century. Both were considered extremely dangerous
>to handle. Nobel made his fortune by inventing a safer explosive, dynamite.
>
>Just why do you think the barrels of modern black powder rifles are two to 
>three times as thick walled as those of modern high power smokeless propellant 
>rifles? It isn't because of a difference in metallurgy.

Because the burn rate of black powder increases with pressure at a higher rate
than modern smokless powders, but still comes nowhere close to detonation.  

I do not think we are talking about the same thing here and I do not have
access to a encyclopedia right now, but I will prove my claims and I am sure
that the readers of rec.pyrotechnics will have something to add.

A good, but older, source for all this is:
"The Encyclopedia of Chemistry", G.L. Clark, Ed, Reinhold, NY (1957)

-- 

             Daniel Joseph Rubin     rubin@cis.ohio-state.edu 
     
                       GO BENGALS!      GO BUCKS!