I don't want to essay. I'd rather just copy and give some brief historical and scientific facts.
The first successful smokeless powder appears to have been made by Captain Schultze of the Prussian Artillery in 1864. At first he seems only to have impregnated little grains of wood with potassium nitrate, but afterwards he purified the wood by washing, boiling, and bleaching, then nitrated it, purified the nitrated product by a method similar to that which had been used by von Lenk, and finally impregnated the grains with potassium nitrate alone with a mixture of salt and barium nitrate (Brit. Pat. 900 (1864)). The physical structure of the wood and the fact that it contained material which was not cellulose both tended to make the product burn more slowly than guncotton. the added nitrates further reduced the rate of burning, but Schultze's powder was still too rapid for use in rifles. It found immediate favor for use in shotguns. It was manufactured in Austria by a firm which in 1870 and 1871 took out patents covering the partial gelatinization of the powder by treatment with a mixture of ether and alcohol. the improved powder was manufactured between 1872 and 1875 under the name Collodin, but the Austrian government stopped its manufacture on the grounds that it infringed the government's gunpowder monopoly. A company was formed in England in 1868 to exploit Schultze's invention, a factory was established at Eyeworth in the New Forest in 1869, and the methods of manufacture were later improved by Griffiths and achieved great success. In 1883 Schultze entered into a partnership in Germany and started a factory at Hetzbach in Hesse Darmstadt.
The next successful smokeless powder was invented at the works of the Explosives Company at Stowmarket in England (Brit. Pat. 619 (1882) to Walter F. Reid and D. Johnson). It was called "E.C. Powder", and consisted of nitrocotton mixed with potassium and barium nitrates with the addition of coloring matter and small amounts of other organic material. It was made into grains which were hardened by being partially gelatinized with ether-alcohol. A separate company was organized to develop the invention, and the manufacture was started at Green Street Green, near Dartford, in Kent.
Schultze powder and E.C powder are known as "bulk sporting powders", either because they are loaded by bulk or because, for the same bulk, they have about the same power as black powder. Bulk powders burn quickly. They are used in shotguns, in hand grenades, in blank cartridges, and occasionally in the igniter charges which set fire to the dense colloided propellant powder which is used in artillery.
Bulk powders are made in considerable variety, but they consist always of nitrocellulose fibers which are stuck together but are not completely colloided. Some contain little else but nitrocellulose; others contain, in addition to potassium and barium nitrates, camphor, vaseline, paraffin, lampblack, starch, dextrine, potassium dichromate, or other oxidizing deterrent salts, and diphenylamine for stabilization, and are colored in a variety of brilliant hues by means of coal-tar dyes. In the United States bulk powders are manufactured by one or the other of two processes, either one of which, however, may be modified considerably; the materialsare incorporated under wooden wheels, grained, and partially gelatinized, or the grains are formed in a still where water suspension of pulped nitrocellulose is stirred and heated with a second liquid, a solvent which is volatile and immiscible with water.
Three typical bulk powders are made up according to the approximate formulas tabulated below. The nitrogen content of
Nitrocellulose............... 84.0 ........ 87.0 ....... 89.0
% N in nitrocellulose .... 13.15 ....... 12.90 ..... 12.90
Potassium nitrate ..........7.5 ........... 6.0 ........ 6.0
Barium nitrate ...............7.5 ........... 2.0 ........ 3.0
Starch ....................................................... 1.0
Paraffin oil ................................... 4.0
Diphenylamine .............. 1.0 .......... 1.0 ......... 1.0
the nitrocellulose is an average secured by mixing pyrocellulose and guncotton. A batch usually amounts to 200 pounds, 100 pounds of water is added and about 90 grams of rosaniline or some other, generally bright colored, water-soluble dyestuff, and the charge is incorporated by milling for about 45 minutes in a wheel mill which is built like a black powder mill but is smaller and has light wooden wheels. The cahrge is then run through a mechanical rubber, which consists of wooden blocks rubbing with reciprocating motion on a perforated zinc plate; the larger lumps are broken up and the material is put into proper condition for granulating. For this purpose about 50 pounds is placed in a copper pan or "sweetie barrel" which is revolving in a vat of hot water and is heated by that means. the pan rotates fairly rapidly, say at about 15 RPM, and carries the powder up along its sloping side to a point where it is scraped off by suitably arranged wooden scrapers and falls back again. It thus receives a rolling motion which has the effect of granulating the powder into spherical grains. The operation requires about 40 minutes, and its complication is indicated by the failure of the powder to carry on the pan because of the loss of moisture.
After it has been granulated, the powder is given a preliminary screening with a 12-mesh sieve. The material which is retained on the sieve is returned to the wheel mill. That which passes through is hardened. It is put into a horizontal revolving cylinder and mixed with a solvent, consisting of about 1 part of acetone and 6 parts of alcohol, is added in the proportion of 1 gallon of solvent to 15 pounds of powder. Acetone dissolves nitrocellulose, alcohol does not; the mixed solvent swells and softens the fibers and makes them stick together. the cylinder is rotated, while hot air is blown through, until the solvent has been volatized. During this process the temperature is allowed to rise as high as 50 or 55° F. The product, which consists of grains now more or less completely agglutinated, is given a final screening. in a typical case, the portion passed by a 12-mesh sieve and retained by a 50-mesh sieve is taken; it is given a final drying and is ready for use.
Nitrocellulose is classified as a "secondary high explosive" along with, but is not limited to the following:
Trinitrotoluene
Nitrostarch
Tetryl
RDX
Nitroglycerin
Military Dynamite
Amatol
PETN
Blasting Gelatin
Composition B
Composition C4
HMX
Pentolite
Picric Acid
Ammonal
Improvised Plastic Explosive Filler
Tetrytol
Nitrocellulose - Explosive made from cotton fibers, containing 13% or more of nitrogen. Although primarily considered a propellant, it is sometimes used as a base charge in electric primers and electrically initiated destructors because it will detonate with proper confinement.
The Chemistry of Powder & Explosives - Tenney L. Davis
