Making charcoal

[splattergun]

for black powder. Maybe Brushippie or Cannonman know this. Any one else welcome, too.
When making your own willow charcoal, is it best to use seasoned wood or green? I presume bark is removed, but I presumed wrong once or twice a few years back.
Thanks!

 

[Caliper_Mi]

Ulrich Bretscher has a great page with just about everything you'll need to know about making black powder.
Here's his page on the charcoal: http://www.musketeer.ch/blackpowder/charcoal.html

Personally, I've not made charcoal just yet. Hardwood charcoal for grilling, ground in a rock tumbler with lead balls works well.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

At the Fort Frederick Market Fair this year a fellow showed me how he makes his own charcoal. He takes a 15 gallon steel barrel, with a steel lid that can be secured with a metal rim-clamp. He has drilled a small hole about 1/2 diameter in the lid. When he burns leaves and brush on his property he rolls the barrel into this fire, and the barrel makes charcoal out of the wood it contains just like some folks use a tea-tin to make charcloth. The greener the wood the more creosote that forms on he lid he says. He doesn't debark anything, but he is using his charcoal for forging and heating...not for powder.

LD

 

[splattergun]

Thanks for the link, Caliper. The second paragraph from it answered my question quite clearly.

"To prepare a high quality charcoal take a low density wood with a low resin concentration, like willow or hazel wood. Use only well dried young branches, not more than 5 centimeters in diameter and peel off the bark."
I will also try out the hardwood charcoal while my young branches are drying.
I'm already aware to use the chunk type, not pressed briquettes.

I have a new paint can purchased at the local box store, and it seems like an easy chore to put a can full of willow in my campfires over the summer for plentiful supply.

Dave, the info about the creosote is also useful.

 

[ofitg]

Ulrich Bretscher has a great page with just about everything you'll need to know about making black powder.
Here's his page on the charcoal: http://www.musketeer.ch/blackpowder/charcoal.html

Bretscher's info spells out that the process depends upon getting the de-barked, dry young branches up to a temperature around 400C (750F)......

Kinda like the temperature inside a lead melting pot......

 

[CANNONMAN]

Seasoned willow is awesome! Just like me, I am told that I am such a better person now that I've been "seasoned". The are some 53 species of willow. I have tried weeping and globe. [Not their species name but a lot easier to recognize.] I have tried both the base or stump, some 30", and the branches, as small as 1". I find the gallon paint can method exceedingly simple and quite efficacious in its finial product. To pre-cut a block out of the base of either of these trees into a "gallon" size then splinter off the block with wood chisel and hammer, pieces about 1" in dia.. Fill the gallon bucket. Cram it full. Lots of holes punched into the top. Make a small fire. Get hotdogs and beer. There is nothing dangerous about this process but it does take a bit of time. Great time to share the growth rate of the fish you once caught. Put can on fire. Smoke will pour through the holes. When the smoke quits I invert the can onto damp to wet rags. Wait till all is cool. Open lid and marvel at the awesome product you have just made. The stump stores with ease. It splinters well with little to no bark to remove. You can get more in the can. Branches take more time. Bark removal and knots from other branches. Can't get as much in the can and it takes more time. This is also why green stuff would... well it would be a pain the butt. Its the next step that makes the real difference. Create float charcoal. I assume there exist a mill of some sort. Here a ball mill works very nicely as this can get messy. ALSO! here there are precautions! If ball mill... 1. cram new charcoal into ball mill. 2. Mill the crap out of the charcoal. I let mine mill for at least 6hrs. This give you exactly what you are looking for in charcoal, assuming that what you are looking for in charcoal is to make it into BP. Super fast, not as smoky, much less fouling! You will pat yourself on the back for hours! Next are methods for extraction of product and storage. I'm not going to do that here cuz someone's gonna yell at me and tell me why eye M doink it awl rong. Interesting factoid: Willows are kinda of neat as you can just slice of a small branch, say three feet, stick it in the ground an it will grow a tree. I like the idea of making stuff out of the stuff around me. I am cruntly installing a volcano in order to collect sulfer. Hope that helped, "Nothing ventured, Nothing gained" some smart guy

 

[Caliper_Mi]

Here a ball mill works very nicely as this can get messy.

Definitely! Finely ground charcoal is worse than ink! Although, if doing it by hand with a mortar and pestle, the charcoal will remove any staining in the pestle from herbs or such ground before...

I am cruntly installing a volcano in order to collect sulfer.

Let us know your progress!

 

[kBob]

There was an article on extracting sulfer for BP use from Dry wall panels in one of the backwoods type magazines some years back.

Garden centers sell bags of sulfer to change soil acidity but I have no idea if it has been adulterated with any thing.

Mind you these same folks obtained salt peter from their compost pile with boiling water and then alcohol in the mix to precipitated it out.

-kBob

 

[Steel Horse Rider]

And here I thought they always used urine.......

 

[kBob]

Composted anything organic. One Euro source mentioned pulling up paving stones in medieval churches to get at soil that had been soaked with urine deposited by mainly female worshipers over the years. Compost made from human waste, liquid and solid was called night soil.

Bat and Sea gull Guano were also traditional sources.

There are tales of the CSA niter Commission and their collection of thunder mugs contents in the larger cities.....this was after the bat caves had played out. There were ribald songs and "poems" in the north about how the smell of the rebels powder made from the product of their women back home made them fight harder.

When I was in Europe the first time I worked near a small village of only four bar/gastehaus that had a communal compost pile at the juncture of three roads. In the winter it smoked some nights and occasionally a white solid that looked like something dripping formed on the outside of the concrete bin. This was crude Salt Peter and thrown in a small flame would greatly increase the action of the flame. Working next to the fields where the winter's poorly composted cow and pig dung got spread at first thaw was an experience not to be forgotten.....but I try, I try.

Pulling a patrol that ended in the pre dawn darkness watching little German girls hauling their wooden wagons with a couple of milk cans on them past the steaming compost pile to the town co-op only to be followed by boys with wheel barrow loads of the other thing the cows gave at milking to be tossed on said pile made one NOT wish for more simpler times.

Chinese POWs during the Korean war did use urine to produce some sort of niter which they used in one of the attempted rebellions on one of the island prisons.

-kBob

 

[H&R Glock]

If all that seems like too much work, you can get 1 pound of airfloat pyrotechnic grade for $4.97 or less online at the fireworks suppliers.

 

[Caliper_Mi]

Garden centers sell bags of sulfer to change soil acidity but I have no idea if it has been adulterated with any thing.

That's what I've used, the label said 95% pure and it worked. Sulphur is a catalyst in the mix and only serves to lower the ignition temp. Apparently, sulphur free black powder works with a caplock, but not so well with flint ignition. Haven't tested personally just yet.

What I didn't like about the soil acidifier pellets was grinding the little things up. The lead balls in the rock tumbler barely touch them and it was a bit of work in the mortar and pestle to powderize them. I decided it was easier to buy 99% pure sulphur already in powder form from eBay, but have not made any BP with that purchase just yet.

 

[splattergun]

I have the wherewithal handy to make charcoal and, if I'm going to make my own powder, I want to make as much as I can. I think sulfur and KNO3 will come a little later, once I get the powder right.
Taking notes; keep the suggestions coming!

 

[kBob]

Hmm Garden supply center gave me a bag of finely powdered yellow sulfur for my Blue Berries (gave up on them and dug them up so do not ask for jelly).

Almost talc powder like. Of course it is all mixed in with the soil where the blue berry bushes were. Got on everything in use.

-kBob

 

[TRX]

The mechanical properties of the charcoal (porosity, grain size) appear to be at least as important as the chemistry.

Almost anything appears to work to some degree. For a commercial product, repeatability is more important than performance. For DIY you don't have to depend on vast quantities of specific materials.

 

[CANNONMAN]

TRX is correct! The howzit done of charcoal was often keep a secrete more than the recipe of BP. The further along you can move BP from a compound to a molecule lies in the charcoal. Having said that, high grade sulfur and KNO3 are very readily available from all sorts of sites. legally! Most likely where every you choose to get these, remember to get a pound or ten of dextrin. I base my batches off of 2Kg. This makes really easy ratios. This 2.2# of BP this makes cost me less than $5. Last, great charcoal and pure other stuff makes for really powerful and clean burning homemade BP. As your addiction to this process accelerates, you will of course need to start making cannons! ... and then world domination!

 

[ofitg]

..... wait for it .......

 

[TOOT44]

charcoal

it can be bought at garden centers I be leave. some black smiths in my area use it in there forges, it gives them a hotter fire then coke/Cole.

 

[brushhippie]

The Charcoal...as has been mentioned...is THE most important ingredient...and the variables between species spans an enormous range of speeds and amounts of crap left behind after the burn...AND as seenyore fly would tell ya....the fastest charcoal may not be the cleanest...But you can always count on the consistency of black willow...no bark left to season for at least a year is what I am told.....and CANNONMAN is correct!

 

[splattergun]

I have a few small logs of black willow stacked to dry as we speak. Meanwhile, I intend to rustle up a few small batches to test with some sulfur I got online (mighty fine fluff) and some KNO3 stump remover from the garden store. I have some well-seasoned apple wood. Knowing that it's not an optimal wood, but am I correct in thinking that apple is much lower resin than pine or spruce?

Working toward world domination one batch of BP at a time

 

[CANNONMAN]

Stump remover is for removing stumps. You could make beer from a third world's river water. But why? KNO3 is perfectly legal to purchase. AND! Quantities under 50# don't interest anybody. Cuz, everyone knows your making BP not triggers for your own personal nuclear arsenal. Even FFFFFFF is not flash powder. [waz that 2many F's?] Make it right. Reliability and duplicity are required in your efforts. Even if yor shoot'n at stumps, don't use stump remover. Having said that, I whole heartedly agree that to "McIver" a product is fun. They sell some amazing stuff in a grocery store. Last, if you have willow use it. It's much more than the sap. It's more, well... "porosity" isn't too bad of a way to look at it. P.S., the method for creating your charcoal will dry, cure and prep yur willow supply. Start with a lower heat for a longer time, about three beers, turn up heat, make charcoal, be amazed and confident with your efforts.

 

[Caliper_Mi]

Stump remover is for removing stumps. You could make beer from a third world's river water. But why?

Agreed - not all stump remover is KNO3. But, Spectracide brand is 100% KNO3 per the MSDS ( http://cdn.spectrumbrands.com/~/med...ther/Spectraicde_Stump_Remover_MSDSNov12.ashx ) Hard to get better than that... Useful for making a first batch, but several pounds off eBay is cheaper per pound.

 

[Diogenes415]

The various species of wood that I've experimented with for use in BP are balsa, pine (standard framing 2X4 scraps), maple, poplar, cherry, oak and honey-suckle (I don't have willow readily available so I've yet to use it). They've all made usable powder although not as powerful as the commercial stuff. If there's one thing that I've learned from my experimentations it's that the way a finished powder behaves in an 'open-air' test burn is a poor indication of how it will perform in a barrel. I've made powders that ignite and burn quickly and leave very little residue in the open but will severly foul a barrel after just one shot. I usually use my inline ML for BP testing because it has an 'accelerator breech plug' and I can easily see the extent of the fouling by peering from breech to muzzle and push the fouling out with a patch for inspection. Yesterday I went to the range to try out my latest batch of poplar based powder and after just one shot there was a wall of fouling at the breech plug that spanned the entire width of the barrel... this from a powder that burned quickly in the open with hardly any residue left behind.

 

[splattergun]

Well, my local water ain't so bad as 3rd world water for my homebrew, as long as I filter out the chlorine and fluoride. Least ways, it's good enough to keep the factory swill out of my fridge...
speaking of homebrew.. Spectracide is the KNO3 of which I speak, so I'll use what I have while I start shopping for larger quantities of it and sulfur.
Let the chemistry experiments begin.