Static electricity is by itself does not contain heat energy; it's pure electric energy, so it cannot heat black powder. In order to generate heat with static electricity, or any electrical energy for that matter, it must be passed through a resistive element. The heat is created by the resistance to the flow of electrical energy.
Howdy
I too worked in the electronics industry for many, many years, and have a pretty good understanding of Static Electricity. In the electronics industry it is referred to as Electro Static Discharge (ESD).
A static spark is exactly like a lightning bolt, only much smaller in scale. As for heat, The exact same thing happens with a static spark as happens with a lightning bolt. Yes, you need a resistive element for the current to pass through to create heat. The resistive element is air. Air makes a very good insulator. When a charge, static or otherwise, builds up to a great enough potential, the charge leaps across the air gap from one conductor to another. That is exactly what happens with a lightning bolt and the same thing happens with ESD. The air separating the conductors is heated to a white hot plasma by the charge going through it. That is what you see with a lightning bolt, and that is what you see when you actually see a visible spark jumping from your hand to a door knob on a dry day. Super heated air. Probably in the vicinity of 1000 degrees F or so.
I go through about 25 pounds of Black Powder every year loading my CAS ammo.
Yes, I have seen those internet photos of sparks and grains of Black Powder a bazillion times. What is probably happening is that the graphite coating on the outside of the grains makes a pretty good conductor. So rather than the charge flowing through the powder grains, it flows over the surface of the grains, with little resistance, so there is not enough resistance to raise the temperature very much.
Another misconception is that grounding the press will help avoid static discharge. Your body and your clothing generate a static charge every time you move. That is part of the nature of ESD. That's why walking across a rug on a dry day generates a charge on your body, your body passing through the air, but mostly because your shoes scuffing the carpet lead to a buildup of charge on you. If you ground your loading press, you are just creating a perfect path for the charge you build up on your body to go to ground. And EVERY SINGLE TIME you touch the press, a tiny spark will jump from you to the press. EVERY SINGLE TIME. You probably will not feel the spark, it takes about 10,000 volts before we can actually feel a static charge. Yes, 10,000 volts. Very low amperage, but very high voltage. So unless you ground your self, and the entire workstation, only grounding the press is useless. In the electronics industry, static discharges ruin millions of dollars worth of tiny sensitive components every year. The standard industry solutions are:
Ground the operator with a wrist strap.
Ground the entire work station.
Raise the humidity level in the air (static charges bleed off more easily and are less likely to build up if there is more humidity in the air)
Remove all static generating materials.
If it ain't a conductor, such as metals, then it is an insulator, and ALL insulators generate static charges. These include glass, most plastics, paper, and wood. Not a great idea to pour loose black powder into a glass bottle. I know lots of guys who have replaced the plastic hopper on their shotgun loading presses with glass ones. They have only substituted one static generating material for another.
Yes, plenty of CAS shooters will testify that they have loaded Black Powder on conventional loading equipment for years. I know too much about ESD to allow me to do that. Yes, I have a Lyman BP measure mounted on one of my presses. The rotor is made of brass instead of steel so it is non-sparking. I also try not to load BP during the dry winter months, so there will be a bit more humidity in the air.
Yes, mechanical sparks made by ferric metals striking objects and ESD sparks are two different things. Mechanical sparks, such as when flint hits a frizzen, contain a tiny shard of white hot metal at their core. These sparks are very, very efficient at igniting Black Powder.
