Hi Bob H. Welcome to the Dope. Great contributions.
For explosive geeks, here is the US Army publication on explosives, propellants, and pyrotechnics. It’s a PDF. I’ll search for my copy with hot links from the table of contents. This PDF is from 1984 but there hasn’t been too many updates since then.
Covers history, classification, manufacturing, characteristics, testing and resource recovery. Relevant to this discussion is table 8-77 on dynamite. Note that the percentage printed on the package/box no longer directly applies to the actual percentage of NG in the mixture. Amonium gelatin 60 for instance is only around 35% NG.
Note that the bullet impact tests in Appendix A are for 100% concentrations.
The danger is that the bulk will get hot enough so that the flame front goes faster than the speed fo sound, and the action changes from deflageration to detonation. I wouldn’t be afraid of a few sticks in an open fire, but I’d leave quickly (don’t walk, run) if there was more and it was packed.
Yeah, my dad was the class science geek in school back in the 1930’s. he said they would mix up ammonium nitrate and paint a bit on the radiators. An hour or two later, it would dry out and then in the middle of class there’d be this big BANG! as the heat set it off. Or spread a little bit across the floor, and anyone walking across it would go CRACK CRACK CRACK!
I heard once from a fellow who worked in a mine that some locals would “take home” (steal) explosives from there. One product was B-line, a sort of explosive string used to set off other explosives. It was relatively safe, sometimes (!!) you could pound it and it wouldn’t go off. Sometimes. Urban legend has it one idiot took a length of it home and his little girl found it, used it for a skipping rope and blew off her fingers. Moral - unless you really know - and follow - safety procedures, some things should not be messed around with. (I believe Darwin made that point too.)
Here’s the thing, Bob H. Suppose we take your word on it that you shot at dynamite with a rifle many times and it never went off. To be fair, then, we also must take beowulff’s word that he has set it off by shooting it with a rifle. What, then, can we conclude? That dynamite shot by a rifle will go off under some circumstances and not under others, and that we don’t even know what those circumstances are. And if there’s one thing that’s more dangerous than something that’s going to explode, it’s something that you don’t know if it’s going to explode.
So I read about this stuff in the library when I was 14, and, having picked up the keys to the chemestry store along the way, made some up. (A gentler, more simple time). As everyone knows, ‘unstable when it dries out’. So I covered, stored and transported it in water.
–‘Dried out’ does not mean ‘not wet’. When I set the beaker down, the powder detonated, spraying water and ammoniaum nitrate over me. There were purple spots on everything, and I crackled when I moved.
So whose expertise are we relying upon here?
It’s fascinating that** legal** questions related to running a stop sign are immediately relegated to IMHO… But opinion on nitroglycerin safety is freely debated here. Seems kind of sketchy.
Mods… Just thinking out loud.:rolleyes:
Chronos; If you read the last sentence in my post of 5-25, I specifically said that I don’t recommend anyone play with anything they find, especially based on my experience. There are too many types of “dynamite”. The old guy I bought that ranch from had it laying around all over the place, he used to buy it from the local hardware store in Ridgecrest, as easily as buying chicken food, well over 50 years ago. And to the person who posted the RED reply, goodness gracious, call the cops!? are you serious? After 911, you tell any cop you found dynamite in a shed on your property, and expect the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security, and bomb squad knocking you to the ground, handcuffing you, and being put on a permanent watch list. I know, my son is a cop. And I would have missed out on one of the funnest days of my life without any sex involved. The only regret I have is I video taped the bigger explosions, including the 40 sticks that emptied a half acre pond and turned it into a geyser, on my old VHS recorder, and then a couple months later inadvertently recorded over it for my sons birthday party, only realizing it after trying to find it later. What I would give to find a way to retrieve the video under that video. Maybe one day that technology will exist, and someone will see what i did was real. I know it was, thats good enough for me. It will be in my next book, mentioned briefly, but isn’t really germane to the storyline. My first book was published before it happened.