Exploding Powder Horns

[CrackStock]

Finn,

While you should treat all guns as loaded and ready, I do not accept the premise that BP can be ignited by a static spark. Look up the heat potential involved in a static spark and then look up the heat required to ignite black powder.

Just because somebody makes a claim after taking a round does not make it believable. It is highly likely that there was a combination of errors beginning with the admitted decision to have the muzzle pointed at a person. The spark came from somewhere and it was not from static.

If you choose not to empty the gun before transporting, put the frizzen forward and cover it, plug the vent and let the cock down. Always keep the muzzle pointed in a safe direction.

Actually, Goex does not believe in static according to their old FAQs. Their plants (the other is in Minden, La) have had problems large and small, but all were tracked back to mechanical rather than static ignition.

CS

 

[Dphar]

In the face of the logic presented here, I'll still believe and act as though static electricity will ignite black powder. My reasoning is that I have everything to gain by believing it will and everything to lose by believing it won't.
Here in PA, we've had a flintlock season since the early 70's and the PA Game Commission has issued several cautions over the years about static electricity setting off flintlocks being transported in cars. In fact, one report had a hunter taking a .50 cal ball in his back after his rifle supposedly fired due to static in the carpeting in his car. Also until a few years ago, we had a GOEX plant here in town dating all the way back to the DuPont days in the late 1800's. That plant blew up every 4 or 5 years like clock work. I know THEY believed in static electricity!
Finnwolf

Static will not do it. The very composition of BP prevents it from what I have read.
GASOLINE vapor WILL fire from a spark, obviously. But BP is not gasoline. Nor can BP be compared with grain dust or even metal dust. William Knight, probably the premier expert on BP in the US refers to electro-static ignition of BP as "non-sense". Smokeless powder is immune as well.
Electric rocket motor igniters use a heated wire to ignite the mixture not a spark.
However, percussion arms, once loaded and capped CANNOT BE MADE SAFE BY REMOVING THE CAP.
If there is any priming compound on the nipple a little friction, something rubbing on the stuff WILL set it off. I NEVER remove the cap on a percussion arm. If I need to make it safe I shoot it.
A flint gun with the frizzen open and the cock down is not going to fire unless someone applies flame to the vent.
So if someone got shot in the back by his flintlock I would have to ask if the frizzen was open or closed. If closed and the flint gets in contact with the frizzen? Not static. Is it legal to carry a FL primed in PA. If the guy get shot will he tell the police he was violating the law?

I think you need to research the blowups at Moosic a little better. One I remember was the result of having an electrician working on LIVE wires in a powder warehouse that they did not empty first. This produces the same thing the a flintlock does, molten metal, not "static".
What is in the papers and what really occurred can be radically different. Static is something that is hard to control, kinda like an act of God. Doing stupid stuff in a powder plant is something else again and shows negligence. Lawyers LOVE negligence. So if I were GOEX and got to tell people what had occurred? It would be something that was not my fault like static. Even if I was running the wheel mill too fast or ignoring other safety procedures, it would still be static or something else that was not my fault.
There have been numerous attempts to ignite BP with static sparks, videos on the WWW etc. All fail.

Dan

 

[Congress Own Regiment]

plain and simple, if a powder horn blows up. It is do to exposing it to heat spark or flame. If it happen more often in years gone-by it is do to the amount of exposed flames and spark one would encounter then. If it happens now some one was over looking there responsibility while handling a flammable.

The only time I have ever had an incident was when I used an ashtray to put a small amount of wasted powder in. No one in the house smoked. us it seemed harmless. That is until a smoker came to visit. it was a small amount, but it shore pointed out the need to not take things for granted!

 

[Sperit de bois]

Sparks wont do it!!! Why do all the persons working in a powder Factory wear cotton non sparking clothes.,use non metalic tool and they keep the floors damp/wet????
IF the powder horn/container/barrel, what ever, never blows up,,well we will never hear about it,,, if it does blow up,,,,welll we will never hear about it either.

 

[zimmerstutzen]

Static electricity can and does ignite black powder. It takes a great deal more than the electricity generated by walking across a wool carpet and touching the door knob, but it is indeed possible.

During the dust bowl there were documented accounts of farmers being electrocuted simply bt touching metal farm implements that had been out in the wind. Metal towers can gather enough static from the wind to knock a grown man out cold. Tesla experimented with harvesting electricity from wind blowing through a metal screen and could generate massive amounts of electricity. At the North Museum in Lancaster there was a colonial era glass and brush static electricity generator. The sparks generated could burn a hole through a playing card. The most powerful static electricity is lightning. Anybody that thinks lightning can't produce enough heat to light black powder has never seen the pile of melted glass left when lightning strikes a sand dune at the beach. Or the melted fused metal parts when lightning strikes a municipal pumping station.

Those who say never are foolishly writing off all kinds of possibilities that do occur. Static electricity exists from very mild to one of the most powerful forces known on earth.

I'm not sure what temperature is required for flash pan powder to light. But in the extremes between the heat of wool carpet sparks and lightning, the temperature of the sparks hitting that powder are on the pretty low side.

 

[Sinner]

Static electricity can and does ignite black powder. It takes a great deal more than the electricity generated by walking across a wool carpet and touching the door knob, but it is indeed possible.

During the dust bowl there were documented accounts of farmers being electrocuted simply bt touching metal farm implements that had been out in the wind. Metal towers can gather enough static from the wind to knock a grown man out cold. Tesla experimented with harvesting electricity from wind blowing through a metal screen and could generate massive amounts of electricity. At the North Museum in Lancaster there was a colonial era glass and brush static electricity generator. The sparks generated could burn a hole through a playing card. The most powerful static electricity is lightning. Anybody that thinks lightning can't produce enough heat to light black powder has never seen the pile of melted glass left when lightning strikes a sand dune at the beach. Or the melted fused metal parts when lightning strikes a municipal pumping station.

Those who say never are foolishly writing off all kinds of possibilities that do occur. Static electricity exists from very mild to one of the most powerful forces known on earth.

I'm not sure what temperature is required for flash pan powder to light. But in the extremes between the heat of wool carpet sparks and lightning, the temperature of the sparks hitting that powder are on the pretty low side.

Except in extreme circumstances, static electricity WILL NOT ignite blackpowder. Blackpowder requires HEAT to ignite it. Unless there is some kind of capacitor system to store literally tens of thousands of volts, there is not enough heat produced to ignite blackpowder. (it's not like igniting fuel fumes)
Static electricity causing a heart attack/death has absolutely nothing to do with heat. It has to do with disrupting the electrical impulses of the heart, which causes ventricular fibrillation. To induce V-fib only small currents are necessary, and actually, large amounts of voltage aren't dangerous, it is the current, or amps that are lethal. The heat comes from voltage traveling through a resistive conductor.
I can see in very dry conditions large metal objects storing enough voltage in static electricity to do some major damage, but that is an extreme circumstance. Static due to walking, wool clothing, carpet, etc will not create enough heat to ignite blackpowder, but if other vapors are present that it can ignite and create more heat in close proximity to the blackpowder, well there you have it.

BTW, it is also possible to drown in 3" of water, but who would suggest walking around with a life-jacket on every time it rains?

I know it isn't quite the same, but a very similar principal I think.