Nitrating paper ..besides hurting stupid takes time!

All my prowess of 60 years of reloading ammunition left me yesterday ..or at least the knowing feeling of confidence in myself did ...for a bit anyway!

Being old but new to BP revolver shooting ..I have immersed myself into all the trimmings and trappings ...

In this segment of stupidity I am nitrating brown coffee filter paper for the formation of paper cartridges ..like
20gr 777/ card wad/greased wad/.375 ball

So forums and youtube become my classroom as I begin to tackle the learning curve

The ignoramus guys were dunking one filter at a time ..too slow says I so I take a stack of 25 and dunk them in my 3 cups of warm water an 1 cup of potassium nitrate (lovingly known as tree stump removal magic in a can) to let them soak ..then it hits me that the inner portion may get the chemical I'm trying to embed filtered out...

Well I pick it up (it is now an "it" because it looks like a blob of cardboard) ..nothing even remotely tells me it is a stack of thin coffee paper filters ...

Well Snap ..there is no edge to be seen ..just a rounded glob of cardboard ..so I get a sharp toothpick and start jabbing the edge looking for some separation of filters ..at his point I'm not choosy ...I'll take seperation anywhere I can get it ...I'm 30 minuets into this separation mission ...yes this is now a boneheaded "Mission" ..

I won't bore you with the details leading to success after an hour and a quarter of forging on but i will share this..

There is a good reason for dunking one piece of paper at a time

If you do happen to find two together wet and inseparable just grasp the edge with thumb and fore finger of each hand holding the paper edge taunt with a thumbs width of separation between your thumbs and blow like the Dickens straight into the edge and while blowing move your hands together ..what happens is blowing the edge starts separation and moving the hands toward each other allows the slack to form a bubble ..from there you separate

Or you could throw away that 35 cents worth of soggy paper and get on with your day

Don't forget to grin at yourself fellows ...you will be a bunch happier !!!

Bear

Glad I never made a mistake like that (that anyone knows about)! You’re a braver man then I !

I think my worst stupid error I’ve made was wanting to see a firecracker explode up close, when I was a dumb kid. I lit it up and set a baby food jar over it to protect my face from the explosion. Luckily the shards of glass only stuck in about a dozen places of my face, but not my eyes.

I had cause recently to chat with an elderly ladies hair dresser. She commented that a sales rep used to tell her that the paper was treated with acids into a parchment paper. That would mean that nitric and sulphuric acids were used to soak the paper and it was then washed and neutralised. Essentially becoming a species of gun cotton leaf or flash paper. It made the thin paper far more durable like a thin actual parchment.

That being so, and if they are stIll made thus, the curling paper will be a propellant in itself and disappear with the black powder.

Coffee filter paper is made of long fibre wood pulp so it will leave traces of ash from that pulp behind.

It would suggest that hair curling paper may be a superior choice for pistol paper cartridges.

Here is a YouTube video from ’The Chap’ from Bloke on the Range YouTube channel where he demonstrates how the French army used to use such paper for short range pistol practice in lieu of powder ie just the flash paper and no powder. I admit that this is an unmentionable but it is the only video to demonstrate what flash paper does ignited in a chamber that I can find.

Brokenbear said:

Or you could throw away that 35 cents worth of soggy paper and get on with your day

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Really good information, especially for us impatient ones

Raedwald - are you saying that curling paper will flash like in that video?

Dude said:

Raedwald - are you saying that curling paper will flash like in that video?

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If they still make them that way but a lot of care went into the French choosing what size and thickness of flash paper to use and exactly how to fold it. I can’t answer for what happens if someone stuffs their chamber full of it and let’s it loose. The relevant matter is that it should leave negligible ash as all of the paper deflagrate rather than leaving wood ash as filter paper etc is burned by the powder.

I shot with this kind of paper when I was in military school, it was a few months ago in fact (it was in 1961)...
This paper was made of textile paper only (never wood) and treated with acids, nitric and sulfuric exactly like cotton powder (it was a kind of almost nitrocellulose in fact), rinsed and dried it was then put in the cases in necessary and sufficient quantity for the shooting at very short distance and for the education of the students...
Today I thank the officer Juge (nobody chooses his name) for having explained this, and much more later, to me when I was young after I had dismantled a MAS36 cartridge from the school out of curiosity with the surprise of finding paper inside instead of powder...

Thank you for the detail Erwan.

Just to reiterated for any bubba who has pricked up his ears. This stuff is identical to gun cotton and if you try to use it as the actual propellant you are loading your gun with gun cotton nitro cellulose explosive. Not only did the French very carefully choose and trial the tiny amount they used, but also were using it in guns built for smokeless nitro powders not black powder. You will die, or be very seriously injured at best. The flash paper sufficient to make a revolver paper cartridge loaded with black powder is not going to be a problem but go no further.

Just, that is absolutely right, the MAS36 were the regulatory weapons of the French army in this time and normally made for the big load of pyroxylated powders (a bit like cordite) and so of the same family that the other nitrocellulose, collodion or flash paper.
The loads of that powder were ridiculous and just able to shoot at 25 meters...
This paper/powder is dangerous to make and dangerous to use like a powder : it is a breaking explosive, like the one called in French "fulmicoton" (cellulose nitrate).
I just talk about for informative destined to the people who don't know or had never ear about this and for some use in black powder barrel, like wrote on the cigarettes: "Could be hazardous to your health"...

Ponderosaman said:

I think my worst stupid error I’ve made was wanting to see a firecracker explode up close, when I was a dumb kid. I lit it up and set a baby food jar over it to protect my face from the explosion. Luckily the shards of glass only stuck in about a dozen places of my face, but not my eyes.

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In my early years of black powder, I built me a Remington Army .44 revolver from a kit. My cold blue job looked like hell, but it shot really well. Living in a rural community 2 hours away from any larger city caused me to compensate quite a bit. The local gas station/garage gave me some wheel weighs for lead, but I would also pillage through the local dump and find old car batteries. I know they contained acid, but I guess I lucked out with that. Anyway, I had an old Coleman stove and a nice cast iron pot. I could melt 4 lbs of lead at a time and pour it into an ingot mold. On one occasion, the mold got really hot so I quenched it in some cold water. I guess I didn't let it dry as there was a bit of water in the corner of one of the casts. Immediately when the molten lead hit the moisture, it exploded all over. Fortunately, I wore some old welding glasses but the burns on my arms and through my pants hurt. Chock it up to being young and dumb.

A follow up Darwin award to my story above also happened with that same Remington Army .44. We were out of school for the Christmas break and my older brother and I decided we would go chop down a tree to decorate. In route to Allen's Canyon (where we usually went to get one), a nice jack rabbit ran in front of us in the snow. We had the truck in 4 wheel drive and was pushing a good foot plus of fresh snow. I noticed the rabbit ducked into a culvert crossing the road up in front of us. "I think we can get him," my brother whispered, "Do you have that thing loaded?" he went on, pointing to my old cap and ball revolver. "That's a big 10-4." I added, opening the door as he stopped. Mark, my older brother, ran to the uphill side where the snow all but covered the exit hole on the other side. From the side the rabbit ran into, it was wide open having been facing the rising sun. Peering into the tunnel afforded by the culvert, I could see the silhouette of the rabbit by the sunlight coming through the small hole in the snow at the end my brother was standing at. Mark had a big stick in his hands to clobber the bunny if he decided to try and escape. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness of the culvert, I could see the rabbit more clearly. He obviously knew my brother was there and didn't try to run. The culvert was 3 to 4 feet in diameter which allowed me to crawl into it a bit. Drawing the hammer back I took careful aim, slowly let the air out of my lungs and eased the trigger. "BOOOOM!" Immediately I realize the error of my action as the noise was amplified tremendously inside the tunnel. I hadn't though of that. I just remember thinking how stupid that was. Through ringing ears, and amidst the acrid smoke, I faintly heard my brother exclaim, "You got him!" as he saw fur fly out of the hole in the other end. My ears rang for most of that day.

Brokenbear said:

..., so I take a stack of 25 and dunk them in my 3 cups of warm water an 1 cup of potassium nitrate (lovingly known as tree stump removal magic in a can) to let them soak ......,

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So the only problem with tree stump remover is that it's really not regulated, so the amount of KNO3 that you get, and it's purity, let alone other fillers, is completely up to the manufacturer, as is the veracity of the label on the container.

So what some of us in the reenactment community do is to buy small amounts of much higher quality KNO3 from eBay, the stuff that's meant for making your own biodiesel. We switched because of past problems with the results, so now we get a much better product when making slow match with the better KNO3, and making slow match for artillery, for example.
Just a suggestion...., ymmv

Artillery may be The King of Battle, but only when the match stays lit and HOT !
And his Royal Britannic Majesty does not care for his artillery not firing, especially when facing wascally webels!
GOD SAVE THE KING

LD

I did an ebay search for KNO3 biodiesel and came up empty. I searched biodiesel - a bazillion hits and nothing about KNO3 in the first three pages. Searched both KNO3 and Saltpeter (Salt Peter, Salt Petre) with only a few hits. Looks like the best I can do is around $6/lb including shipping. Dave, could you give a link or directions on how to find the stuff you buy?

Do you live near any country stores (mennoite,Amish) that sort of thing if so look in there meat curing section, old time salt cures sometimes called for salte petre as a drying curing agent for the suger cures used on hams.

Dude said:

I did an ebay search for KNO3 biodiesel and came up empty. I searched biodiesel - a bazillion hits and nothing about KNO3 in the first three pages. Searched both KNO3 and Saltpeter (Salt Peter, Salt Petre) with only a few hits. Looks like the best I can do is around $6/lb including shipping. Dave, could you give a link or directions on how to find the stuff you buy?

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Search for potassium nitrate. There's a guy selling it by the lb right now (~$18 shipped). I don't remember how much I paid for the pound I bought for making slow match several years ago, but I do know I still have most of it left. A little goes a loooonnnng way.

Dude said:

I did an ebay search for KNO3 biodiesel and came up empty. I searched biodiesel - a bazillion hits and nothing about KNO3 in the first three pages. Searched both KNO3 and Saltpeter (Salt Peter, Salt Petre) with only a few hits. Looks like the best I can do is around $6/lb including shipping. Dave, could you give a link or directions on how to find the stuff you buy?

Click to expand...

What I'm using is this Klik here , I think that you can get this in the USA : Klik here ...

At the second link the KNO³ is temporally out of stock, but here is another one : Link ...

Brokenbear said:

All my prowess of 60 years of reloading ammunition left me yesterday ..or at least the knowing feeling of confidence in myself did ...for a bit anyway!

Being old but new to BP revolver shooting ..I have immersed myself into all the trimmings and trappings ...

In this segment of stupidity I am nitrating brown coffee filter paper for the formation of paper cartridges ..like
20gr 777/ card wad/greased wad/.375 ball

So forums and youtube become my classroom as I begin to tackle the learning curve

The ignoramus guys were dunking one filter at a time ..too slow says I so I take a stack of 25 and dunk them in my 3 cups of warm water an 1 cup of potassium nitrate (lovingly known as tree stump removal magic in a can) to let them soak ..then it hits me that the inner portion may get the chemical I'm trying to embed filtered out...

Well I pick it up (it is now an "it" because it looks like a blob of cardboard) ..nothing even remotely tells me it is a stack of thin coffee paper filters ...

Well Snap ..there is no edge to be seen ..just a rounded glob of cardboard ..so I get a sharp toothpick and start jabbing the edge looking for some separation of filters ..at his point I'm not choosy ...I'll take seperation anywhere I can get it ...I'm 30 minuets into this separation mission ...yes this is now a boneheaded "Mission" ..

I won't bore you with the details leading to success after an hour and a quarter of forging on but i will share this..

There is a good reason for dunking one piece of paper at a time

If you do happen to find two together wet and inseparable just grasp the edge with thumb and fore finger of each hand holding the paper edge taunt with a thumbs width of separation between your thumbs and blow like the Dickens straight into the edge and while blowing move your hands together ..what happens is blowing the edge starts separation and moving the hands toward each other allows the slack to form a bubble ..from there you separate

Or you could throw away that 35 cents worth of soggy paper and get on with your day

Don't forget to grin at yourself fellows ...you will be a bunch happier !!!

Bear

Click to expand...

Al Einstein once said,’everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler’ I have tried to prove him wrong so many times….

Stump rot / stump remover is almost all potassium nitrate. Get some at your nearest hardware or garden store, such as Lowe's. That's what I use to nitrate paper. And also to kill stumps of my ash trees.
Note that you want to use a good rag paper, such as tracing paper, which you can get from an office supply store. Not newsprint or paper towels, or even copy machine paper.
.
https://www.lowes.com/pd/Spectracide-16-oz-Stump-Remover/4764059