Q&A for How to Make Black Powder

Glasses wouldn't hurt, but definitely wear gloves. Make it in a room with low wind flow and NO candles or propane heaters.

If you are referring to white gunpowder as true gunpowder, there is no clear difference in power. Both are dangerous, but white gunpowder is a lot harder to make and emits less smoke.

If you buy lab grade chemicals, it will cost you $8/500g. Each. The total would be about $24- $30.

It will work, but the powder you make will be less dense than manufactured powders. You will need to use almost double what you usually load. The reason for the heavy density of manufactured powder is they are capable of a much higher milling pressure as companies use granite stones weighing tons, and they provide longer milling times for the ingredients. It's true, the finer the ingredients, the better the powder.

The alcohol will get the powder to dry faster than using only water, but water will work fine and is traditional. It just takes longer to dry.

No, the chemicals will make your black powder either non-combustible, or it will give off lethal smoke. You can make it as a display powder, as it will look the same, but don't try to light it.

Yes. It may not be as effective as sulfur, but it will definitely work. You may also need to try to alter the ratio because the ratio with iron oxide may be different from that with sulfur.

Black powder is made with just sulfur, potassium nitrate, and charcoal, however, in order to get useful powder, you need to follow the instructions. Just mixing the ingredients together won't blend them enough. By using the process above, the chemicals are blended much more evenly and the particles are closer together, resulting in a butter burn.

Step 4 says to chill the alcohol, not to add it. Wait until step 8 to add it.

Yes, but the quality will be poor. The best charcoals for black powder are soft wood charcoals, especially willow, grapevine, and alder.

Charcoal sticks for sketches are typically pure charcoal, but it's much cheaper to fill a paint can with wood, poke a hole in the top and throw it into a fire until flames stop coming out of the top.

Compared to potassium nitrate, it is a poor oxidizer. One can use sodium nitrate, but you would need to coat it with graphite to prevent the sodium nitrate from attracting moisture. Also, be aware that ammonium nitrate is explosive under certain conditions and could be dangerous.

This could work both ways, but it's best to just pour the isopropyl over the hot mixture.

Someone mentioned that you will need almost twice as much powder for black powder guns, I'd assume it the same for black powder shotgun cartridges.

Dry, as the black powder will not work as good if it is wet. Also, the additives of any kind of plants will ruin your black powder, making it very weak.

Yes, but you have to prepare your dextrin right or it won't work as well.

No. Sulfur is insoluble in water and remains behind when filtered. The nitrate is initially dissolved in water (step 6) to the point of saturation. When the entire mix is rapidly chilled (step 9), the nitrate crystallizes out of solution, within the sulfur and charcoal. So pretty much everything remains in the filter medium.

Yes, you can do this if you prefer to granulate your powder while keeping the grains fine and soft.

It depends on where you are. It would be beneficial to check with local and state law enforcement.

Enough to thoroughly wet the dry ingredients. The goal is to displace the water so as to better dry the material.

Not really, you would need to use almost double the amount because it is less effective than the industrial black powder. It would be mostly ineffective for you.

Black powder should not be used for any modern bullet. It doesn't burn as quickly as smokeless powder and is much less powerful. You are better off just buying .22 ammo in bulk or using normal smokeless powder for any other cased ammo type.

Yes, but it is less reactive than potassium.

Wetting the black powder mixture prevents it to ignite due to the friction of the mixing process. There are some who use kerosene instead of water. My preference would be water. Alcohol will mix easily with the water thus speeding up drying time. The early powder mills used a vat type arrangement in which the three components were milled together by having a rubber tire type roller rotate through the mixture and grind it to a finer insistence. Finer gun powder burns faster.

No, this will create lots of smoke that is very toxic and might become friction sensitive.

Graphite is harder to light, and results in a much slower burn. It's useless for anything other than (maybe) homemade sparklers.

Mesquite is supposed to rival willow as a good charcoal, buy 100% pure bags of mesquite charcoal.