PROGRESS IN EXPLOSIVES GUTTMANISr. 265 



production were exported,'^ and a good deal was used for railways, 

 roads, etc. 



There has been practically no progress made in black powder 

 within the last twenty years. Brown powder, which, as is known, 

 contained slack burnt charcoal and a small percentage of sulphur, 

 greatly improved the shooting of large guns, but has gradually 

 given way to smokeless powder, even for the very largest guns. A 

 little black powder is still used as a primer for large charges, but 

 even for that purpose it will gradually be replaced by specially 

 prepared smokeless powder. There are still some old sportsmen 

 who prefer to use nothing but the old fine black sporting powder, 

 and this is more especially the case in remote parts of Germany, 

 Austria, and Italy, whilst in the United States of America profes- 

 sional sportsmen, i. e., those who shoot wild fowl for the market, use 

 black powder because of its cheapness. There is a certain amount 

 of competition going on in this quarter with smokeless powder, 

 and manufacturers of black sporting powder are thereby obliged to 

 make special efforts to produce material of the highest grade only. 



The enormous developm^ent of the German potash industry, and 

 the peculiar requirements of potash and salt mining, have also re- 

 vived some rough mixtures of black-powder-like explosives, of which 

 very large quantities are now sold in Germany. 



In America, also, large quantities of black powder made with 

 sodium nitrate are used. Labor there is so expensive that work is 

 done with this cheap explosive which on this side of the Atlantic 

 would be carried out with pick and shovel. 



Progress of a different kind has been effected by using ammonium 

 nitrate as an ingredient in a powder mixture. This also was tried 

 in France in the eighteenth century with but little result.*^ Amide 

 powder,^ however, made by the Koeln-Rottweil works, and con- 

 sisting of 40 parts of potassium nitrate, 38 parts of ammonium 

 nitrate, and 22 parts of charcoal, might, but for the advent of smoke- 

 less powder, have become a serious rival to black powder. Mayer, 

 of Felixdorf, in Austria, also worked in this direction. The Aus- 

 trian Government makes Wetter-Dynammon as an explosive for 

 fiery ijiines, which, according to Ulzer,'^ consists of 93.83 per cent of 

 ammonium nitrate, 1.98 i^er cent potassium nitrate, 3.TT per cent 

 charcoal, and 0.42 per cent moisture, the charcoal grains being 1 to 

 G ^ in size. 



" Private communication. 



^ Bottee et Riffault, " Traite de I'art de fabriquer la poudre a canon." Paris, 

 1811. 



'^ Gaeus, British patent No. 14412, of 1885. 



^ " Mitteilungen des technologischen Gewerbemuseums," Weiu, 1900, p. 204. 



