APAN tests.

[DBSP]

Ok the tests I said I'd do has been carried out now, I just came home from the blasting site.

Some info: All charges were held in small plastic bags and the dets were 30-06 cases filled with 2,5g AP each. The dets were simply taped to the charges. Everything was triggered electrical with a thick 50m long copper wire and a car battery.

Contents of each charge:
1) APAN 8% AP. Weight 50g.
2) APAN 6% AP. Weight 50g.
3) APAN 4% AP. Weight 50g.
4) ANNM. 23g AN 5ml NM.

Results:
1) the charge was placed on the base of a tree that the wind had blown to the ground. I was 25m away behind a Big rock. Uppon detonation: a very loud bang and much damage done to the tree. complete detonation and good brisance.

2) same place. Uppon detonation: still loud report but you could easily hear that the explosive wasn't as powerfull the first one, the brisance wasn't as good in this one.

3) same place. Uppon detonation: not very loud and much less powerfull than the two others. It did detonate but I can't be shure of wether it was a complete det. or not but I think it was.

4) same place. Uppon detonation: very loud and just about as powerfull as the first one even though it only weighted half as much as #1. ANNM kicks ass!

Conclusion: One thing is shure, APAN is a very good explosive for those who can't get NM or secondary explosives to detonate ANFO. APAN could probably be used as a booster for ANFO if you'd have about 50g of 20% APAN.
This was the first time I detonated APAN above ground, I set off a 1/2 kilo 10% APAN charge 1,2 m under ground some time ago, that was massive I could imagine that much above ground.
APAN has the best performance above 8% AP, that has the tests made clear. I'll probably be making additional tests to figure out the sensitivity of the explosive, I don't think it's very sensitiv though. If anyone else could make some similar tests I'd appriciate it.

[Madog555]

hey, this is very interesting.

the only thing that i can think of that caused 2 and 3 to be less powerfull is the fact that they had less AP in them so they were less sensitive and detonation was incomplete.

i would think that it would be more powerful with more AN, there must be somekind of balance that is the best ratio.

next time i make AP im gona set off some ANAP and post the results. its not gona be very big, i live in a populated area and im only 14 so i have no car to go to a better place.

i think i may do this tomarrow.

[DBSP]

I'm only 17 so I haven't got a car either but I have a nice grandfather so he follows me so I can take the car anyway. Ther's only about 250 people living in my hometown and they are used to hearing bangs since we hunt quite alot around here. And I normally try to set my explosives off when it's bad weather wich it was today, it was very windy and lots off snow so the sound doesn't get to far and even if someone hear it they don't know what it is.

I think the reason the two last were less powerfull was that the det. velocity was lower because of the smaller ammount of AP in #2 and 3.

If you want to reduce the sound you could set the charge either underground, in snow or in water.

How many people live around you Madog?

[Madog555]

you live in a very small town.

im not exactly sure how many people live in my town. its probaly around 5000 i live in a medium populated town

i have never had the cops come to my house over loud noises and i set off some fairly large things right in my backyard. i have doing this for over a year now.

i go to the town forest which is up the street for the real big stuff. thats where this is going. after it goes off i check it out real quick then split. i don't know if the cops have ever showed, i don't hang around too long.

doesn't stuff with a lower VOD have a sound that travels farther? i have noticed this, my mom and sister can easily hear the boom of flash powder salutes when they're inside but they don't hear AP as well.

[DBSP]

Your right about that sound thing. The thump of a ANFO charge can be heard a longer distance but the crack of an AP charge of the identical weight isn't heard as long.
I'm not shure but I think it has something with the size/shape/length of the soundwaves.

[Madog555]

its the length of them

the hight pitched (high frequency) shockwave/sound produced by AP will get killed easier than the low ones made by AN based explosives. the low pitched ones will also go through stuff easier.

im gona use a large pill botle for a container and 2 .44 spec. bullet shells together filled with AP for a detonator.

im gona grind my AN prills (from a cold pack) with a cofee grinder thing.

[xoo1246]

Yepp, AN/NM rocks, I broke a stone (maybe 50 cm diameter)into pieces with some 200-250 grams of AN/NM/AL. The charge was placed partialy under the stone.

[Ctrl_C]

heres some pics of my own APAN tests. I am not sure of the ratio of AP to AN because i STILL don't have a balance. anyway, the pics speak for themselves.

<img src="ftp://ewf:df447jh4@209.195.155.80/Hosted%20Images/APAN%20Charge.jpg" alt="" />
<a href="ftp://ewf:df447jh4@209.195.155.80/Hosted%20Images/APAN%20Charge.jpg" target="_blank">APAN Charge</a>

Copper tube is fuse shield. 30-06 shell detonator. ziploc snack baggie.

<img src="ftp://ewf:df447jh4@209.195.155.80/Hosted%20Images/APAN%20craters.jpg" alt="" />
<a href="ftp://ewf:df447jh4@209.195.155.80/Hosted%20Images/APAN%20craters.jpg" target="_blank">APAN Craters</a>

These speak for themeselves. Thats wet clay there.

<img src="ftp://ewf:df447jh4@209.195.155.80/Hosted%20Images/APAN%20crater%20with%20hand.jpg" alt="" />
<a href="ftp://ewf:df447jh4@209.195.155.80/Hosted%20Images/APAN%20crater%20with%20hand.jpg" target="_blank">APAN crater with hand as reference</a>

A guage of the diameter and depth. And yes I already know my middle fingers are crooked as hell.

<small>[ March 27, 2002, 07:01 PM: Message edited by: Ctrl_C ]</small>

[Madog555]

nice pics, how did your finger get like that

[kingspaz]

thats a pretty decent crater!
just something i thought i'd bring up...this explosive would be best prepared just before detonation due to AN's slight acidity. i beleive one of the hydrogens on the ammonium ion can somtimes free (i've forgoten the real name for this!) giving AN a slight acidity. looks a decent improvised ANNM alternative charge anyway.

[mark]

Maddog, what kind of cold packs have AN in them? How much is inside? iM sorry if this has been asked before, but I dont have any other option for AN at this point.

[kingspaz]

mark, i face the same problem. i obtain all my nitrates from ammonium nitrate whcih i get from 'instant ics packs' - thats what to ask for at the chemists. they are used by atheletes as a form of ice coldness for injuries, they can't find ice on a hot summers day halfway round a race track!

[mark]

Thanks you! I have a few more questions. How does one get the nirate from the packet? How much is inside?

[Madog555]

AN gets (very) cold when it contacts water. so they make instant ice packs out of a bag of AN with a smaller bag of water in it. when you want to use the pack you squeeze the water bag untill it bursts, then it gets realy cold. just go to a pharmacy (like CVS if you know what one is) i have herd that they sell them at wal-mart too. this is how i got my AN. alot comes in a pack, like 150g

[mark]

*drools*150 grams! hot damn! im going to the drug store. And iwith this apan test, ill have a way to set it off! The biggest charge im gonna make is a filmacanister underground+water, sot his may last a while. Thanks guys. Do I need to purify the product in any way?

[kingspaz]

i don't think so, as far as i know there is no coating and its 100% pure :D i can't see there being a coating of any sort since it would hinder the waters absorbtion. also the AN is in prill form so its prepared allready for ANFO, etc. the prill form gives a lower density making it easier to detonate.

[Madog555]

you must put it through a coffee grinder before you make ANAP or ANNM but ANFO is good prilled.

[mark]

How do I mix the ap with the AN? Its such a tiny amount, how do I know if I've mixed it thourougly?

[Yikes]

Simple trick: mix in a tiny amount of powdered charcoal.
This way you can easily see if you have properly mixed white powders.
(Streaks of black: not mixed properly - plain grey: OK!)

[Madog555]

thats a great idea yikes.

[mark]

How should I go about mixing the to together. I cant very well shake a bunch of AP and AN together in a filmacn can I? How shall I mix them?

[Madog555]

DBSP rolls his aound in a infalted plastic baggie

[Ctrl_C]

I used the "diaper method" which constists of placing it on a piece of paper and shifting the paper back and forth until mixed thoroughly. It's not too hard to tell if its throughly mixed because the AN is dull and the AP crystals shimmer in the light.

btw, the pics will be up off and on as they are hosted from the ftp and my new modem won't be here for a few days.

[EP]

While on the subject of AN based explosives, I've got a question I've been wondering about for a while. We all know ANFO uses prilled AN and ANNM uses powdered AN, but why not powdered AN for ANFO? Certainly it would be very difficult to detonate, but with a sifficient booster, wouldn't the increaded density of the powdered AN give a higher VoD?

[mark]

What do you guys think is the minimum amout of anap to detonate? I want smallish charges.

[Madog555]

Yi did 10g, thats pretty small.

[Anthony]

Dunno EP, I guess reliable and complete detonation is more important than squeezing an extra few hundred M/s out of it. If you need a little extra power it's possibly cheaper to use another pound of ANFO than it is for a larger PETN or RDX booster.

mark, I should imagine that the critical quantity for APAN is very small, probably sub-gram if it retains much of the characteristics of AP.

[mark]

Thanks! Im very exited about this he.

[Ctrl_C]

I tried powdered ANFO with a .223 shell filled with AP inside a PVC pipe. It didn't work. My conclusion is that the detonator blew apart the pipe and threw all the ANFO out before it could detonate or it's just hard as hell to detonate and the det wasn't big enough. I think you need some air in there (as there would be with prills) to allow the det shockwave to procede partially unimpeded so it still retains close to normal shockwave propagation speed.

[Madog555]

setting ANFO off with straight AP is very hard, that may have worked if you had it in a thick steel pipe. i have herd that 100g works nicely but i wouldn't fuck with that, i sugest useing TNP, ANAP, ANNM, or another booster.

<small>[ March 27, 2002, 04:17 PM: Message edited by: Madog555 ]</small>

[DBSP]

The APAN should contain at least 8% AP and it detonates in very small ammounts. I once tried detonating a 1,5 kg charge of AN and raps oil, I don't know what to call it, it's not ANSOY. Anyway I ahd a 40g AP det, but it failed. But I think you could get it off with +50g APAN if pressed. ANNM is of cource one of the better.

The cold packs contain ~170g AN, and as Madog said it has to be pulverised before it can be used for APAN, if it isn't pulverised it wont mix intimately enaugh and it won't detonate. You dont have to purify the AN. I've had no problems with it before it has worked for both APAN and ANNM.

Ctrl_c did you just leave the APAN on the ground? I try to press all explosive into one corner of the bag and then seal that piece off, that way you get a more dense explosive. Nice pics!! :)

Would someone mind doing a flame test? try to trigger it with a gram of B-powder or something. I'm short on AP right now so I can't do it.

[Yi]

I just had a great yield of HMTD so I'll try some AN/HMTD this weekend, parhaps (~20g) should be interesting :)

[Madog555]

hmm, i wonder if HMTD is compatable with AN, i would venture to say that you should be fine.

[Yi]

I was wondering the same thing, I'll look into it... Also I'll do a flame test. The fuse I use burns damn hot & underwater etc, so I'll just make a knot and pass it through a small amount of AN/HMTD and see if it goes. Like 0.5g in a card tube and in the open. Maybe 40% & 20% HMTD. It should det as there is enough primary there, well see.

[Madog555]

i bet the 40% will go bang but it would just be the HMTD, put the device in a cardboard box or something so you can see if there is any AN or if it actualy detonated.

[Yi]

Good idea, I'll suspend it in the middle of a box. But in 0.5g charges I don't think there will a noticable amount of powder to find. The ~20g (probably 10% HMTD) charge will be in the ground so remaining powder will be visible, also it will be initiated with a cap so It should detonate fully.

[Ctrl_C]

I was born with my middle fingers crooked.

Yes, they were just sitting on the ground, no confinement. The APAN was packed in that bag pretty good. I put in just enough to let the bag seal properly and made sure to brush the interlocking ziploc parts with a paintbrush before sealing so there was no AP in the grooves. I mixed the AP in wet on purpose because it allowed the final mixture to be "molded" a little bit and also when packing it into the bag it was less likely to detonate.

The nice thing about ANAP is that it is very reliable, cheap, and can be made in pretty massive quantities. For 12kg of AN you only need 1.2kg of AP. A lot of people think making a kg of AP is dangerous but not if you do it in seperate batches. I am unsure, however, how the weight of the 12kg of AN would affect the AP. My guess is it would not at all because it is a constant pressure, not an impact. The hardest part would be mixing it. You would have to do a LOT of smaller batches then mix them together. BTW, 12kg of AN and 1.2kg AP is exactly how much it would take to fill a 5 gallon detergent bucket. I am considering trying this or ANNM but NM is expensive as hell.

[Yi]

How about ANFO with ANNM booster (100-200g), I'm not sure if APAN will be a sufficient booster for it.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

I had no problems detonating 500g ANSOY with 20grams ap and 10 grams picric acid.

[Zambosan]

AN from cold packs would probably be pretty impure.

<small>[ July 18, 2002, 01:32 AM: Message edited by: Zambosan ]</small>

[mongo blongo]

Zambosan- When you say "AN from cold packs", do you mean the "instant ice packs" or the ones that are containers with a liquid in them that you put in the freezer and they stay cold for ages?
I'm having big problems finding the instant ice packs! None of the pharmacies around my area have ever even herd of them! I'm guessing that these instant packs are AN with an ampule of water in them that when broken, the AN is dissolves (an endothermic reaction). Am I right about this?
I live in Wales by the way, has anyone from the UK found these?

[DBSP]

When someone say they got there AN from cold packs he is saying he got if from an instant cold pack, there is no AN in the liquid ones it's jut some kind of glycol.

If someone decides to kame a flame test please try it on a mix with 10% AP since thats the mix that is interesting. There is no point in testing it on a 40% for instance since that is a primary with some AN and not AN with a primary.

I once detonated a 0.5 kg charge, I'll se if I can borrow a dig. camera and get a pic of the crater. It's only about 1 meter wide but the charge was placed 1.4 meters under the ground. I felt mu way through the hole with a stick and found that it had gotten 0.5 meters deeper and the bottom of the hole was very hard, full with rocks so I couldn't dig deeper. The hole had allso gotten about 0.75 meters wider in each direction, paralell with ground.

ANNM is expensive but if you think a bit further it's not so expensive. I paid 21.5$ for a liter, thats over 5kg of ANNM, and thats a lot!! Shure APAN is cheaper but it hasn't got half the strenght of ANNM.

[Aaron-V2.0]

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica"> <img src="ftp://ewf:df447jh4@209.195.155.80/Hosted%20Images/APAN%20Charge.jpg" alt="" /> </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">_C, in that picture it appears that the baggy is filled with cotton balls, is that to cushion the APAN? DBSP said he just presses it into a corner of the baggie.

<small>[ March 28, 2002, 03:35 PM: Message edited by: Aaron-V2.0 ]</small>

[DBSP]

Cotton balls, yeah shure it's APAN for gods sake. Can't you read or what. I press the explosive into a corner because 50g doesn't fill a
2L baggie!! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="eek.gif" />

[Aaron-V2.0]

DBSP: The AN that my freinds and I get is green tinted from the local made fertilizer. I know AP is white but I was confused when the bags contents was all white. I'm going to check into the instant cold packs to see pure AN. (The fert AN we get is 40%)

Still, ignorance isnt a good excuse, I'm checking out the pictures on the FTP.

[Madog555]

pure AN is pure white, bada-bing! :)

<small>[ March 28, 2002, 05:29 PM: Message edited by: Madog555 ]</small>

[kingspaz]

Aaron, surely if its 40% you could purify it. then you would have lots of white, pure AN. i beleive it would need washing in alcohol to remove the anti-absorbstion (can't think of the proper word!) coating, then recrystalise the impurities (phosphates, other nitrate, etc) and remove by filtering. then boil the water from the filtrate (the liquid remaining) and you should have pure AN. i've never actually done this so the method may not be 100% accurate.

[Aaron-V2.0]

Thank you kingspaz on the purification technique, I'm going to do that tommorow. I'm so psyched about doing my first APAN charge. And since mark asked most of my questions I have all the answers I need, such an informative thread. :D

<small>[ March 28, 2002, 06:26 PM: Message edited by: Aaron-V2.0 ]</small>

[mark]

Should I recrystalize the AN from the cold packs? And would a filmcanister of it detonate if the det(1.5 inches long, 3/8 inside diameter pressed ap) if i just taped it to the side?

[Anthony]

That is IMO way OTT, a .22LR case of pressed AP should be enough.

[Madog555]

the cold packs have to be very pure to react vigourously to make it realy cold. no need to recrystalise at all. i would use the detonator that you described if i was in your position, but i would put it inside. do not transport it with the det in it. put the det in at the blast site.

[mark]

I wish to seal the film canister shut so its waterproof. I do not wish to do that with the det inside.

[Madog555]

ok, it should go off fine with the det on the outside. i would use the det that you proposed just to make sure though

[mark]

Thanks. Is there any way to make this into some sort of plastique? I'd like to have soem to play with. Also, should I mix in a small amount of baking soda into the AN to neutralise it?

[Madog555]

probaly not. i have herd reports of HMTD plastisized with mineral oil works good. do you have concentrated H2SO4? you could use this and the AN to nitrate starch and plastisize that with wheel bearing grease. or KClO3 plastique.

i dont think its necessasarry to add bakeing soda

[DBSP]

The AN from the coldpacks doesn't need purifying if it says: "contents: ammonium nitrate and water.".
I once got a pack that contained calsium as well. I dissolved everything in water and a layer of it setteled at the bottom, I haven't done anything more yet but it's just to filter and boil the water off.

It wasn't very much calsium in it so you could probably have useed it as it was but the water bag had leeked so it was all damp anyway.

[oxyrad]

I have experimented with hmtd/AN and i think it works. i half filled a film canister with hmtd and filled another canister with half hmtd and half AN so they both had the same amount of hmtd in them.I detonated them both under the same conditions and the one with the AN made a bigger crater and more dust.so i assumed the AN detonated.
I also tried ANNM for the first time about 2 month ago.I did 150 grams of AN with 30ml of NM and a film canister full of hmtd.I set it of about 15cm under ground and the explosion was massive the dirt scatered all around the crater wich was almost a metre wide and 30cm deap.But someone saw us run back to my house and they called the cops so i had to make up a bullshit story to get out of it.I will have my licence soon so i can start making ANNM again

[DBSP]

Well as I said before this kind of thing isn't very usefull since you had about 50% HMTD in the charge. It will act as a primary, I have tested some APAN and ALAPAN chrges in small quantities. For the APAN I had a 50/50 ratio. It detonates with just a fuse, it shoould be the same for HMTD/AN. It would be more interesting to know how well a 10%
HMTD/AN mix workes, and how much is needed to set it off.

[Yi]

The 10% mix is not fuse sensitive. I have tested a small amount of it.
once I can get somewhere a bit further away from people I can try a larger amount with a cap. 50g I think. I don't see any reason for it not to detonate, should be interesting. My caps are usually either 0.75g and 1g HMTD so we'll see how sensitive it is.

[DBSP]

If you have a look at the firs post you can see that a 10% does detonate. I belive a 1g det should do it but I haven't tried detonating APAN with anything smaller than 2g AP so I'm not shure.

[Mick]

APAN is win!

i just detonated(in theory of course =) 200g of APAN (10% AP) and i must say that it gave me half a woody when it went off :D .

the detonator i used was made from a piece of electrical conduit, with paper end plugs. the end plugs were made by screwing up a sheet of A4 paper, then stuffing into the conduit, then pressing the paper down hard in the conduit with the help of a bench vice.
then i cut the conduit to the required size (about 70mm).
i drilled a hole for the fuse in the side, inserted the fuse and filled it with AP so that it was about 15mm from the top of the conduit.
then i took another piece of conduit and screwed up paper, and once again pressed it down hard in a vice. i then removed the hard pellet of paper with a brass drift. then by mounting another vice in my bench vice so that it was vertical, i pressed the pellet into the top of the conduit with AP. thus making it quite a good detonator.

the secondary was made with a piece of 90mm PVC, with one end plug made from pressed paper(news paper).
i drilled a hole in the side of the 90mm PVC, so i could insert the fuse from the detonator thru it, i then filled it with 200g of Ammonium Nitrate, and 20g of AP (mixed via diaper method). once it was filled i placed a piece of glad wrap(cling wrap, plastic wrap whatever you wish to call it) over the open end of the secondary and proceeded to fill the remainder of the pipe with car filler(also known as BOG - used for filling rust holes) then i drilled 3 holes in the side of the 90mm pipe and pushed 3 three inch nails into the BOG(to reenforce the BOG to the pipe).
and thats it.

i place it at the base of a tree around 300mm under the ground.

i am almost 99% certain that it was a complete detonation, the noise from it was extremely deep (as opposed to a sharp crack like AP) and there was allot of dirt thrown up in the air, and the was also allot of smoke(in the air, and also coming out of the dirt in the crater)
the crater left was about 400mm deep, and 500 to 1000mm in diameter.
it also removed about 40 to 50% of the root ball of the tree.

all in all, i would say that APAN is a winner, and i will be testing sometime in the coming weeks to see if it has sufficient power to be a booster for ANFO.

after all that dreaming, i think i might go make myself a cuppa coffee.

[DBSP]

Nice!! I'm glad that more people are realising the potential of APAN.
And the fact that it isn't fuse sensitive allso improves the good sides of APAN. And the fact that it's very cheap doesn't make things worser either.

It would also be nice to see if it's strong enaugh to set ANFO off. I belive a 60g charge with a 5g det should do it but you never know with ANFO..

[Mick]

i would say you would need atleast 100g + for ANFO, i've tried ANFO with 120g of AP before, and it still didn't detonate.

[Yi]

A 1g HTMD det will definately set off APAN or HMTDAN.
<a href="http://incoherent.topcities.com/Explosions/Pictures/an.htm" target="_blank">http://incoherent.topcities.com/Explosions/Pictures/an.htm</a>

[YTS]

Can you get cold packs in uk i cant find them

[Yi]

I know St. Johns Ambulance uses them...You can buy them from them and I'm sure in other places also.

[kingspaz]

yi, i think mick is saying you will need atleast 100g of APAN to set off ANFO.
nice pics and page by the way!

edit: you can get instant cold packs in chemists. about £2 for about 150g of AN. its pure so needs no purification processes as fertiliser grade often does.

<small>[ March 30, 2002, 06:01 PM: Message edited by: kingspaz ]</small>

[Yi]

I was referring to DBSP's post (not his last one but the one before that) :)

This stuff is wonderfully sensitive to caps...I wonder how well it performs to drop tests. Any ideas casting methods? nitrocellulose?

<small>[ March 30, 2002, 06:17 PM: Message edited by: Yi ]</small>

[mark]

Im giddy with exitment! I just bought 3 coldpacks, and theres a whole lot of AN prills in there. More than enough for about 10 filmcanister sised charges. I also plan to fill up medium easter eggs with the stuff. All I have to do know is make some AP on monday and crush the prills. How should I go about crushing them? Mortar and pestel? Hammer? I dont think I want to buy a coffe grinder. Also, how should I store the AN to keep it dry? I have it in 2 plastic bags right now.

[nbk2000]

I used to dissolve my AN prills in water to a pasty consistancy and dry it in an oven at 300 degrees, occassionally stirring it up with a spatula.

It would come out as a superfine powder with just a few small clumps.

[NoltaiR]

Yeah I just bought three 'instant kold packs' from walmart.. only about $1.50 each so that isn't too bad.. (although it sucks if you compare it to the 50 pound bags that I used to be able to get--too bad I hadn't bought more than two--that only cost $20.

Well I will do some of these APAN tests tomorrow.. especially since I have 40g AP just sitting around because my picric acid lab failed last night so I won't be doing any APPA tests.

[Aaron-V2.0]

Ok, purification project was a failure, I went to get my bag of 40% AN and that morning my father needed some fertilizer in the garden so... I'll just make some cherry tomato bombs!

No, but I'm going to check the Rite Aid and pick up the AN instant cold packs. And I'm happy to hear that 50% AN 50% AP is fuse sensitive since I'm a bit leery of making a casing cap.

And Yi, great pictures!

[DBSP]

Yi very nice pics. I'm downloading the vid now. This week it's a school hilliday so I can't get in tuch with one of my friends who has a digital camera. As soon as I can I'll see if I can't borrow his cam and take some pics as well.

Aaron making a cap isn't that hard, just find a sutible continer and fill it with AP and tamp it lightly, insert fuse and it's done.

Edit: Just a note, the smoke from your 90g charge is exactly the same I have.

<small>[ March 31, 2002, 05:24 AM: Message edited by: DBSP ]</small>

[Yi]

Which video are you downloading? One of the older ones? I haven't upped the vids for 90g APAN, 50g HMTDAN nor the 100g Chlorate. I'm just getting the pics so those will be added later today (a few hours maybe).

Unfortunately it was quite dark when the 90g was set off so its quite hard to see it on video/screenshots <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="frown.gif" />

[DBSP]

I downloaded the 10g one, couldn't get it to work though.
I'd love to see the videos of the 90 grammer. What kind of video camera do you have?

[Anthony]

Just be sure that your prills are NH4NO3, I got some cold packs that had Urea prills in them.

[EP]

Anthony - How can you tell the difference? Do they say on the package or is urea a different color?

[mark]

Only one of my packs says amonium nitrate on the side. The other two dont say anything. Should I be woried?

[Anthony]

I was able to tell because, under closer inspection, my packs said "contains Urea" on the packaging.

[kingspaz]

noltair, have i understood you correct?! your going to mix AP with picric acid?!
are you looking for death?....picric ACID is acidic, therefore making the mix extremely unstable and unpredictable! this is why you hear of so many acidents with AP and HMTD, because people haven;t neutralised it after manufacture. this leads to spontaneous detonation and extreme sensitivity. you just asking for trouble!

[Yi]

I've got a basic JVC digital video camera. Vids are up BTW but not 90g until I can edit some sound out..

[mark]

Is there a surfire test for AN?

[NoltaiR]

Actually I just misstated that.. I wasn't going to actually mix it.. was just going to fill a film canister halfway with PA. Then place a layer or two of ceran wrap over it, then fill the rest it AP (so actually its not a mix at all.. just a primary placed on top of a booster without actually using a bcap.

Edit: and one more thing.. my cold packs didn't mention anywhere on the package what it had in it.. the prills that I took out looked like AN but then again there are countless other chems that have the same color as AN. I think the best way to tell the difference easily will be to simply grind some up and mix with a bit of charcoal and see if it burns like ammonpulver (spelling?)

<small>[ March 31, 2002, 11:09 PM: Message edited by: NoltaiR ]</small>

[Mr Cool]

Ammonpulver doesn't burn particularly well at atmospheric pressure (obviously this isn't a problem in a gun barrel). Just put a prill on an old metal spoon and blast it in a gas flame - you'll know if it's AN, because it'll melt, start to bubble and give off some white fumes, then kinda catch fire with an orangy flame, and there will be no residue.

[Yi]

Woohoo...APAN & HMTDAN rule..Someone just tried a shape charge (lucky I witnessed it huh :D ). Some more testing has to be done still, but it looks good so far :) .

Pictures on my site in the AN section.

[Ctrl_C]

Yi: Do you mind if I copy your page and vids and put them on the FTP?

[Yi]

No problem....I'm going to stop making things soon (for a bit)..otherwise i'll probably fail my exams <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="frown.gif" />

[NoltaiR]

Well due to the fact that my mom raided my 'lab' and my coffee grinder was a prime target, I had no way of grinding any charcoal. So instead I powdered all of my cold pack AN in a food processor from the kitchen (its easy to clean up so I didn't have to worry about it like I would if it was charcoal) and I tried a small amount out in a simple newspaper/AN smoke (as described on Lowry's makeshift arsenal) and it seemed to prove itself worthy. Well anyways I am making a mix of 35% AP:55% AN:10% rubber cement and am currently letting it dry (the mix weighs 45g although it will probably weigh about 35g once it is done drying). Due to the higher content of AP, I will probably see if I can detonate it with an open flame (by setting a trail of KNO3/sugar to it). However if anyone thinks that I should go ahead and make a AP bcap for it than go ahead.. in the end it may save me some work.

edit: one more thing.. today was the first time I initiated a rubber cement/AP charge within any packaging confinement at all (although I have set countless charges off that were just the dried clumps out in the open or partially under something). The 20g charge was wrapped almost completely in papertowel and duct tape. It was placed 5" within the side of a large dirt hill. A trail of KNO3/sugar was led to it and ignited.. clods of dirt were blown 40-50 feet away and the small charge left a crater 1 and a half feet deep and 2 and a half feet in diameter... nice :D

<small>[ April 01, 2002, 08:32 PM: Message edited by: NoltaiR ]</small>

[mark]

Im positivley giddy! I tested the coldpack, and its pure AN! And ive got lots of it too!

[Yi]

Why not test a small amount with a flame first..Then if it doesn't work, use a det.

[mark]

I will be making some ANAP in a few days. As I lack a scale, I will mixing the ingrediants by volume. What ratios do you sugest for a 10-15% AP content?

[DBSP]

This is very hard but if you measured out lets say 100ml of water and made a "balance" scale perhaps you could try to get about 100g AN and then do the same for the AP??

[nbk2000]

All you need is a light spring. Something that'll stretch a couple of inches with a few ounces weight is adequate.

Just hang the spring from a nail with a small pan made from jar lid and string. Use coins as weights, and mark off on a stick or the wall where the pan sits with 1, 2,....., 10, etc coins in it. Then just use those as ratios.

[endotherm]

Due to the naturally acidic nature of ammonium nitrate, and the overall unpredictability of acetone peroxide; this looks to be a rather dangerous explosive mixture. Right up my alley!
How long do you think this APAN mixture can be stored for, do you think it would be OK to let a constructed device with say 50 grams APAN and a 1 gram PETN cap sit for a few hours, 12 hours, a few days?
Is it possible that relativity stable AN improves the storage time of AP?

[mark]

Couldnt baking soda be added to the AN? How about disolving the AN in bicarb solution and then heating it until it recrystalises?

NBK, thats a cool scale idea, but I think I'll be sticking with spoons for the first few batches.

[nbk2000]

If you mixed the bicarb and nitrate together in water, you'll get a mix of ammoium and sodium carbonate and nitrate. That'd defeat the purpose.

Spoons aren't going to be consistant because of the variable density of powders. A scale (like I described) is butt simple to make.

If you can't afford a $5 dollar kitchen scale, steal one! It isn't like the guards are paying a lot of attention to kitchen scale thieves. :D

<small>[ April 03, 2002, 02:44 PM: Message edited by: nbk2000 ]</small>

[DBSP]

I don't know how long it can be stored but I've had a small sample quiate long. If some crystals would detonate because of the acidic environment the hole charge might not go off since it has passed a fuse-test wich means that some single crystals detonating isn't enaugh to set the hole charge off.

[mark]

Im proud of myself! I actualy went down to ace and built myself a scale. Its like nbk's, ecept instead of a pan I have a plastic baggie alegator cliped to the spring. Ive calibrated it with nickles. Would someone with aan actual scale weigh a nickel for me so I can have an Idea of how big my charges will be? How much does a penny weigh?

<small>[ April 03, 2002, 09:30 PM: Message edited by: mark ]</small>

[Madog555]

lol. thats cool, i will give u the weights of various coins tomarrow. i need to sleep now though

[endotherm]

i recall a nickle is exactly 5 grams

<small>[ April 03, 2002, 10:37 PM: Message edited by: endotherm ]</small>

[Mick]

i attempted a 500g APAN charge on the weekend, unfortunatly it sucked.

for some reason, it didn't go off with much of a bang - infact it was more of a "pop!".

i don't know why it didn't go off this time, the major changes i made were(compared to the 200g charge) - electrical ignition (model rocket ignitor) and i buried it about 800 to 900mm down.

the only thing that i can think of that would have stuffed it is water. recently we have had shit loads of rain around here, and when i dug my hole i dug down to a nice big rock shelf - big enough that it had it own stream flowing across the top of it.(when i hit the bottom, about 10 seconds later, water just started flowing accros the bottom of the hole).
Also, i had to leave it overnight after i buried it too. after i had placed the charge in the hole and started to fill it back in 2 cops walked past me then walked back to ask me a few questions.
apperently, there was a house robbery up the top of the gully and they were down in the bush looking for the guy who did it.
They asked me what i was doing and i just said my 96 year old neighbours cat just died, and i came to bury it down here, because my dog will dig it up if i put anywhere near my house - and if my dog digs it up and my neighbour see's it, it will literally kill her.
They bought it, and just said alrighty then..if you see anyone else down here looking "sus" then just give the cop shop a ring, they didn't even ask for my name, or adress or anything like that.

It would appear to me that once you get above say 250 to 300g you would need to increase the AP % to atleast 25 to ensure complete detonation.

[DBSP]

This is realy wierd! I detonated a 500g 10% charge without any problems. What kind of det did you have.

The hole I put the charge in was fully filled with water so I just put the charge in a plastic bag and sealed it.

What kind of container did the charge have? I had it in a paper-pipe about 50mm in diameter.

[NoltaiR]

Alright.. I detonated the 55AN:35AP:5rc charge underneath an old metal folding chair. The charge was wrapped in scotch tape and papertowels. It was primed (whether it needed it or not) with a 5g charge of AP/rc (hmmm.. easy detonators that wouldn't require metal casing.. that is something to think about..). It blew the folding chair about 6 or 7 feet in the air tearing off the legs of it during detonation and making a little mountain-shaped dent into the seat of the chair about 4-5 inches deep. And because the explosive was set in on a pile of loose sand, the shockwave could be easily seen as there was a large 'bubble' of sand that from a distance looked as if it had been what caused the chair to lift off the ground.. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

Anyways I tried to make a 250g of 15% ap APAN charge primed with a 10g AP/rc clump. It failed miserably.. All I had heard was an initial pop from the priming charge and a slightly louder pop from the main charge. The plastic bottle which it was contained in was still intact!!! The only reasons I can think of was that I never dried my AN and it obviously had a bit of moisture even though I had it stored in a ziplock bag (the moisture had probably been driven out by the toluene in the rubber cement in the earlier test). Also I expected that I could have just mixed the AP and the AN and I would be able to tell because my AP has a bit of a glazed shimmer look. Well this was dead wrong... once I poured the two together I couldn't tell the difference. So I just mixed it with the diaper method for a minute or two.. this may not have been good enough. And one last 'strike-out' for me is that I never packed it at all.. I just poured it in the bottle and set my primer in.

Damn that is a lot of AP and AN wasted.. :mad:

<small>[ April 04, 2002, 08:22 AM: Message edited by: NoltaiR ]</small>

[Demolition]

I wasted 354 grams to be exact of pure blasting AN on the weekend, :( along with about 35 grams of AP, :( and a good 45 seconds of fuse. :(
Ah well,its all a learning experience. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

<small>[ April 04, 2002, 09:22 AM: Message edited by: Demolition ]</small>

[DBSP]

I will be buying 50kg of AN tomorrow and I'll make some AP tonight as well, I only have about 4g left of the 130g batch I made half a week after my tests.

I'll do another 500g charge to see if there is any difference this time. I never dried any of the AN I've used for APAN so it can't be that that has caused your problems. The only thing I can think of would be that the APAN hasn't been mixed well enaugh.

I think I'll let the APAN mix in a mill for an hour or so to assure that it has benn properly mixed, without the balls of course <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

[mr.evil]

i've just extracted some AN from fertilizer(Pretty Shitty work!) later this week i will make some AP(i don't have any Acetone anymore, but it isn't a problem to get it) :)

but anyway, how much APAN would be necessary to Detonate ANFO? is there an critical diameter for the APAN? what would be the Det. VoD for APAN? :confused:

Cya

<small>[ April 04, 2002, 11:07 AM: Message edited by: mr.evil ]</small>

[DBSP]

Since I'm getting a large ammount of AN tomorrow I could make some ANFO as well and test that later this weekend. I just realised that I didn't have so much acetone as I thought(only 200ml) so there is a chance that I can't make a 500g charge, but I'll buy some acetone as well tomorrow so the ANFO test should be possible to carry out.

[Mick]

mr evil, how do you extract your AN from fetillizer?

i use AN fertillizer as well, and i must admit i have never bothered to extract the AN out, i just grind it up and use it, coating and all.

i wonder if when making large charges (500g+) if it needs to be pure..

[DBSP]

The AN I'll buy is fertiliser with some impurities in it but I don't think that it will effect the explosive that much. Purifying AN is easy but still a pain in the ass. First you dissolve the AN in water or other cheap solvent then you filter off the insuluble additives and then you boil the remaining water off..it sound easy but it's very much work.

If the impurities would affect the explosive it shurely would be greater in small ammounts that in large.

[mr.evil]

I put some fertilizer(brown balls, wich is chalk and Ammonium nitrate)
in a bucket, than i put some hot water to it... stir a while until all the balls has dissolved..now let it stand for a while, i guess about 1 hour(somethimes it takes longer, maybe 2 hours).
Than i take off the liquid, and leaving behind the Brown, mud(like durt)... then i boil it down, well not really boiling but just heating to vaporize the water. When a White-Yellow mud is formed, i stop heating(otherwise you'll get NO2 fumes, and it will go bubbling and stuff.. i had this once, everything was splattered to the walls :rolleyes: next; i let the NH4NO3 dry in an oven, don't heat it above 40degrees, otherwise it will melt... squeese clumps.
Than, after a while you got your dry AN. becarefull with it, as you know it is very hygroscopic, it will fuck up in no time! :(
Anyway, This is Really long work!

Mick; For what purposes do you use your AN? i think unpure AN wouldn't work in Explosives... at least that's what i think.

Cya

[Zambosan]

When you say 40 degrees, do you mean centigrade? Have pity on us poor, backward americans that don't deal with the metric system all the time. :)

<small>[ July 18, 2002, 01:28 AM: Message edited by: Zambosan ]</small>

[DBSP]

He means centigrades. How did you get NO2 vapours? I've boiled partially melted AN without any NO2. It won't melt from 40 degrees I dry my AN at 75 degrees in the oven. I dissolved some AN from coldpacks and there was some impurities in it but it hasn't effected the explosive, at least I haven't noticed.

[mr.evil]

well, there were some warm, suger tasty fumes... i guess it was NO2.(maybe i can breath something, than i will know if it's NO2 <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> )

first my AN was kinda yellow, after drying it in the oven, it becomed nice and white...(very fine powder)

Cya

[mark]

I will be heating my AN in the oven soon. How long do I leave it in? How do I know if its recrystalised? Also, how hydroscopic is AN? Will it gain moisture imediatley from me opeing the bag?

[mr.evil]

Hey,
well, i dry my AN until it's done, i mean; when there are no more clumps and it is a fine, white powder.
Do you extract your AN from fertilizer? or from instant cold packs?
AN is very hygroscopic to me, if you are laying some of it on a piece of paper for a few days, the paper will be very foggy and you AN will be fucked up... just store it into jars with some 'balls' toilet paper, or ziplock bags, they work well..

Cya

[mark]

Mines from cold packs. I was just wondering if it would obsorb moisture from the air while I was mixing in the AP.

[mr.evil]

Hey,
well, i don't know exactly, i think you just have to do it quickly(i mean, not mix it, and let it stand in open air for a few hours...)
but don't worry, it will take a while before it's really foggy...

how much did you paid for those cold packs? where did you get thim?(my AN is about 95% pure, i want soms 99,9%)

Cya

[DBSP]

The AN should probably be kept in the oven for about 3h @ 75 degrees.
That shuld be enaugh to get it dry. Anyway I weighted my AP a few minutes ago, 119g half wet. SO it shuld be enaugh for 1/2 kg.

The AN will start drawing misture from the air the seconf it's exposed to it, but it won't be spoiled emediately.

Edit: got my AN half an hour ago. It's fertiliser grade AN and has a brown color. It contains some MgCO3, the bag says 3% Mg wich leads me to think it's MgCO3. Anyway I've just pulverised 0,5 kg of it. I'm just waiting for the AP to fully dry.

I'm not shure how it will effect the explosive but I'll give it a try. I think I'll go for a 5gAP/2gTNP det.

<small>[ April 05, 2002, 05:58 AM: Message edited by: DBSP ]</small>

[DBSP]

I tried detonating the 500g charge half an hour ago.

I got 50kg of AN and 25kg of Ca(NO3)2 erlier today. The AN was fertiliser grade and had some MgCO3 added to it. I pulverised it and mixed it with the AP in a mill for half an hour, you could clearly see that it was properly mixed since there was lots off small glittering crystals throughout the charge. The crystals was easier to see since the AN was brown.

I had the charge contained in a paper-pipe about 50mm in diameter.
I had 2g of TNP and 10g of AP as det in a film can. At the blast site I dumped it into a river about 1,5m deep. I waited and waited and then my buddy said "it wont go" 1 second later kabooom :) . One hell of a bang. It cant have been anything but a full detonation. This is my secand 500g charge of 10% APAN and both have fully detonated. I haven't got a clue to what the problems is with your charges. I think that you need a proper det though.

What kind of dets did you have?

[mr.evil]

this morning i detonated succesfully an 100gram charge, it worked great! (to bad i don't have any pics, because i don't have an digital cam :()

DBSP, did you used your AN right from the pack?

[DBSP]

Yes I used it straight from the pack, no drying, no purifying, no nothing just pulverised it and mixed it.

What kind of det did you have mr.evil?

[mr.evil]

WOW! that's pretty cool! i must extract my An first from the fertilizer because it contains large quantaties off Potassium oxide, chalk and Phosporic acid...

where did you buyed your AN?

my detonation was really loud, i think it was an complete one...

[DBSP]

I bought my AN from lantmännen it's a swedish chain of agricultural suppliers. I thought that the additives would ruin my APAN but since it wasn't to much of it it worked.

[Mick]

hmm, my AN fertilizer is white, not brown...i wonder what sort of coating it has on it..it doesn't say on the bag anywhere.
when i grind it up and put it in water for AN + paper smoke bombs, there is usualy very little sediment at the bottom.

hmm, i think i just fucked my 500g charge up, i don't think it had anything to do with the coating.

[DBSP]

What kind of det did you have? I've asked many times without any replies. I think the failiers are caused because of a to weak det.

[rikkitikkitavi]

DBSP, It was pure AN (fertilizer grade)you bought ?

How much did you pay for a 50 kg sack?

/rickard

<small>[ April 06, 2002, 01:39 AM: Message edited by: rikkitikkitavi ]</small>

[DBSP]

I paid 184 Skr for it or 18,4$.

I was thinking a little bit yesterday. Perhaps you could make similar composition with CN, what do you think? It could be fun to try.

[rikkitikkitavi]

If you refer to CN as calcium nitrate I remember this being covered here at the forum, and if I remember it correctlu the conclusion was that calcium nitrate based -fuel oil oxidizer sucked! Less power than ANFO and less sensitive=> probably not worth trying calcium nitrate-AP
CNAP ?

thanks for the info. I had problems aquiring AN , but the problem was that they only wanted to sell in big-bags! WTF should I do with 500 kg
AN ? :D

/rickard

[Yi]

Heheh. How much was the 500kg bag?

[mr.evil]

Hey,
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">I got 50kg of AN and 25kg of Ca(NO3)2 erlier today. The AN was fertiliser grade and had some MgCO3 added to it. I pulverised it and mixed it with the AP in a mill for half an hour, you could clearly see that it was properly mixed since there was lots off small glittering crystals throughout the charge. The crystals was easier to see since the AN was brown.

</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">read the posts first eh? :)

[DBSP]

Rickard did you check lantmännen? Since there is a lot of agricultural suppliers down the south you shuld be able to find someone that sell smaller bags. Otherwise maby you could buy it directly from a farmer or something, say that you don't need the big bags lantm.. sells and you want to buy a smaller ammount,some 50kg or something.

The AN the farmes have is purer the the stuff lantm.. sells, last summer I got 2,5 kg from a friend who is a farmer that AN was purer then the AN I got yesterday.

<small>[ April 06, 2002, 08:54 AM: Message edited by: DBSP ]</small>

[mark]

I tried my first batch of APAN today. It was made with 3/4 of a tsp of AP and 2 and 1/2 tsp of AN. I mixixed it otgether pretty thouroughly for about a minite, and put the charge into a baloon. I tried to set it off with about a 22 sized amount of pressed AP. It sucked, only the det went off.

[vonK]

I made up 50g of APAN(5g/45g) yesterday using AN extracted from rose fertiliser.
I half filled a small ziplock bag with 20g of the APAN and then tapped a .22 shell filled with compressed CTAP to it.
I'm fairly sure the whole thing detonated. It was hard to judge by the size of the crater because I put it on a pile of grass clippings but they were spread everywhere and the sound was a deep "BOOM" rather than the sharp "CRACK" that CTAP makes on it's own.

[tango]

This kind of the wrong section to ask this but .... Vonk could you plz give the name/brand of the AN fertilizer you got, and where you got it. Because im having trouble finding AN in around my area.
thanks

<small>[ April 08, 2002, 09:56 PM: Message edited by: tango ]</small>

[nbk2000]

You can hardly expect 3 teaspoons worth of APAN to be a significant explosion. Try it with a pound and see if it's still just the detonator.

[mark]

But that much AP would have done alot more the the bucket underwater. Do you sugest any perticular container for small charges like mine?

[nbk2000]

DBSP:
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica"> I pulverised it (AN) and mixed it with the AP in a mill for half an hour... </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica"><img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="eek.gif" />

Am I reading this correctly?! You ball-milled acetone peroxide?!!

[mr.evil]

i think i milled it without balls..otherwise you will be very stupid!(as AP is so super unstable) :rolleyes:

[nbk2000]

Either that, or he's Mihoshi lucky.

[vonK]

I actually extracted my NH4NO3 from Nitrophoska rose fertiliser. It contains 12% nitrogen which is all from NH4NO3 so that means the fertiliser is 25% NH4NO3. The other main ingreadiant is K2SO4.
I poured a heap of fertiliser into a pyrex bowl, added a 500ml of water and boiled it while stirring. I then filttered the solution, threw away the residue and repeated the process using the filtrate to extract more NH4NO3.
After filtering a second time I put the filtrate in the freezzer. When no more crystals precipitated out I filtered it again then put the fitrate in a pot and boiled it on the stove untill there was a thick crust of crystals around the edge. Next I put the pot in the oven on fan bake at 100C untill there was no water left.
I then scraped the crystals out of the pot, put them on oven paper and baked them at 70C for three hours.
It was a very long process but it worked, I got about 100g of NH4NO3 at the end.

You can also buy Ammonium Nitrate from large fertiliser supply places like Veg-Grow for instance where it is packaged in 25Kg bags but sold in hundreds of kilos.
My Judo instructor works at a Veg-Grow and was going to get me some from a spilt bag, but he's a Britt and the kind of guy who spends his evenings brawling in back country pubs, he's not very reliable.

Instant cold packs are sold in NZ but are very expensive. I bought one just this afternoon, it cost me $9.70 and appears to contain around 100g. It was made by Ace and imported from Canada, which probably explains why it cost so much.

I have also made it through a double decomposition reaction (?) between ammonium sulfate and sodium nitrate.

So there you go, take your pick.
Kurt.

[Yi]

Mark, try using film containers and a small det. 0.5g HMTD is enough.
If you have a film canister full of APAN with a stand-off, like in a shaped charge, it imprints the pattern at the bottom of the can onto metal :) Pictures (& vid)coming up...

[DBSP]

NBK: I'm not stupid enaugh to mill it with the balls in it, I simply ran it in the mill assure that it was proper mixed.
I don't have any balls for it actually!!

[mr.evil]

Hello,
You can buy lead balls from hunting suppliers, they use it as bullets(duh)

[DBSP]

I haven't bothered to get any balls since I don't have any use for a mill anyway.. DUHH

I have things to make somet balls if I need them.

And I couldn't buy those round lead bullets since noone has any mussle loaders here since you aren't allowed to hunt with them.

[mark]

<img src="http://www.paintballresource.org/ubb/userpics/174.jpg" alt="" />

Oh my goodness! I detonated 3 tsp of ANAP, and boy am I happy! I should have had more than 1 gallon buckets. The charge was inside the finger of a latex glove, and I used a det twice the size and milled the ANAP without balls.

[Madog555]

cool, looks like it worked very well.

[mark]

Shure did! I t was the biggest HE charge Ive ever lit(pretty sad compared to what you guys do) but I was in a state of awe when the thing went off. I thank all of you guys for your help in my experiments.

Btw, if anyone has a scale, would you mind weighing two things for me? Id like to know how much 3/4 of a tsp of uncompressed AP weighs and how much 2 and 1/2 tsp of uncompressed AN powder weigh. Id like to know to see if I should adjust my ratios.

[Chris Shiherlis]

Mixing primary explosives with secundary explosives using a mill :) .
There's two possibilities: you are suicidal or just plain stupid/ignorant.
We only have to wait till some other fool comes up with the splendid idea to use some other primary or secondary explosive and blow himself up! (Hey guys, don't have AP and I'm to stupid to make it, but will try mercuryfulminate with PETN, sounds great or what I'll set off a big charge tonight....... :) )
The only reason this didn't happen already is pure luck, because this AP/AN mixture behaves not as one would expect.
It seems reasonably safe. It doesn't detonate by flame or friction, which almost any other mixture would! A single detonating crystal of primary can be sufficient to set of a secondary explosive!! (a few milligrams of leadazide will initiate TNT!).

The only reason this doesn't happen with AP/AN is that single crystals of AP don't detonate by flame or friction, it needs confinement. And ammoniumnitrate is a very insensitive explosive. But please don't try it with other ones. Chances that it will explode in your face or far more greater than that it won't.

But luck or not, I have to admit this AP/AN mixture is a very nice explosive. Cheap, easy available ingredients, easy to handle, cap sensitive. So congrats. And stay alive.

<small>[ April 10, 2002, 06:52 AM: Message edited by: Chris Shiherlis ]</small>

[Yi]

Mark if you live in the UK you can get scales that are +/- 1g and range up to 3kg from argos for ~£15.

[DBSP]

Chris AN isn't a secondary! It is a BINARY explosive and a bitch to set off. So even if some crystals would go off the AN won't.

An example of the insensitivity of AN is a thing I gave a try the other day, I just did it because I was bored and have a shitload of AN. I made a mix of some rubber cleaner(nasty thing) and AN in 5:95 ratio. I tried to detonate it with 120g of ANNM but the AN only got compressed into the bottom of the container. Tis shows how sensitive the AN is. So it might take some crysals of AP to set it off. It detonates easier when it's mixed intimately with the AP. The big risk isn't some single crystals detonating, it's the risk that the AP crystals might detonate another crystal and so on.

[mark]

Unfortunatley, in the US, or more specifacly california, gram sensitive scales are clasified as drug parifanilia, so acces to them is limited.

I did, however, manage to borrow a ounce sesitive scale, and weighed my coldpacks AN. For $2.50, I got 168 grams of AN. :)

[vonK]

I've just mixed up 50g of APAN but unfortunately my CTAP wasn't completley dry and now the APAN is damp.
I was wondering how safe it is to dry this stuff in the oven.

Thanks
Kurt.

[firebreether]

thats a good price, i remember the one time i saw instant cold packs in my local drug store they were 14 bucks for a two pack and i was like whoa !!! hell no!! i bet when i go to wlmart sometime though theyd be about that price that you have

[nbk2000]

Dry it in the oven and you're not going to have an oven any longer.

Put it in a funnel, pour some cold, dried, methanol over it, and spread it out on a plate in the sun with a fan blowing on it. This assumes it's not humid outside, otherwise you're back where you started.

[vonK]

Thanks for the advice.
I was rather worried about the oven so i attached a heat lamp to an extension cord and dried it outside under that, no problems.
I must say I am very impressed with this mix. I'd always dismissed ammonium nitrate based explosives as to insensitive (and I can't get nitromethane) but this stuff is great.
I used 1g of pressed CTAP to detonate 40g of APAN and blew a stump in our backyard to bits, you should see the grin on my face :D .
I've got it on video, unfortunately the recorder isn't digital. Does anyone know a way to get around this problem.

Kurt.

[Yi]

If you have a television capture card on your pc you should be able to record it.

Those cold packs are quite good, the prills work unpurified and because of the coating are less hydroscopic than pure crystals. I had some powdered prills from 2 different makes of cold pack (one being pure) and the powder from the co-op pack was drier. BTW be careful when cutting them open so the bag of water doesn't break :p

Damp APAN should work as long as its not wet (obviously not aswell).

[Chris Shiherlis]

AN is a secondary explosive. Only very hard to detonate, even when sensitised with fuel oil or other additives. But pure AN can be detonated but this is never done (although it happened once by accident when a ship loaded with tonnes of AN fertilizer exploded). And AN isn't a binary explosive. Binary explosives are mixtures of two explosive components so a mixture of AN with another explosive substance like NM is called a binary explosive. And a binary explosive is always a secondary explosive, but not vice versa. Get it?
And this new interesting AP/AN mixture is just one of the very few exceptions to the rule, so it's luck you all survived.
That you get a capsensitive AN mixture when you mix it with a few percent of AP only proove that. Since pure AN needs normally a LOT of confinement and booster to detonate.

[mark]

I love ANAP!! I set off amother finger of it today, ecept this time it was in a hole filled with water. It went off with a loveley thud and sent a nice jet of water like 35 feet in the air. It rained down for a couple of seconds too. Not only that, but my neighbor witnesssed the whole thing and I found out he like fireworks!

[DBSP]

Not really related to APAN but still.

Today when I had absolutely nothing to do I wieghted my last grams of AP(leftovers from the APAN tests). I thought I'd try some CNAP. I pulverised some CN and mixed 3g of AP with 30g of CN. I put my last two grams of AP in a paper tube, snapped a cracker at the middel and put it in the tube. Taped the hole shit together lit the fuse and went away. To my great suprise it went off. :) I had put it on an old oil drum and it made a hole about 15-20cm wide. I'm not shure if it all detonated but I couldn't find any powder left and I don't think that 2g of AP in a thin paper tube would make such a hole.

I have the audio if anyone wants it. I can't uppload it to the ftp since it's offline and I can't uppload it to my home page since it's a forbidden format. I can mail it though.

[mark]

hey what is cn?

[nbk2000]

Calcium Nitrate fertilizer.

OR

Chloracetophenone tear gas.

Depending on the context. In this case it's the fertilizer. That may be clearer if it's abbreviated as CaN, instead of CN.

[mark]

Could someone please weigh 1 tsp of uncompressed AP and 2 and 1/2 tsp of AN? I had enother charge fail to go off today and i think it might be my rations. It would be a huge help if some one would do this for me. Thanks.

[kingspaz]

mark, you REALLY should invest in some cheap diet scales or make a mass balance. it makes things ALOT more reliable, i know i used to do stuff by volume and wondered why nothin worked properly. soon as i started using scales to weigh chmicals everything worked fine :)

[mark]

Umm, does GNC sell gram sensitive scales? Its all ounces and pounds on the scales I see in stores. Ans isnce you have a scale at the moment, is there anny chance you could weigh those chems by volume? :) Please? :)

[DBSP]

I know this isn't related to APAN but I don't think it's worth starting a new topic for it.

I made another CaNAP test today. I detonated 100g about 0.4m under
water. It went off real nice. I think that this explosive is under estimated. I haven't compared it with APAN yet but I will.

I've got the audio of this one too I'll put it ut as soon as I can.

[kingspaz]

mark, i don't have gram sensitive scales, i can't afford them!
i use cheap diet scales which measure in 5g intervals. they cost me £2 which means if i spill chemicals on them its no big deal since they are cheap. have a look around on the internet.
<a href="http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=diet+scales&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&meta=" target="_blank">http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=diet+scales&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&meta=</a>

[DBSP]

I've put the audio up now. You'll have to excuse the bad quality, I've done my best.

30g <a href="http://w1.478.telia.com/~u47804009/E&W/Sounds/30g_CaNAP_by_DBSP.wav" target="_blank">HERE</a>
100g(under 0,4m of water) <a href="http://w1.478.telia.com/~u47804009/E&W/Sounds/100g_CaNAP_by_DBSP.wav" target="_blank">HERE</a>

If anyone else has access to CaN I'd apriciate if you'd test this one as well.

<small>[ April 21, 2002, 04:04 PM: Message edited by: DBSP ]</small>

[mr.evil]

DBSP,
Good job :) i can feel the shockwave thru my stereo :D (i've connected my PC to my stereo boxes)

What's wrong with the quality? i play them in winamp, good sound.

[Guerilla]

Hey,

I had a dream yesterday, and in that dream I made 138g charge of APAN. It was 10% so I mixed 13g ap to 125g AN. I packed it in a tin can. I used 4 grams of ap as a blasting cap, it was placed in a aluminum pipe in the middle of APAN can.

I placed the can in a old stump and lit the fuse. I was at a distance of 25 meters with the cam when it went off.

I could easily felt how strong the shockwave was...

<a href="http://www.voimakentta.net/apan.mpg" target="_blank">Here it goes</a>

Well.. what do you think about it?

<small>[ April 22, 2002, 12:35 PM: Message edited by: megalomania ]</small>

[Demolition]

Thats sweet. :D
You can see the shockwave hit the trees to the right of the stump. :) Very nice. :p
Its a real nice quality video too. :cool:

[DBSP]

Poor stump :p Haha he had it comming.

Ok seriously, good work. I wish I had a video camera, so much more fun.

Thats 138g, emagine half a kilo above ground.
This summer I'm going up north on my holiday and there at some places there are more than 100km to the nearest house. There you can set some big things off. I was thinking of APAN but I don't want to have 300g of AP in the car so I'll go for ANFO with a ANNM booster which means that I only need some 10g of AP for the det. Maby a 5kg charge, that would be lovely.

Guerilla how long was it to the nearest house from the det site?

[xoo1246]

Remove

<small>[ December 11, 2002, 12:22 PM: Message edited by: xoo1246 ]</small>

[DBSP]

Xoo you didn't happen to get any pics did you?? And how far from home where you with the blast, half a kilo ANNM is LOUD! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> :D My brother heard the 100g CaNAP charge which was under 0,4m of water 2,5-3km from home quite well.

Our woods are practically the same as the ones in finnland.

I've found the N28(fertiliser grade AN) bitchy to set off as it is(except with APAN and ANNM). I'm working on making a sutible composition so that you can skip the purification of the N28.

[xoo1246]

Remove

<small>[ December 11, 2002, 12:24 PM: Message edited by: xoo1246 ]</small>

[Madog555]

Great work guerilla!! that seemed to have worked very nicely :D

[Mick]

as far as transporting APAN goes, i think its pretty good. providing of course that your AN is completely dry and in air tight container.

i made a 300g charge of 15% APAN 1 week before i went on holidays, i stored it in a gatorade bottle with the lid siliconed on.
then a week later i transported the bottle 600kms in the car(thankfully it was at 3 in the morning, so it was nice and cool)
then it sat for another week on a shelf.
on my last day, when i finaly got to set the charge off, i cut the silicone and opened it up to put in the detonator the AN was still completely dry.
i put the 16g AP detonator in and then took a walk down to the beach and set it off.

its a funny story acctualy, i threw the charge in the water expecting it sink to the bottom - which it did.
but when i touched the wire on the battery, it turns out the charge hadn't sunk and had infact floated to the surface and then the waves had washed it over to me.
so when the charge went off it was only 5-6 metres away from me.
needless to say i got a very big surprise when all if a sudden it felt like someone had hit my whole left hand side with a sledge hammer.

anyways, back to transporting
i think it all boils down to what your comfortable with.
you could always make the AP and AN seperate and transport them in diferent containers, then combine them when you need them.
it also depends when your traveling too, like it would be quite stupid to transport 500g charge of APAN(or any other explosive, primary or secondary) in the middle of the day, in a hot car boot. on the other hand you could probably get away with transporting the same charge in the middle of the night when its nice and cool.

[DBSP]

I also felt like dreaming taday so about an hour ago I made some 350g of APAN and drove off to the river. I then lit the fuse and threw it into the river then I turned the recorder on and waited and then kablouumt. It was quite deep, maby 1,5m so the sound wasn't very loud. It was very nice though a really deep boom and then the water lifted some 40cm and turned all white. I had the charge confined in a paper tube from an old firework case and I had a shotgun shell full of AP as det, I found out that my fuse fits perfectly into the primer hole. The density of the charge was 1,3g/cc.

And the <a href="http://w1.478.telia.com/~u47804009/E&W/Sounds/350g_APAN_by_DBSP.wav" target="_blank">AUDIO</a> I fucked up and stood to far away so the sound isn't very loud.

I allso think that it's quite safe transporting APAN but I just don't feel like driving 1000km with 3kg of it in the trunk. I'd like something safer and I can't think of anything safer than ANFO.

[Guerilla]

I'm glad that you all liked my video... :)

i think the nearest house was about 3km away from the det site.

i'll be back with ANNM :D

[mark]

Hey guerilla I loved your video! Trully awsome. Now, had you suspended the camera say 50 feet directly above the charge going off, now that would be trully perfect. Good work.

Also, DBSP, how does the CNAP comepare in power to ANAP? How does it compare in initiability?

[mark]

I will be conducting an APAN test tomorrow. Here are the pictures of the unfilled charge.

The det
<img src="http://www.paintballresource.org/ubb/userpics/247.jpg" alt="" />

The empty charge container
<img src="http://www.paintballresource.org/ubb/userpics/246.jpg" alt="" />

<small>[ April 22, 2002, 08:38 PM: Message edited by: mark ]</small>

[Rat Bastard]

Guerilla , that was the best amateur pyro clip I have ever seen. Thank you for the great quality!

----
Now I don't want to sound a little n00b-ish but I'd like to know a little more info about AP blasting caps. I have made AP (and YES I do wash it with bicarb solution!) I have seen quite a few posts mentioning caps, but no really in-depth info. I know vaugeness can lead to accidents and nickname me "stumpy".

My hobby is all low-order, and I just would like to get a start on high-order, and I need a little info & tips.

<small>[ April 23, 2002, 02:44 AM: Message edited by: Rat Bastard ]</small>

[DBSP]

Mick: I haven't done any simoltanius tests with CaNAP and APAN so I can't be shure. They are comparable in initiating sensitivity. I've set them off with 2-2,5g of AP and no one has failed. I have however used larger dets for my larger charges just to make shure. I will test the CaNAP and APAN more closely to figure out the differenses. One I can think of right now is that the CaNAP is more hygroscopic.
The CaNAP shuld have a lower VOD but I'm not shure about that one.
How much APAN can you get into that container?

Rat Bastard: B-cpas are very easy to make with AP. I've never had any problems making them. If you want one that is reliable and detonates most things just cut a PVC pipe into pipes meassuring about 60mm in length and 15mm in diameter. Fill them with AP, you need to press the AP but not extremely much, if you press with something like a pencil it's about enaugh to press untill you feel some resistans. It's not supposed be be a lose powder. I belive you can find all info about safety somewhere around. One last thing try not to scrape the pressing rod agains the walls of the cap to avoid friction.

[xoo1246]

Remove

<small>[ December 11, 2002, 12:26 PM: Message edited by: xoo1246 ]</small>

[DBSP]

HMTD might be better in caps because the HMTD seems to be easier to press since the powder allmost cling together when it is pressed, not like AP wich doesn't like being compressed and allmost resists itself.

[Zambosan]

I think it's an amorphous powder.

<small>[ July 18, 2002, 01:21 AM: Message edited by: Zambosan ]</small>

[Madog555]

mark, you use electrical ignition?

are you gonna take pics of the effects of that charge?

is that cap a piece of pen? i have used the same thing several times.

[Pu239 Stuchtiger]

This may have already been said, but I haven't been reading this thread and don't have time to. :)

Acetone peroxide / ammonium nitrate mixes are not much safer than straight acetone peroxide. Much less flame sensitive, but essentially just as shock sensitive. I wouldn't be caught fooling around with large acetone peroxide / ammonium nitrate charges.

[kingspaz]

Pu, have you actually made any and experimented with any?
you shouldn't assume things. if you have experimented then thats fair enough but if you haven't you shouldn't assume its properties.

[mark]

Madog, this is my first electrical ignition. I wanted to bury my charge this time, and a foot and a half of visco would take to long for my nerves. And yes, that is a pen tube. And yes, I have the pictures of what the charge did.

This is the before picture. The charge has been burried about 1 foot and a 1/4 under whet mud and potting soil.

<img src="http://www.paintballresource.org/ubb/userpics/252.jpg" alt="" />
<img src="http://www.paintballresource.org/ubb/userpics/251.jpg" alt="" />

<small>[ April 23, 2002, 08:34 PM: Message edited by: mark ]</small>

[Madog555]

NICE PICS!!!

what did you use as a e-match? rocket igniter? homeade?

[Pu239 Stuchtiger]

No, I have not experimented with it. However, when I consider the chemistry of that explosive, it strikes me as frighteningly dangerous for use in large charges. Its lack of sensitivity to flame is deceptive. It is nearly as shock sensitive. Why?

It seems 10% acetone peroxide, 90% ammonium nitrate is a popular ratio for "APAN" mixes here.

Pretend you have 100g of "APAN". That would be 10g of acetone peroxide, 90g of ammonium nitrate. Now pretend that 100 "units of pressure" are applied to your 100g of "APAN". The 10g of acetone peroxide is going to pick up 10 "units of pressure". So, each gram of acetone peroxide receives one "unit of pressure".

Pretend you have 100g of acetone peroxide. Now pretend that 100 "units of pressure" is applied to that 100g of acetone peroxide. Each gram of acetone peroxide receives one "unit of pressure".

It should be clear now. Also, keep in mind that ammonium nitrate is acidic...

[mark]

Thanks madog <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> I used an $1.15 pyroteck rocket ignitor and my handy lantern battery to set it off. This will be my last charge for a while, as its just to stress full messing with HEs.

Um, Pu, will you clarify your post? Im not good with imagination. Do you mean that the 10 grams of AP, that is intimitley mixed in the amonium nitrate, will detonate and set off the remainding charge?

[Pu239 Stuchtiger]

I was trying to illustrate that "ANAP" should be as shock sensitive as straight acetone peroxide.

[xoo1246]

I wouldn't trust ANAP either, have you tried hitting it with a hammer, when dry and maybe when you have had it exposed to the moisture of the air?

[10fingers]

Secondary explosives and detonators are never kept together for safety reasons.
When you mix a primary like AP and a secondary like AN what you are doing is carrying around a high explosive with a detonator in it. Maybe even more dangerous because a detonator is in a metal case and is somewhat protected from shock, friction, static etc.
That fact that it detonates so easily is an indication of how sensitive it is. Really not too safe you guys.

[Zambosan]

I'm not asserting that APAN is safe, but Pu239, I think your argument is somewhat flawed.

<small>[ July 18, 2002, 01:20 AM: Message edited by: Zambosan ]</small>

[Yi]

How would ammonium nitrate be acidic??? It is certainly not acidic. Its a salt. Can anyone correct this if it is wrong?

[xoo1246]

Remove

<small>[ December 11, 2002, 12:29 PM: Message edited by: xoo1246 ]</small>

[firebreether]

AN is acidic in solution, because the NH4+ ion will dissociate accoarding to its Ka into H+ and NH3 ie, NH4+ <=> NH3 + H+, because H+ is strong acid (duh) and NH3 is a weak base , its slightly acidic in solution. But the salt is neither acidic nor basic because the are no H+ or OH- in the AN.
Also, going back to before, AN is hygroscopic, so it will absorb water from the air, so wouldnt the moisture picked up sort of negate the sensitivity of the AP? If you left it sitting out in the open for a bit enough i guess.

[DBSP]

I shot 13g of APAN today with my 22LR from about 5m. It didn't go off. It wasn't a very large ammount though, if I have time I'll try shooting 50g tomorrow. I couldn't test anything large since I couldn't get enaugh far away today. I might shoot it with my 8x57JS as well, 2955 joules at 50m.

[Pu239 Stuchtiger]

Zambosan: Yes, that's the problem with linear equations and simplistic mathematical models. The acetone peroxide in 10% acetone peroxide / 99% ammonium nitrate composition would be just as likely to decompose as the acetone peroxide in a 1% acetone peroxide / 99.9% ammonium nitrate composition. That is what I meant by sensitivity. :) However, since ammonium nitrate is so exceedingly insensitive, "ANAP" mixes containing 1% acetone peroxide would not be as likely to detonate from shock as an "ANAP" mix containing 10% acetone peroxide. That is because the acetone peroxide becomes sparsely spread; an so, when a single crystal of acetone peroxide decomposes (in an "ANAP" composition containing little acetone peroxide) the shockwave and energy released will mostly be absorbed by the ammonium nitrate, which is insensitive (and so probably won't decompose); instead of shocking other acetone peroxide crystals (in an "ANAP" composition containing a fair amount of acetone peroxide), causing them to detonate, therefore causing the "ANAP" mix to detonate.

Even without any of these thoughts and without utilizing chemistry knowledge, I still would consider mixing a primary explosive with a high explosive, and using large charges of that mix to be a death wish.

[kingspaz]

yes, i do agree with you Pu. i'm trying to make it clear i wasn;t disagreeing with you before <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> .
i agree that the acidity of ammonium nitrate is just asking for trouble.
BUT, if people insist on mixing primaries with secondaries, what about:

10% HMTD
90% KClO3

like KClO3 and wax but HMTD instead, should make an easily detonable mix but with less risk.

[mark]

But many of us, or atleast I, lack either of those chemicals.

[Madog555]

i also agree with Pu.

Mark i think maybe TNP would be good for you, you can use AN for nitration...

[Pu239 Stuchtiger]

I would be very worried if I had a KClO3 / HMTD mix. Powerful, unstable oxidizer, mixed with an unstable powerful reducer/oxidizer... Go ahead and give it a whirl, if you like, but I would start with very small amounts and carry out scientific sensitivity tests. Personally, I don't plan on ever using such a composition.

[Rat Bastard]

<img src="http://members.shaw.ca/raydawg/pics/kcl03.jpg" alt="" />

I got some KCLO3, should I make any of the stuff?

<small>[ April 24, 2002, 07:18 PM: Message edited by: Rat Bastard ]</small>

[mark]

Yes madogg, I probobly could do that, ecept that I find synthesising AP to be nerve wracking. The addition of heating and poisonous gas is not a welcomed one for me. Also, its just not my type of explosive. Its incredibly bristant, when Im looking for a grunter, and its toxic, when Im looking for playdoh. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> THanks anyway though

[Project IGI]

Rat, where did you get the Potassium Chlorate from?

[Madog555]

umm, if your going to use a chlorate bassed HE i think rack-a-rock is best, its powerful safe and pretty easy to make. it is way better than the vaseline/KClO3.

Rack-A-Rock is a mix of 10% mononitrotoluene/ 90% KClO3 or KClO4.

mononitrobenzene, mononitroxylene or mononitronapthalene will work too, perhaps even better.

i wrote up a PDF on this, it was on the FTP but the FTP is gone now, i can upload it to a server somewhere when i get the chance if someone wants me to.

[Al Koholic]

Madog555, would you load it up to my server please? You can email me for account info and pwd, ip etc. My email is junk_7@yahoo.com

[DBSP]

I shot a 50g APAN charge with my 22 today from about 20m. It did go off but only partially. There was loads of powder left from it. I had a 3g AP cracker with me wich I set off after I shot the APAN. That boom was about ten times the APAN. I think it is safer than you might think. I belive that only the APAN around the place the bullet hit went off dispersing the rest of the powder into the air. And about the acidity of the AN I don't think that it shuld a great problem as long as your AN is completely dry. I belive that there are people here that doesn't wash their AP very carefully and yet I haven't heard of any accidental detonation of AP. So if your AP is carefully washed and your AN is dry it shuldn't be a problem.

I belive that the AN cusions the AP when it is exposed to mechanical force. And the fact that is a powder means that it allso compresses quite alot untill it has reached maximum density.

I've been thinking a lot about thinkable mixes with AN that shuld be reasonably sensitive but still safe. One Idea is mixing it with UN (urea nitrate). Since you can make UN without hard to get acids it's allso easy to find the chems for it(HCl+NH4NO3+CH4N2O).
Btw how sensitive is UN?

A nother one would as someone said be AN and mononitronaphtalene. Can you make MNN with HCl or do you need H2SO4?
And the one described in KIFE, AN and MMAN. One big problem would be the extremely hygroscopic MMAN. It is quite hard to detonate too. But it's very easy to make. I still have some, so I might try this one.

<small>[ April 25, 2002, 12:50 PM: Message edited by: DBSP ]</small>

[Madog555]

you have KIFE?!?! can you please upload a copy onto a server or something, that book is very hard to get.

i tried AN/MNT but it didn't work too well because the AN had some moisture. i think i will soon try it again

look at Mr. Cool's page for a recipe for MNN, i think H2SO4 is needed to make MNN but i think useing HCl would be worth a try.

[DBSP]

I have KIFE on one of Xoo1246s ftp:s, you are welcome to download it. <a href="http://w1.478.telia.com/~u47804009/E&W" target="_blank">Look in E&W</a>

I know of the method for MNN on Mr Cools page, I just wondered because I need the little sulfuric acid I have for better things.
And if you are going to make larger quantities lots of sulfuric is needed. HCl is very inexpensive so that would be nice if you could use it instead.

I read the topic urea nitrate and nirourea agai..., and it seemes to a lot more sensitive than AN so it might be a sensitiser to think of.
It wouldn't have the cap sensitivity of APAN though so you'd probably need a bigger cap. I wonder what ratios? Not 90:10 maby 75:25??

<small>[ April 25, 2002, 03:27 PM: Message edited by: DBSP ]</small>

[Pu239 Stuchtiger]

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">I belive that there are people here that doesn't wash their AP very carefully and yet I haven't heard of any accidental detonation of AP.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica">Dead people don't talk.

[Demolition]

It's the same for people without hands and/or fingers who can't type. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="frown.gif" />

<small>[ April 28, 2002, 11:41 PM: Message edited by: Demolition ]</small>

[Chris Shiherlis]

I already congratulated you guys for inventing this new explosive. Although at first I very much doubted it was safe (for good reasons). But by now I tend to believe this APAN mixture is reasonably safe (or at least not as unsafe as I assumed). According to the tests conducted by you guys it is not flame sensitive, not really friction sensitive (apparently you can mix and grind it in a ball mill :) ), and it's even impact insensitive by bullets.

So now that is more or less established (we need more tests for that to be sure, because grinding it one time and survive doesn't mean you will survive a second time) we can truly call it a new explosive mixture which is easy to make, with readily available materials and most importantly: you don't need the expensive and more difficult to get NM or a booster which is normally necesary for AN explosives.

But I think it would be useful to get to know more of the properties of the APAN mixture, e.g. the VoD, power and brisance compared to other explosives.
Now, I liked the video of the treestump that got it coming very much but I would suggest testing this mixture on steel plates to get an idea of the brisance, and comparing it with ANNM and ANFO-mixtures (there's nothing wrong with blowing up treestumps or just enjoying the explosions but if you use steel plates you combine pleasure and usefull research).
My guess is that the power and brisance will be comparable with other ANFO mixtures although the VoD might be slightly higher.
And to measure the VoD of this new explosive you only need some det cord, APAN and a piece of metal.

<small>[ April 29, 2002, 05:36 AM: Message edited by: Chris Shiherlis ]</small>

[DBSP]

Just a note. I didn't have any balls in the mill. I just used it to mix the explosive. I have 5 days off school soon and I might test it on some plates and compare it with ANNM.

[kingspaz]

Chris Shiherlis, 'And to measure the VoD of this new explosive you only need some det cord, APAN and a piece of metal.'

how many people here do you think have access to det chord?! :rolleyes:

[Madog555]

there is people who have it.

can u explain how to conduct a test to get the VOD

[Chris Shiherlis]

To measure the VoD is quite simple. You need a cilindrical charge of APAN e.g. by putting it in a (plastic) pipe. At the top, a few centimeters below the detonator you stick one end of the det cord (of which the VoD must be known) in the side of the cilinder. And the other end you stick through the side at the bottom (and you should measure the distance between the two points where the det cord is put in the charge). The det cord should be around 1-2 meters led away from the APAN charge, and just past the middle it is put straight over a piece of metal (and the precise middle of the det cord is marked at the beginning of the metal plate).
Now, when you detonate the mixture, the shockwave moves from the top of the cilinder downwards. Then it detonates the first end of the det cord and this shockwaves travels to the other end of the det cord. But in the meantime the shockwave moving through the APAN mixture reaches the end and detonates the det cord, sending a shockwave to the beginning of the det cord.
At some point they meet. And when these two opposing shockwaves meet they make a extra deep dent in the metal plate.
Now you measure the distance between the middle point and the meeting point.
And then you can calculate the VoD of the charge. I only forgot how to do that :)

<small>[ April 30, 2002, 05:08 PM: Message edited by: Chris Shiherlis ]</small>

[Chris Shiherlis]

I think it is in "the chemistry of powders and explosives" by T.l. Davis.
But I'll give it a try: the distance between the meeting point and the middle of the det cord is the delay caused by the APAN charge. As you know the VoD of the det cord you know the time of the delay: delay=distance/VoD det cord.
In this time the shockwave travelled from the top of the charge to the bottom, which distance you measured beforehand: X.
So VoD APAN mixture=X/delay.
I think.

If the VoD's would be equal the distances would also be equal. If the VoD of the det cord is twice as high, the distance on the plate is twice the distance X (this should give you an idea how long the metal plate should be compared to the length of the charge. But I wouldn't make it to small :) ).

<small>[ April 30, 2002, 05:06 PM: Message edited by: Chris Shiherlis ]</small>

[Madog555]

i thought of another way, take a charge of APAN that is in a piece of PVC that is 1m long. have a realy good electrical detonator that will go off with almost no delay from when the electricity goes through it. have that in one end. at the other end there is a wire. when you set off the blasting cap it also starts a very acurate timer that counts untill the wire that is on the oposite end is cut and the circuit is broken. now you see what the timer stoped at, that is how fast it takes the shockwave to go one meter. you can calculate the M/S from that.

anyone think this would work, i just made it up.

[Anthony]

I seriously doubt that you'd be able to make it work, assumbing a detonation velocity of 5000M/s, the shockwave would be in duration along the pipe for only 500 micro seconds. To be anwhere like accurate you'd probably want a degree of accuracy around +/- 100M/s in DV. So you're counter would have to be able to record in steps of no less than 50uS. To get that sort of accuracy you'd need to take into account how long the electrical pulses took to travel down wires. Your blasting cap would play complete havoc with any kind of accuracy. The condition of the battery would affect how much current it could deliver, the amount of current available determines how quickly the bridgewire would heat up. The length, batch resistance and conductivitey of contacts of the bridgewire would affetc how quickly it would heat up. Then there's the purity and moisture content of your primary, this could affect it's ignition temperature, affecting how long it would take before igniting. Then there's the density you've pressed it to affecting how long the shockwave produced will take to reach the charge... ad naseum...

[DBSP]

Yesterday I went shooting with some friends and I thounght about what I could make to make the shooting more fun. So I filled 3 film cans with APAN and left a 5mm gap to the top of it. At tha range I filled the rest of the space with AP and and turned the charge so that the AP faced the shooter. I shot them from about 50m with my 22. It workes great! The film canisters contain about 30g APAN and 1,5g AP. I allso made a 75g charge, more fun <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> :D

[Madog555]

yeah, it would be very hard to get to work, u would need one hell of a timer. many of those problems would be eliminated by haveing a 1.5m long charge and have the cap at one end, then a little ways down there is a wire which is somehow rigged to start the timer when broken. then 1m from the start wire there is another that stops it when broken.

[Al Koholic]

OK...ummm just out of curiosity, what is acetone peroxide soluble in? I have checked online MSDS archives for about the last 2 hours and cant find ANY solubility data at ALL. Also, a search on the forum revealed nothing. Anyway, if someone can tell me what will dissolve AP, I would greatly appreciate it as I believe it would be very useful information regarding this topic....
AL

[mr.evil]

i thought Toluen and Aceton....

[Mr Cool]

CTAP dissolves quite well in acetone; dumping a saturated solution of it in acetone, with a bit of sodium bicarbonate, into cold water with a little sodium bicarbonate should cause it to precipitate as uniform, fine crystals, with all acid traces removed.

[Demolition]

As you can make an ANFO type explosive using AN and Acetone how about disolving some AP in Acetone then adding the Acetone/AP solution to the AN.
This would mean you wouldnt have to mix AN and AP in its powder form,just pour the Acetone/AP mixture on the AN,let the AN absorb the solution and then insert your blasting cap?
Any ideas?

<small>[ May 17, 2002, 09:38 PM: Message edited by: Demolition ]</small>

[Rat Bastard]

I am prolly going to do an APAN test some time, (I have all the materials) I will supply you guys with movies & pics.

I have successfuly made HMTD & AP a few times now.

I am still triying to find the perfect contaner for a blasting cap. It's HMTD that ruines metal, but does AP? and would an aluminum or copper tube be better?

[DBSP]

AP is okay with metals, at least shorter periods, I've never seen it corrode any metall. As for the container for HMTD you can simply use a plastic pen or you could just roll some paper into a tube I've detonated CaNAP using that method and you don't need any larger ammount to set APAN off asuming you go with the 10% a couple of grams of either peroxide will do the trick.

[Mick]

the only thing to be really concerned about when putting AP and metal together is making sure your AP is absolutely 100% dry before you put it in the metal casing.

copper is a bit off a red herring, i've had AP in copper pipe for well over a week, and its shown no signs of reaction with the copper, however i've had others that have caused the AP to turn a greenish color after only a day or 2.

i think it is best to avoid using metals for any type of detonator casing where ever possible.

its not that hard to make a no metal casing, you can use a pen tube, or you can use a piece of electrical condute(10 - 20mm PVC pipe) or you can wrap several pieces of paper around some copper pipe then slide the copper pipe out of the paper tube.

[Mr Cool]

AN/CTAP soln. would be detonatable, but it wouldn't be as sensitive as normal AN/CTAP. Also, if any acetone evapourates you'll get big crystals of CTAP forming, between the AN grains. So if the mixture is disturbed at all, the grains will slide past each other, and break/rub/crush the crystals... I wouldn't make it if I were you,just in case.

[Mick]

has anyone tried to use APAN as a booster for ANFO yet?

figured i might give ANFO another go in the coming weeks, i was thinking about a 3kg charge or thereabouts(i figure atleast 500g APAN charge would be needed for a booster)

[BrAiNFeVeR]

I've only seen my AP react with metals when it was still wet and acidic, like in, fresh from reaction. And indeed it turnes green !!

I removed the AP that was green and nuetralised the rest.

[DBSP]

The last week I have been experimenting with different AN structures and now I have one that might have a good low density. Which in turn means that I will try to detonate some next weekend, I think I will go for AN and raps oil. I think it shuld be reasonably sensitive but just to be shure I'll try it with a 30g ANNM booster first and then APAN might get to have a go at it as well.

I've allso got a 1,47 kg charge of CaN and raps oil, I will try to detonate that one with a 100g ANNM booster and if it works I might try detonating a nother one with APAN as well.

[Mick]

whats "raps oil" is a raps a brand name?
or is it an acctual type of oil?

what is it used in?

[ALENGOSVIG1]

It is an actual type of oil. I believe its used in the production of bio diesel.

mick: 500g APAN is a bit overkill. I was able to detonate ansoy with just 20g of ap and 10g of picric acid.

[Chris Shiherlis]

Any progress in testing the VoD and brisance of this new explosive?

[Zambosan]

I believe "raps oil" is referring to rapeseed oil, correct me if I'm wrong.

[A_W]

Raps oil, or rape-seed-oil, is oil made from pressing the seeds of a yellow plant called raps or rape(!). Raps oil is used in food, but since other food-oils can be used in AN-explosives, I think raps-oil should work well.

[xoo1246]

500 grams of APAN seems like suicide(/overkill too) to me, no mather how stable this mixture seems. I thought the idea of APAN was to make inexpensive, easy to detonate, small charges.
Chris Shiherlis: Since most people here don't have access to det. cord, I doubt it. A guess would be around 3000-4000 m/s. But that's a guess.

<small>[ May 20, 2002, 12:25 PM: Message edited by: xoo1246 ]</small>

[Mick]

500g is stable (or has been so far for me, i've dreamt of atleast 9 500g charges.)

the reason i have said 500g is because i currently do not have access to the materials requried to make picric acid, or anything other detonator for that matter.
AP is all i have for the time being.

and because i hate wasting time with explosives that misfire, i figure it will be easier to just go a little overkill in order to make sure the ANFO goes off first time.

[Chris Shiherlis]

Well some have det cord. But to test the power and brisance (and get an indication of the VoD) all you have to do is, instead of blowing up trees, try it on a metal plate. And compair with to other known mixtures. Simple. But if you just keep up blowing up trees that's fine with me. Maybe I ask too much of you.

[xoo1246]

Who is blowing up trees?

[DBSP]

Chris what tha fuck are you complaining about :mad: , if you are so interested in finding out the VOD and brisance why don't you do it yourself instead of asking everyone else to do it for you.

And what's your problem btw? as soon as your name comes up you allways have something negative to say. I really think you need to change you attitude towards other people.

[kingspaz]

i agree.
chris you seem to think you know it all, don't act superior. you're only able to do that once you've earnt that right.

[Mick]

i'm not quite sure what his problem is, but i would agree that everytime i see his name its always something negative and/or asking someone to do something for him - and telling them how they should go about doing it.

it would seem logical to me that if you know how to do something that your asking someone else to do - do it your friggin self.
if for some reason you don't to make/dream explosives yourself, then i'm afraid you are on the wrong message board.

[Chris Shiherlis]

<small>[ May 22, 2002, 10:44 AM: Message edited by: Chris Shiherlis ]</small>

[Chris Shiherlis]

Sorry you get that impression. But I started with a contribution about improvising linear shaped charges. And I contribute sometimes with constructive criticism, which is not always appreciated. And yes I can get negative when something pisses me off. And that 'knowing it all'-attitude pops up when confronted by stupidity.
And just you know it, I have plenty of experience with explosives and I joined the forum hoping to be able to increase my knowledge and share some experiences. And maybe even making virtual friends, because we share a, for me, important interest.

Back to the topic: I congratulated you guys with the invention of this new explosive. And I said that if you use a metal plate instead of trees you get to know some of the properties of this new explosive. It's not telling what you should do. It's telling what you could do: it's the same effort, the same fun, the same hassle, the same danger.
The only difference is it will get us some valuable information also.
If that's not a nice constructive contribution I don't know what is.

<small>[ May 22, 2002, 10:43 AM: Message edited by: Chris Shiherlis ]</small>