Cartridge primer, in need of a simple impact explosive

[professor k]

Hey, I recently got the idea of reusing primers. With boxer, it's not too practical, as the anvil is built into the casing. Anyway, Berdan has no anvil on the primer, it's just a disc, the anvil is built into the cartridge casing. I dont think there's too much else of a reason to not reuse a primer, since all you gotta do is just flatten out where the firing pin hit, which isnt too hard to do.

Anyway, I'm in need of a formula for a impact sensitive explosive that would be suitable for this. I think actual primers use I mercury fuliminate. Anyway, I'm just looking for something along the lines of what's in a capgun cap. It mainly needs to make a good flame, it doesnt need much explosive power.

I also heard strike anywhere matchtips can be used, but that doesnt sound very plausible to me.

Any ideas on what I could use?

Thanks

[Bert]

Strike anywhere match tips are your easiest alternative. Yes, it will work. It will also leave a corrosive residue in your weapon that will need to be cleaned out with water rather than standard cleaners for smokeless powder residue.

(edit)
Also, if you are interested in re-using your cases for a number of reloads, avoid Mercury fulminate mixes. The Mercury residue will embrittle and destroy your brass cases rather quickly. Lead styphnate is the modern choice, if you can find resorcinol it's not that much harder to make.

http://www.roguesci.org/megalomania/explo/leadstyphnate.html

In the future, I would suggest searching this site a bit before starting a new thread to ask a question that's allready been addressed at length...

[Cindor]

proffesor k if you can try with Lead Picrate/Styphnate or something like this, they are safer than Mercury Fulminate.

[ShadowMyGeekSpace]

I believe lead azide is used for primers.

[a_bab]

You believe wrong. Lead azide is not that impact sensitive to be used for primers.

Mercury fulminate used to be the main ingredient, along with potassium chlorate. The lead styphanate is the modern choice as stated before.

[irish]

The anvil in Boxer primers can be removed with a strong pin or small nail, they are really not worth the trouble to reload though unless you live where they are completely unobtainable. Reloading Berdan primers on the other hand let's you reload a lot of ex-Mil. brass that is oterwise just scrap metal.

The main problem in reusing primers is not so much going to be getting them to go off but getting consistency in the flame/flash with no hangtime.

[kurtz]

If you have no precursors for styphnic acid on hand, maybe you'd like to go boldly into lead dinitrosalicylate. US2021497 (http://v3.espacenet.com/origdoc?DB=EPODOC&IDX=US2021497&F=0&QPN=US2021497) claims "sensitiveness to shock substantially equal to that of mercury fulminate", yet US1928780 (http://v3.espacenet.com/origdoc?DB=EPODOC&IDX=US1928780&F=0&QPN=US1928780) uses a very small amount of it in the composition. So if anyone wants to know if it is useful as styphnate replacement, they'll have to experiment.

[rebelpride33]

If you are into cheap and effective powder formulations for reloading shells (and I believe you referred to something close to cap guns) Than maybe you should try the following mixture of Red Phosphorous Sand, Potassium Chlorate and glue/starch or any easy binder as this mixture is exactly what is used in toy cap guns today, but be careful as this is a highly sensitive material that in my own experience can flare up just scraping the material softly with a toothpick or slightly applying pressure on a cap.

For further help on usage with guns and shells in this case however, you should go to Wikipedia and look up the chemicals involved with the previous mixture and it will explain specifically what to add to make it more suitable for reloading. I think the chemical added is boron carbide. This mixture also contains tiny amounts of sulfur and calcium carbonate thus adding to the mixture sensitivity.

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Armstrong mixtures require ratios, something you have failed to provide. NBK