project avalanche

[Ctrl_C]

well some of my friends and I have created a cult of sorts paralleling fight club. Initiation includes giving yourself a NaOH burn...which hurts like a mother. anyways, our sole purpose is to wreak havoc wherever we go. enter project avalanche.

project avalanche consists of going to our local ski resort after hours. a cordless drill with a 3 foot auger bit and 3, 8" long, 1"dia. pvc AP filled pipes are included in the armament for the evening. If it is not obvious already, we will drill 3 feet down into the snow at the top of a slope, insert the AP charges, light, and disappear. Hopefull this will cause an avalanche. think it will work? Hopefully project avalanche will commence this weekend and as always, pics and possibly videos will be taken.

[DBSP]

Sounds interesting. On the news today they where talking about the dangers with avalanches and then they showed a short clip of a couple of workers triggering an avalanche (before the people came there) with explosives. They had two charges (about 5-6 sticks measuring aprox.3x20 cm) wich I think was some kind of AN (slurry/gel) type. The charges where put on sticks about a meter above the snow and detonated.

I think the reason they put the explosives above the snow was that the shockwave would affect a larger area and thereby triggering the avalanche more efectively.

How many grams of AP will your charges hold?

And don't watch the charges go off from below :D

[ALENGOSVIG1]

when i was in whister ski resort last year they were constantly setting off explosives on the mountains, just on closed trails of course. talked to someone i know that works there and apparently they use AN based explosives. ive seen some videos of workers setting off avalanches and it looks pretty simple to me. They just light the fuse, throw it over a cliff into some snow. i dont think ap is a choice explosive for this kind of thing. too powerfull and has a high brisance. not the best thing for moving earth, snow etc. i think 1 or 2 lb charges of anfo in pvc pipes would do the trick.

[Ctrl_C]

anfo is hard as fuck to get to go off though. i'd rather go with something tried and proven...plus i can't get AN around here at this time of season because the farm suppliers dont stock it now.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

i set off a 1 lb charge of ansoy with a 30 g detonator. 20 g ap and 10 g picric acid i believe. Its not as hard to detonate as everyone says. you can get the AN from cold packs, theres really alot in there. 4 packs from walmart and you should have 1 lb of AN easy. the walmart ones only cost $1 or so. the walmart around here is always out of stock so i get them from the pharmacy. 2 dollars per pack but that isnt a bad price for homemade explosives really. $8 per pound of AN for me, $4 if the walmart has them in stock

i think your best bet is to use some sort of AN based explosive. mabe some Improvised ammonite? simply RED wrote up a topic about a mix of AP/AN/bronze paint that he was experementing with. its in the archive and the topic is "improvised ammonite".

[PYRO500]

I think the slope should be pretty steep for you to cause an avelance, and packed enough to have a tendency to roll, acetone peroxide would not be my weapon of choice for this for several reasons including high sensitivity and brissance and you will probably need more than is safe to make/carry to cause an avelanche. what else can you make.

[Ctrl_C]

well...chemicals are in short supply right now because money is in short supply. right now the only things I have are pyrodex, 30% H₂O₂, 38% HCl, acetone, H₂SO₄, NaOH, and napthalene. As you can tell I need to restock. I don't see anything else I could make.

I think AP may work though because we will be drilling into the base which should be VERY packed, providing good confinement. Sand or just more snow will be pack over the charges once inserted.

I may try to secure some AN this week but it will probably be a futile attempt.

[DBSP]

If you could get AN a simpel an quite powerful explosive would be APAN. I've been experimenting with it the last month and I've set off two larger charges. One 70g and a 500g. It's a mix of 90 AN and 10 AP. I't easy to detonate a 2g det should do it. The half kilo charge was very impressive the charge was placed in a 1,3 meter deep hole in very wet mud (the hole was full of water). It detonated with a very deep kaboom and threw mud and water up in the sky like a geiser, I'm not shure but at least 10 meters high. Its a earth moving explosive and I think that a 1/2 kilo charge should trigger an anvalange without any problems.

The AN I used was from cold packs. Every package contains 200g Of AN wich I pulverised in a mixer. I'm not shure but I think that you could have as little as 5% AP in the mix if you had a bigger det, 5-10g.

[Madog555]

hey, u beat me to it!

i have also used this but my charge was verys small(20g-25g). worked good i used 2 .357 mag shells (together) of AP as a det. it was about 60%AN/40%AP. i like this stuff

simply RED makes his amonial(sp?) by mixing aluminum paint with AN and letting the solvents evaporate. i need some Al paint...

[Ctrl_C]

I'm going to pick up cold packs at Eckerd tomorrow. I forgot they were a source of AN...thanks!

[DBSP]

I't a bit off toic but it concerns APAN. I've just run out of AN because I've found NM
so it has been some ANNM blasting recently.
However as soon as I get som more I will make a few test to figure out a "safe" mix that will be insensitve to normal handling but easy to detonate. I'm think I'll use 2g MMAN and 3g HMTD as det.

I will probably post my results within a month.

[Mr Cool]

Ctrl_C - how much pyrodex have you got?
If you can get enough, an 8" dia. by 10-12" stringbound pyrodex charge would probably work very well, to give the slow push required to move the snow.
Ah, but I bet that'd be expensive...

What about 90% AN, 5% acetone, 5% Al powder? Or just use 10% acetone if you can't get Al. That mixture is supposed to be quite sensitive compared to ANFO, make up 10g of AP and you should have no problems detonating it if you make it with low density, crystaline AN.

Can't wait to see the pictures! Just make sure there's no-one downhill before you do it...

[ALENGOSVIG1]

mr.cool have you used the AN/acetone mix you descrbed yourself? Im very interested in it.

[Madog555]

that mix is in "Improvised munitions from AN"

but i can't seem to find it, i know i saw it somewhere though

[wantsomfet]

I couldn't find this mix in "Improvised Munitions from Ammonium Nitrate". You're sure about that mix?
I couldn't imagine...

[NoltaiR]

If you guys can find the part in the IM of AN that says that the mix works, then I am going to definelty have to try it out... having acetone in it already would make it sensitive enough that only very small amounts of an AP charge would be needed. Actually the mix might even be able to make its own transition between deflagration and detonation due to acetones extreme flammability; now that would be interesting, a AN explosive that didn't require a primary charge or if all it needed was a commercial firecracker...

Anyways I am curious how you are going to pull something like this off on property owned by the resort and still expect it not to be investigated?

Also if you do go ahead with the plan, you may (depending on how high-tech you are planning to get) may want to wire your charges so that they go off in rows, starting from the highest point so that as the snow is falling, continuous blasts from below and behind will increase the velocity of the avalanche. here is kind of what I mean:

<pre>

.
.' '.
.'1 1 1'.
.' '.
' 2 2 2 '.
'.
3 3 3 3 '.
'.
'.
'.

</pre>

you would have to calculate it so that number 2 doesn't go off until the snow from number 1 passes over it.. likewise number 3 wouldn't go off until the combined snow from number 1 and number 2 pass over it.

edit: i just wanted to add that although you are using a 3' auger, try and make your holes as deep as possible just so you can get as much energy as possible traveling through the surrounding snow

[ 24 February 2002: Message edited by: NoltaiR ]

[ALENGOSVIG1]

The mix DOES work and have talked to some people that have tried it. i was just wondering if mr.cool had used it himself.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

Oh how about calcium hypochlorate/naptha? those can both be bought at the hardware store for very cheap. naptha is simply white gas and calcium hypochlorate can be found in the pool chems section.

[DBSP]

How much does the HTH cost in the states? In sweden it's very expensive it's about 250-300 swedish kronor or about 25-30$ for 3kg. If you buy AN fertiliser you would get 50kg instead. So I'd rather buy AN.

[Madog555]

_c u deleted you post

i swear acetone was used in IMFAN but i cant find it

i doubt it would be that sensitive.

[Ctrl_C]

oops. i said i got some AN and will sensitize with 5% by weight no. 2 oil (diesel). I just made detonators from .223 shell casings filled with AP. One is fused, the other is not. they will both go in the center of the pipe and hopefully the shockwave from the fused one will set off the unfused one. there isn't that much AP though, only a few grams per shell. I hope it's enough.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

I dont think two .223 shells full of ap is enough to set off your anfo. how many grams in total is in the shells? you shouldnt have put them into the shells! if you had say 10 grams of ap (which i doubt will set off anfo) then you could have saved 3 grams for a big detonator, and use the 7 grams left over to make 70 grams of AN/AP/fuel that is 10% AP. i bet 3 grams of AP would set off 70 grams of the improvised ammonite and im sure 70 grams of improvised ammonite would detonate a properly prepared anfo charge.

[ 27 February 2002: Message edited by: ALENGOSVIG1 ]

[DBSP]

With the experiense I have of APAN I can garantie that 3g AP will set off a 10% AP mix, If you press the AP there's absolutely no problem.

Btw I bought some AN today and I'll make some AP tonight so the tests I said I would do will be done either tomorrow or at saturday. I'm thinking of 8%, 6%, 4% AP. All charges 50g AN and set off with 3 or 4g AP in a 30-06 case.

[Ctrl_C]

You guys thought I only made enough AP for the primers?!?! AHAHAHAHA...when I make explosives, I make in bulk. I must have 200g here. Sadly though, I have no scale other than my friend's that was stolen. I will have to estimate or work out volume and use density perhaps. with the ANAP, do you still mix the diesel in? before adding the AP? Mix the AP in throughly or have a layer of it in the pipe?

[NoltaiR]

Just out of curiosity, how long did you let it sit to get 200g? And what ratio did you use of chems? Maybe someone can calculate whether or not you could have made more or if you made the maximum expected.

(we could figure out the 'percent error' of the apparent amount to the theoretical amount of product.

[PYRO500]

If you need to get a fairly cheap and accurate scale that will suit all your pyrotechnic needs go to ebay and look for an i500 scale, they measure up to 500G and they are sensitive to 0.1G I just ordere'd one for around 70 bucks.

[xoo1246]

If you worry about cost, use AN/NM/AL as a booster to a larger AN/FO/AL charge and let the booster go throught the whole charge, too boost performance. :)

[Madog555]

maybe to get it more intimate add the AP to acetone and mix it with the AN. you could let it dry or set it off as is.

ANAP is good stuff. i used like 40% AP when i made it. i wanted to make sure it whent off.

if your gona spend as mutch as 70$ why don't you get a 110$ triple beam balance from edsci? they are far superior to electric scales in acuracy. i got one.

here it is http://www.scientificsonline.com/Products/DisplayProduct.cfm?productid=8128

[DBSP]

Whwn I make APAN I never add anything but the AP to the AN. So you dont have to wait for the diesel or whatever your using to soak through. Whwn you mix the chemicals you pour the AN and AP into a small plastic bag fill it with some air and close one end so that it looks like a ballon. Then you twist and roll the bag carefully and thorougly until it is intimately mixed..

I'm just like Ctrl_c when it comes to making AP I do it on mass. I use 200ml 35% H2O2, 260ml acetone and 10% acid, I use 30% HCl. I normaly get about 130g in four hours, When it is finnished it's kinda solid all crystals stick together in a big lumb.

I just woke up now and I'm on my way to prepare the samples for the APAN tests. I'll be posting results later today.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

If you dissolve AP in acetone, the ap will form large crsyals of ap if the acetone evapourates. The large crystals are extra sensistive, so i dont think its a good idea to try it. I like the idea of AN/AP in small charges, but all you need is one crysal of Ap to spontaneously detonate to set off the whole charge. I wouldnt use more than 100 grams of the stuff in a charge. I would never make half a kilo like some of you guys. To me, thats just foolish. You could have used a small AP/AN charge to set off a anfo charge.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

Whwn you mix the chemicals you pour the AN and AP into a small plastic bag fill it with some air and close one end so that it looks like a ballon

Not recommended. Your ap could detonate due to static electricity from the bag. Diaper mix the composition on a piece of newspaper.

[xoo1246]

Maybe we should try sensitivity to static electricity with an piezto-electrical igniter found in commmon ciggarett lighters. If the explosive isn't found to be sensitiv to this treatment it should be somewhat safe to mix in a plastic bag, right? I think I will buy one tomorrow and try it with some HTMD.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

sparking ap with BBQ ignitor wont prove anything. You could probally mix the AP/AN in a plastic bag 1000 times before something happens. or mabe it will explode the first time you try it, or mabe the tenth time. you never know. whats wrong with just taking the extra time and using the diaper method anyhow?

[xoo1246]

Everything you do is based on statistics. But you are right, one should do things the "safe" way, especially when one is using explosives. So don't be a fool, spend some extra minutes and stay alive.

[xoo1246]

About this calcium hypochlorate/naptha explosive: Doesn't HTH and flameable fluids have a tendensy to spontanly ignite? And wouldn't this be low explosive? Please correct me if I'm way out of line.

[Vegeta]

ALENGOSVIG1 made a good point. Mixing primary explosives with secundary explosives is dangerous. You get a mass of powerfull high explosive with the sensitivity of of a primary. And one crystal of that primary detonating (by friction, heat, shock, static electricity) can set of the whole charge.
I remember (or is this a deja vu?) that a few milligrams(!) of leadazide will set of any of the secundary explosives: picric acid, PETN even TNT.
Now, AP is not leadazide and AN is not TNT but I wouldn't go near that AP/AN mixture.

[xoo1246]

True.

[Madog555]

I wouldn't go near that AP/AN mixture.

i will

i may so some tests on useing it as a LE

[zaibatsu]

Whats the point of using it as a LE? If it begins to burn it will probably (all from speculation) make the change from Deflag. to detonation. If I was you, I'd experiment with it as a HE, but stick to LEs such as BP and flash.

[Mr Cool]

"You get a mass of powerfull high explosive with the sensitivity of of a primary."

I'm pretty sure CTAP is more powerful than AN (higher density, higher VoD), so mixing them will make a safer product that CTAP alone. A bit like an AN/NG dynamite in some respects, but it won't be desensitised as much.
I think an ANNM booster with a CTAP det would be the best way to set off your main charge, if CTAP is the only primary available to you.

[xoo1246]

TCAP,AP,ATCP,whatever is a primary explosive (as we all know) but many of you seems to be producing it in bulk quantities. I can't see why? Is it beacuse it's inexpensive and easy to produce?

[Madog555]

zalibatsu, thats what i want it to do

mr cool, that is the exact thing i wanted to do when useing it as a LE.

xoo, you hit the nail right on the head, the materials are easy to get and fairly inexpensive.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

I think this mix is great if your using 100 grams or less. The more you make, the more chance there is for 1 crystal to spontanously detonate. If i needed a cheap 100g charge then i would probally use AN/AP myself. but if i needed a cheap 1kg charge then i would just make anfo. But im constantly hearing about people setting off a kilo or two of the stuff, which i think is just stupid. if you were planning on making 1kg of 10/90 ap/an mix, you could have just used the ap to make a smaller charge of an/ap to set off a anfo charge, which is alot safer. and cheaper too becuase you would need less ap.

[DBSP]

Since there is so many speculating in the sensitivity of APAN i will do some additional tests to figure out the sensitivity. I'll do drop tests flame tests and a friction test aswell. This can't be done until next weakend though. Nobody has done any kilos of APAN I made a half kg once but that was because I hadn't got NM wich I do have now so I don't really need APAN anyway. I've done my tests because I was interested in finding out how the explosive works and what properties it has got. And helping others to get some nolage! :(

[Madog555]

i got an interesting idea. i think that a 50/50 AP/AN or 60/40 AP/AN would be a good mix for use as a primary. sience AP has a negitive oxygen balance wouldn't it make the AP more powerful? and maybe less sensitive (sience theres less AP) and it will be real cheap sience AN is way cheaper than AP.

i tried a 40g charge of 10% APAN and it didn't work. in fact it was realy weird. my AP in the det must have been a little damp because it didn't even put a mark in the pillbotle that this was contained in :(

it just threw the mix around.

[ALENGOSVIG1]

Nobody has done any kilos of APAN

Simply red and a couple others mentioned using large amounts in the original improvised ammonite thread which can be found in the archive.

And i dont see how you are going to do accurate sensitivity tests. Mabe if everybody's AP was the same and you had proper testing equiptment. One thing ive noticed is that everyone's ap has different properties. Some people report being able to hit it with a hammer and not have it explode. When i first started making AP i used 3% h202. Now i use 35% and can tell you that the stuff made with the 3% is less powerfull and more sensitive than that made with 35%. Ofcourse the temperature that the ap was made has to do with its sensistivity and performance too. I had a small batch of ap runaway because i added the hcl too fast once. Since it was such a small batch i set it outside and let it keep going instead of diluting the whole thing with water. The end product was way diffent than the ap made at proper temperatures. The AP burned like weak flash powder. im not trying to flame you but theres no way everybody's AN/AP will be the same.

[ 03 March 2002: Message edited by: ALENGOSVIG1 ]

[Madog555]

simply red has told me about his experiances with ANAP. he has used some realy large amounts.

[Vegeta]

Although I still think that mixing primary explosives with secondary explosives is dangerous, you guys might just have invented a new interesting explosive.
It seems to be that this mixture behaves differently and is pretty safe, according to your experiments. But theoretically and normally you wouldn't expect this. In fact, if you had used (almost) any other primary and/or secondary explosive you would be dead by now (because you would have created a highly sensitive powerfull explosive that can be detonated by flame).
The only reason that didn't happen is because single AP crystals don't detonate when ignited. You need a certain amount of AP and confinement to get it to detonate. And the second reason this mixture behaves different then expected is that AN is a insensitive explosive (even ANFO mixtures are not detonator sensitive but need a booster).
So all I want to say that you probably invented a new interesting explosive by doing a very stupid thing. And it's just luck that you survived. But many inventions are made this way. It's called serendipity I think (or stupidity? ;)).
Well, congratulations anyway. But I still would advice not to use large quantities of it (or maybe to use only large quantaties because then you're sure that you get killed when it accidentally goes off and not just maimed and badly injured, which seems worse to me). And I still don't trust it till I see some real scientific prove that it's safe.

[ 05 March 2002: Message edited by: Ray Quick ]

[DBSP]

Hmm this must be heaven then. :mad:
So mixing lets say TNP with AN would mean a disaster because it would detonate the very moment the to ingridients are mixed. Don't think so, whatever explosive you use you still need something to trigger it, flame, shock, friction etc. Lets say you have an APAN mixture and drop it to the floor from lets say one meter the probability of it detonating shouldn't be greater than if it was AP since AP is more sensitive. Compare the sensitivity of AP alone and APAN the AP would probably be more sensitive than AP desensitised with AN wich is allmost impossible to detonate alone.

Then of course you have to consider the weight factor Drop a gram of either if them and they'de survive. Drop a kilo and the chanse of them detonating increases greately. Lets say you actually would drop a kilo of each of'em, I'd put my money on that the AP went off first.

Have you Actually got any experiense of APAN at all?

[Madog555]

AP is not the only primary that doesn't detonate without confinement. HMTD, TACC, TACN are somwe of the others that don't detonate in open air.

[xoo1246]

Are you saying 5 grams of HTMD wouldn't detonate if not confined?

[Madog555]

woops, i meant in small amounts, like if it is spread out through AN it probaly wont det

[xoo1246]

Ok, true.

[James]

small technical point for project avalanche. IIRC avalanches only occur when there are at least two layers in the snowpack. A dense layer with a not so dense lay beneath, there should also probabky be another layer of dense snow underneath. I may be wrong however. ^C please check how you are phrasing things.

[Ctrl_C]

well i hurt my knee pretty badly last time i went skiing so I don't know if I will make it back this season. Also, a drastic thaw has probably thinned the base to under 2 feet. however, this has been a great experience testing APAN and knowing what I will use and how to implement it should I get the chance next season. I will also be going to Austria in December, but I think they frown on taking explosives on airplanes. damn.

[nbk2000]

I have to wonder about the "scarring yourslef with lye" thing.

Last thing you should want is a permanent distinguishing or identifying mark on your body. An RTPB.

And you don't have to travel with explosives when you know how to make them out of damn near anything, right? :D