Potassium Nitrate?

1) The term Mad as a Hatter was due to Hatters using Mercury and driving them... well mad... :D

2) Is there a law stating you can only have so much ammonium nitrate in your possession at one time? :p
 
Mercury is used by prospectors as it makes all the gold dust stick together, than you recapture the mercury when it evaporates, as you would if distilling something. Then it can be reused. A logbook is convenient, and if the government knows you have it you better have a reason.
 
this is kind of off topic ......

last summer i was talking to a guy who had a claim on the fraser river in the " richbar " area , south of quesnel .

anyway , they dug down till they hit a area of false bedrock and ran into literally gallons of mercury in pools on the false bedrock .
the chinese where famous for building sluice boxes with hundreds of small pockets built into them where they used to fill with mercury to capture the fine gold particals .
 
burnt_servo said:
this is kind of off topic ......

last summer i was talking to a guy who had a claim on the fraser river in the " richbar " area , south of quesnel .

anyway , they dug down till they hit a area of false bedrock and ran into literally gallons of mercury in pools on the false bedrock .
the chinese where famous for building sluice boxes with hundreds of small pockets built into them where they used to fill with mercury to capture the fine gold particals .
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Oh, that should be good for the salmon!

The placer miners used to poison themselves by heating their gold amalgam to burn off the mercury. The vapour produced is absolutely deadly: Methyl Mercury IIRC.

Of course if you mix mercury with tin, copper and a bit of silver it goes from being the second most toxic element after plutonium to being perfectly safe and completely harmless.

That's why they put about 3 tons of it in people's teeth every year in North America.
 
But it's most common use is as fertilizer, it's also used in medical applications: those "cold packs" you buy are made from it, as it's one of the few substances out there which produces an endothermic(sp?) (as opposed to exothermic) effect when combined with water..... AFAIK it's also routinely used in the food industry.

drache said:
It was also used in multiple bombings like Oklahoma City ;)

It's also used in mining explosives....
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Potassium Nitrate is also used in the making of paper cartridges. The paper or card stock being soaked in the nitrite. The paper is then fully consumed during the firing process.
So,, makes sense that you would find it in an old reloader's collection.

Fairly common in the black powder crowd.

I can't see mercury having any practical use in reloading.
 
RobSmith said:
But it's most common use is as fertilizer, it's also used in medical applications: those "cold packs" you buy are made from it, as it's one of the few substances out there which produces an endothermic(sp?) (as opposed to exothermic) effect when combined with water..... AFAIK it's also routinely used in the food industry.
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Yeah we have about a ton of high grade ammonium nitrate for fertilizing the fields out at the ranch :D
 
When we were kids, (long fricken time ago) we'd take HP .22 bullets, hollow them out a bit more, put a drop of mercury in the hole, then seal it with wax. Absolutely devastating on gophers. :D
 
Blackpowder is easy to make with a scale and a ball mill, both easily available on the internet. It is not a difficult process.
 
Shelldrake said:
Potassium Nitrate is also used in the making of paper cartridges. The paper or card stock being soaked in the nitrite. The paper is then fully consumed during the firing process.
So,, makes sense that you would find it in an old reloader's collection.

Fairly common in the black powder crowd.

I can't see mercury having any practical use in reloading.
Click to expand...

Thats how you make magicians flash paper. The stuff that totally consumes itself in a second.
 
ammonium nitrate is still used a lot for fertilizer,the only reason farmers are switching to urea is cost.urea is cheaper than ammonium nitrate.i hope there are no crazies/terrorist around work we just had 17 ton of the stuff delivered today.that would leave one heck of a hole in the ground should it explode.
 
17 tons of ammonium nitrate would need a lot of help to make a hole in the ground. Over a ton of help, actually, properly distributed, and then very forcibly inititated. Shades of Oklahoma City.

Mind, it would make a very nice hole!
 
I have no trouble acquiring 50% ammonium nitrate fertilizer as fertilizer, and have not been inclined to ever try making ANFO. Potassium Nitrate is likewise available as a 13-0-44 fertilizer, and it is the compound used in de-sensitizing toothpaste as I recall.

...I thought powdered rubber is now the big thing in adding to solid fuel rocket propellants?
 
As a golf course superintendant i buy these chemicals in bulk all the time... 2 years ago someone, i'll be very clear it was not me, made up a small batch of "stump be gone"... it was pretty surreal to see a large arbutus stump sailing through the air.
 
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