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Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: Winston Smith on May 16, 2006, 10:08:40 AM

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: Winston Smith on May 16, 2006, 10:08:40 AM

In explosive shells, which explosive substance was used?

This is for a school project. I appreciate your help.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: K Frame on May 16, 2006, 10:20:15 AM

A lot of nations had their own explosive mixtures.

Japan had Shimose, a picric acid derivative.

Others used variations on gun cotton, TNT, and the like.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: charby on May 16, 2006, 10:28:40 AM

I was thinking TNT for the Americans, but that is what popped in my head.

C

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: Stickjockey on May 16, 2006, 11:06:42 AM

The Brits used cordite a lot in their shells.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: Gewehr98 on May 16, 2006, 11:07:54 AM

Might've been Amatol, too. Amatol is a mixture of TNT and Ammonium Nitrate, intended to boost the effects of TNT.  They even named a town in New Jersey after it for the munitions produced there during WW1.

edited to add:

http://venus.atlantic.edu/amatol/index.html

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: K Frame on May 16, 2006, 11:23:59 AM

"The Brits used cordite a lot in their shells."

Not as a primary explosive; cordite is actually a pretty poor primary explosive.

Cordite was used extensively as a propellant. It's a double-based smokeless powder, in some ways not unlike Alliant's 2400.

Cordite's primarly composition is a combination of nitrocellulose and nitroglycerine combined with stabilizers and other compounds (including, in some formulations, vaseline).

One of the problems with some cordite compositions is that, like dynamite, it could "sweat" nitroglycerine. It's theorized by some that this led to the loss of at least one Royal Navy ship in the years prior to WW I, and it may have contributed to the losses of Queen Mary and several other British ships at the battle of Jutland.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: K Frame on May 16, 2006, 11:25:00 AM

Amatol.

That's the one I was thinking of.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: Preacherman on May 16, 2006, 02:47:59 PM

The overwhelming favorite in most WW1 artillery shells (the explosive filling, not the propellant) was lyddite, also known as picric acid.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyddite for details.

This was a fairly unstable explosive, and was gradually replaced by amatol and TNT over time - but for most of WW1, it dominated.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: grampster on May 16, 2006, 02:54:43 PM

When I was a kid, there was an unfinished picric acid plant about 5 miles from our house.  We used to pack a lunch and ride our bikes and play war in the underground bunkers that were to be used to store the explosive.  The war ended before the plant was finished.  It's now a golf course.  I remember when the blew the huge chimneys from the unfinished main plant.  I was in my teens in the late 50's.  That was really something to see.  All the bunkers were bulldozed and filled in for the links.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: Gewehr98 on May 16, 2006, 03:46:47 PM

Picric acid is interesting stuff.  My hometown high school in Baraboo, WI was evacuated one afternoon.  It appears the new chemistry teacher was cleaning the chemistry lab's storeroom of unneeded stuff, when he came across a jar with a faded label that said "Picric Acid", probably put there sometime between the world wars, and it was dry, not wet.  The Sauk County Sheriff's Bomb Squad needed little extra assistance to send the ballistic blanket sky-high when they remotely detonated the stuff in the football field.  

One would think the aftermath of the Halifax maritime explosion would've made for safer picric acid handling procedures.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: K Frame on May 16, 2006, 04:55:22 PM

Yep, that's probably been repeated many times across the country over the years.

As Sideshow Cecil said in The Simpsons, there might be a loud ringing in your ears, but fortunately you'll be nowhere near them.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: Stickjockey on May 17, 2006, 04:54:46 AM

Quote from: Mike Irwin

"The Brits used cordite a lot in their shells."

Not as a primary explosive; cordite is actually a pretty poor primary explosive.

D'Oh! Mike's right. Cordite was a propellant, not a primary explosive.

It looked like dried spaghetti noodles
cut to fit the casing:



Second one in from the right.

Title: Which explosive was used in WWI
Post by: Phantom Warrior on May 17, 2006, 09:46:45 AM

Quote from: Preacherman

The overwhelming favorite in most WW1 artillery shells (the explosive filling, not the propellant) was lyddite, also known as picric acid.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyddite for details.

This was a fairly unstable explosive, and was gradually replaced by amatol and TNT over time - but for most of WW1, it dominated.

Preacherman,
As I read Winston's post my first thought was "I bet Wikipedia would be the place to look..."