Tempering Black Powder

[319]

How are you folks mixing the water with the mill dust for corning?I have been using a bowl and a wooden spoon. This works ok for small baches but I would like to work with a larger amount.

Are there any food mixers that would work?

Thanks

Sam

[nater]

I do not corn my powder, but when I granulate it, I mix the water in with a spoon and screen the mix several times to distribute the moisture evenly. I do the same when I make comps to pump with 5%-10% water, which is in the ball park for corning. I usually make 1 kilo at a time, so this works well for me.

 

For food mixers, the Kitchen Aid mixers use an orbital pattern which mixes everything wihout touching the side of the bowl. Another pyro on another site says the commercial producers use commercial kitchen mixers and he uses a Kitchen Aid with the bowl that raises and lowers in his shop for blending comps with the paddle.

Edited April 4, 2014 by nater

[Mumbles]

My hands work just fine.

[Nessalco]

When corning, I'll usually wet 3 kilos at a time. I use a plastic bucket with a good lid. Add 3-4% water, shake like the dickens, then push through a 20-mesh screen. This will nicely distribute the water. It will still appear fairly dry - the water works mostly as a lubricant and dust reducer.

 

Kevin

[TYRONEEZEKIEL]

For corning, I use 7.7g water/alcohol mix for every 227g BP. So right around 3.3%. This is the perfect amount of water for corning. All you gotta do is just work it in with your hands like playing with playdoh. I use a stir stick at first then just squish it around. All you need is the BP to all adhere together. The press will really force the water throughout the comp if its in that state. Theres no need to blend it all up mechanically, although a kitchen aid mixer might work well. I just think it would be too dusty to even bother with it. It only takes a minute or so to squish all the moisture around.

[Arthur]

Put the powder and the water into a zip top bag knead the lot and leave it to stand for a long while. You can get a minimum of water mixed evenly that way.

[FlaMtnBkr]

Spray bottle and use a scale to weigh comp and water as you add it. Put some plastic wrap over the top if you want to let it rest. Put a little alcohol in the water to help break the surface tension.

 

Then screen like normal.

Edited April 4, 2014 by FlaMtnBkr

[319]

Thanks for all the help. My wife loaned me her Kitchen Aid mixer and it does work but like anything else I will need to learn what works best.

I made 2 batches 200g and 600g + 6% water/alcohol mix. First batch the wafers came out fine. The second batch some of the wafers had the "dreded white spots" caused by not being mixed enough.

I try to make the wafers aprox the thicknes of the grain size I need. This is no problem for The larger grain size(lift powder, powder wedge,cannon ect) the smaller grain ( ffg,fffg) are harder to make.

My powder die(3"PVC pipe3" tall) sits flush in table top and has a piston that moves up and down in the die by screw thred.

With the piston at the hight to give the proper thicknes when pressed rake powder across table top to fill die.Index piston down

drop in thin Al disk and repeat. I have found that 300g at a time works best after that the thin wafers don't compress well.

When the die is full I press until the gague will hold 4000psi.

Thanks agin for your help

Sam

[Arthur]

My wife loaned me her Kitchen Aid mixer ...

On condition that you bought her a new one!