Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1888-08-30

ton.
lie IS not many years since gun-cotton
was termed a high explosive, it being, as
1t Is, vastly superior in strength to gun
powder, but the discovery of never and
far more powerful explosive compounds
has taken the name away from gun cot
ton entirely. Powerful explosive as it is,
that substance is weak, compared with
the numerous compounds based upon
nitro-giycerine. A writer in the New
York Mail and Express gives q brief &C.
count of some Of these. This first high
explosive, according to the classification
of the present, was originally discovered
and put into practical use by q distin-
guished chemist. He made it by slowly
digesting ordinary giycerine at low
temperature, in mixture of equal parts
of nitric and sulphuric acids. In this
operation the oil slowly separates and
falls to the bottom of the vessel. It is of
q yellowish color, and has a sweetish, not
unpleasant taste. If ignited in the or
binary methods employed in burning
other infamable oils it burns in similar
manner to them, but if it be ignited by
percussion, it instantly explodes with in
conceivable force.
So sensitive is nitro giycerine to con-
cussiOp and percussion shat if it be drop
ped only few feet or struck even a
slight blow it will explode. An example
of this wonderful property occurred a
few years ago in Panama, when the sud
den ignition of quantity of it, convert
ed wharf and warehouse into mass
of unrecognizable fragments, inflicted
damage to the amoun6 of about million
dollars and suddenly ended number of
lives.
Careful investigation soon demonstrate
ed that the change which converted a
harmless substance like glycerins into
such tremendous explosive is made by
the substitution of molecules of nitrogen
an oxygen for atoms of hydrogen in the
original compound. When this is done
with great care, and the process is carried
throu2h to the last stage the resultant
liquid is nothing more than vast mass
of gas held together by the weakest and
most unstable thread.
1t wss seen that the same law of suhsti.
tuition could be applied to other bodies
with exactly the same results. If applied
gun cotton. Applied TO ordinary geIatine
it produces nitro geletine, with which
Lieutenant Zalinski recently performed
such remarkable feats at Sandy Hook. As
a matter of curiosity it has been applied
by chemists to great variety of sub
stances, and high explosives have been
produced from linen, sawdust, bread, cOf-
fairgrounds, tea leaves, cigarettes, hay,
ola Ill o&lo
ials. In fact, DR.. Chandler, who is in his
line the most distinguished authority in
the country, orce said that there was
hardly substance in ordinary use in
household life but what, by proper treat
ment could be converted into an expIo-
sive compound powerful enough to de-
stroy the largest building in the city.
The alarming number of accidents
which occurred from the used OF Mobiles
oil, as well as the great value of the dis
covery in mining, quarrying and excavat-
ing operations, called the attention of
scientists to the matter, and they went to
work to find some means of destroying
the danger without imparing the efficacy
of the compound. They soon discovered
that if nitro-g lycerine be absorbed by any
pulverUlent body it would after explode
only by percussion, and that the per-
cussion had to Re paratively power
full. It was mixed with fine clay made
into cartridges or nodded III forms, to be
sold in bulk. Some German chemists
employed sawaust as an absorbent, and
produced what is now know as dynamite.
Others have used plaster of paris, Chalk,
magnesia, FulIer's earth and other inert
powders, and have produced the varieas
oLob
and the like.
The LATEST discovery in this line was
very recently reported from London, and
Is that of new compound called carbo-
dynamite. It is composed Of ninety
parts of nitro glycerine absorbed by ten
parts of a variety of carbon. One of the
London papers has published an account
of a number of experiments made with
this new compound, which, it is asserted,
showed that it possesses several important
advantages over ordinary dynamite.
Among other advantages it is said to
have considerably greater power, and to
generate much less noxious vapor by ex-
plosion.
1t is difficult to overestimate the econo-
mic value of these high explosives. Some
ores, like the copper ores Of the upper
Lake Superior region, are almost proof
against gunpowder blasting. The rock
and metal together are so hard that two
charges out of every three of gunpowder
are fred out, as if from a cannon with
out SCATTERING the ore. IF the high ex-
plosives are used the expansive power is
found to be so great that the ore is
shattered in every direction. The differ
ence is so great, that while gunpowder
may be said to blow up and sideways all
the great high explosives blow downward
as we'll. This property has been utilized
in many ways, notably in the removal of
reefs and other distractions in the New
York harbor. Diamond reef, off the
Battery, and a number of the smaller
rocks near Hell Gate, we're destroyed by
lowering heavy charge of nitro glycer
enc Or dynamite directly upon the sub
AGO ueous surface OF the rock and explod-
ing it by means of an electric wire. In
every case the rocks were shattered and
the channel improved from one to five
feet in depth.
Farmers find the high explosive especi-
ally valuable in clearing new land of
stumps, as single cartridge will make
fine kindling wood of a stump that would
take two men week to remove. Another
and most reprehensible use of the eg
plosive is the killing of fish. One small
cartridge exploded under water will kin
every fish within 200 feet of it.
In shooting wells, too, the high sxplo-
siyes are invaluable. When we'll runs
dry two or three heavy charges are com
monty lowered to the bottom and expled
ed with an electric wire, the theory being
that the little veins or isures in the sub
stratum, through which the oil or water
so that the hujd TO longer finds its way