The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1890-12-08
POWERFUL DESTROYER.
The Navy Experimenting With a
New Compound as foreibIe
as Gun Cotton.
Expected to Be Very Useful In
q Fight at Close
Quarters.
A Hundred Pounds of EInmensite Ex-
plOded on a Vessels Deck Would
Probably Disable Her.

WAsHrNGToN, Dec. THE ordnance
bureau of the navy is still experimenting
with the high explosive invented by DR..
Stephen H. Emmens and known as emmen-
site. and it is believed the results thus far
obtained indicate that another most inn
portant offensive agency will soon be at the
disposal of the navy.
The experiments show that the compound,
when exploded with illuminate detonator,
has about the same explosive force as gun
cotton; that it is insensible to friction IN
impact, and only locally ignited by flame
that it is not effected by great changes in
temperature nor injured by freezing and
thawing, and that it loses little of its
strength after being repeatedly saturated
with water and dried.
large number of projectiles loaded with
it have been fired from powder guns with
out single premature explosion or accident
of any kind and the bureau is now making
preparations to test it on larger
scale. For thispurpose a special
ton ordnance foundry capable OF
throwing projectile containing bursting
charge of 100 pounds of emmensite. This
gun is to be of steel, built up much az the
regular service rife, but will not be 80 long.
1t will be rather a rided mortar, longer in
the tube, however, than the ordinary type of
rified mortars being built for the army. The
tube will be short enough to avoid the
danger Of premature explosion by excessive
gun, as might result il the long service gun
were used, and it will still be long
enough to give much greater range, and con-
sequently greater accuracy can be obtained
than with the ordinary mortar. As soon as
this gun is completed it will be taken to the
new new proving ground at Indian Head, on the
Potomac, and 9 series of tests will be made
to ascertain the exact capabilities Of the
new explosive and the limitations of its
usefulness.
just what place it is destined to occupy
in the armament of war vessels will not be
definitely decided until after these expert
ments; but it is believed that it will be spe-
to fight at close quarters, such az the Am
men ram and the torpedo cruisers. The or
dinance bureau has always held that high
explosives in naval operations should be
fred from powder gun, and it is thought
the new gun will prove superior to the
cruiser Vesuvius is provided. The gun to
be built at the ordnance foundry can be
handled just the same rs the ordinary SER
vice gun in every respect, while the pneu-
matte guns of the Vesuvius are built into
her hull and can only be aimed by manceu-
wiring the vessel, and their range can only
be varied by varying the amount of air ad-
mitted to fire them.
If this new weapon is successfully devel-
oped its effectiveness will be extraordinary,
A single shell containing hundred pounds
of emmensite dropped on the deck of the
largest vessel afloat would probably disable
her, and the effect of its explosion against
even the thlckest armor plate might be very
serious.
DR.. Emmens has recently made another
invention that may be of great value to the
naval ordnance bureau. He has devised a
process by which nickel matte can be re-
duced in few days, and quality of nickel
produced especially we'll adapted for max
ing niokle steel. Nickel matte can only be
treated by chemical processes, and the
method heretofore in use requires months
to complete.