NC Synthese

In my endless hunger for new experiences in the field of energetic
materials, ... blablabla ... yaddayadda ...

So I don't have the
inspiration right now to do a good introduction, big deal !!

The stuff
needed for making some NC:
- 30 ml of >95% H2SO4 (sulfuric acid)
- 25
grams of KNO3 (potassium nitrate)
- 2 grams of cellulose (I used toilet
paper)

So that is from left to right: toilet paper / KNO3 / H2SO4

Pour the H2SO4 with your KNO3 in a nice acid proof potty (glass is
fine) and stir until all the KNO3 is dissolved.
With these quantity's, the
temperature rises to about 50°C. Just let it rise, when making small batches
like this one,
hardly any temperature control is needed.

Sure, you see some red fumes due to hotspots in this reaction,
and a lot of HNO3 vapour evolves,
but if you do this in a fume hood or
outside, this shouldn't be a problem.

So once you have no big lumps of
KNO3 left in the reaction vessel, you can start adding the cellulose.
I
shred it in small pieces before I add it, because it stirs easier this way.

The pic to the left is after 1 toilet paper added, the pic to
the right is after 4.
Then there is just no room for any more ...

This mix of toilet paper + KNO3 + H2SO4 is left for some time,
about
as long as it takes to make the first piece of this page. (10 minutes)

How convenient ... :-)

Moving right on after those 10 minutes,
we pour the reaction vessel full of good old plain H2O,
to water down the
acid and loosen the hard cake. And then this is poured in a sieve .

Then more water is poured on the NC, and then a solution of some base to
neutralise it.

I used ammonia, since it is cheap and of high concentration in belgium
(rough guess: 2€ for 1 liter 15%)

Next day:

Now the NC is
totally dry, and a clear view of the yield is possible: 4 grams of NC !!
No
need to say I find it very cool that from 2 grams of cellulose, I can get 4
grams trinitrocellulose.

And even though I've been informed that the
ammonia could break the nitro-bonds in the NC
(so I suggest you use another
base), this apparently didn't happen to any much of an extent

A few pics of my yield ...

A little movie of some coarse NC burning

A little movie of some fine NC burning

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