The Chemistry of Powder and Explosives - Sciencemadness Dot Org

338 DYNAMITE AND OTHER HIGH EXPLOSIVES
Straight Dynamite
Straight dynamite containing 60% or less of mixed nitric
esters—but not more because of the danger of exudation—is used
extensively in the United States, but has found little favor in
FIGURE 85 Dynamite Manufacture. (Courtesy Hercules Powder Company.)
Rubbing the dry ingredients of dynamite through a screen into
the bowl of a mixing machine.
Europe. It is made simply by mixing the explosive oil with
the absorbent materials; the resulting loose, moist-appearing or
greasy mass, from which oil ought not to exude under gentle
pressure, is put up in cartridges or cylinders wrapped in paraffined
paper and dipped into melted paraffin wax to seal them against
moisture.
The strength of straight nitroglycerin dynamite is expressed by
the per cent of nitroglycerin which it contains. Thus, "4O9&
straight nitroglycerin dynamite" contains 40% of nitroglycerin,