A NEW GUNPOWDER.

Hawke's Bay Weekly Times, Volume 1, Issue 14, 8 April 1867, Page 79

A NEW GUNPOWDER.

Every day some new discovery is -being made in the instruments and appliances of war, and the last invention promises cer-. tainly not to be -one:of , the least important. A Swiss inventor-'-, has discovered an explosive compound",which we believe ■ .has -been offered for experiment to our War Office authorities.- : It consists of a powder, the ingredients of which are as yet unknown, as they are the secret of the inventor This powder is.intended to be . used only- as a bursting charge-for shells-, or for explosive*- rifle bullets 5- in fact, it can be used as a charge for every species of projectile, r ahd its' force is so great that - a bullet charged witliit and fired from the ordinary Enfield rifle suffices to blow upthe caisson of an artillery waggon. What its effect would be when forming the. charge of the hollow projectiles of the heavier,species,.of- ordnance is as yet un» . known, as it has not hitherto been-expe-rimented.upon oh a large scale, bufjudging from that, produced by the very small quantity of the powder contained in a hol-low-missile fired from the ordinary rifle, it must pfovo a terrible engine of destruc* tion. " Although possessing such formidable explosive powers,, the .-composition is, .iu its ordinary condition,- one of the-safest known, as it only explodes when the hoi- .. ; low projectile., charged! with’it strikes some object when fired from a.; rifle ora piece of \ ordnance ; even the shell does not burst till it has penetrated the substance Agamim ;i wliich'"it strikes. A; bullet .charged,with this' substance- can be jfluug about aud , struck: without any explosion, resulting s- - from r the:roughest ing,thrown into, a- fire.-the,-bullet will be : fused)-' and: --no r explosion.: ensues.t;>s ,tUpon;:; siowiy and* without nearly m'toasame mauiier as-would A similar 4 'quantiity- j ~ of common sulphur. Th» ; mpdevqflusing it is exfcremely wmple, aa it is : eunply

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