I can't get sulper what can I use insted? is grinded coal is good enough for BP? for how much time can I store BP? can I wet the BP to keep it for langer time? Get Tom's Book Introductory to Practical Pyrotechnics   Skylighter ay www.skylighter.com

I can't get sulper what can I use insted? is grinded coal is good enough for BP? for how much time can I store BP? can I wet the BP to keep it for langer time?

can I wet the BP to keep it for langer time? A small amount of water makes it MORE dangerous.  And even so, the water causes slow crystal growth of the KNO3 making it slower and slower...

I can't get sulper what can I use insted? Strictly speaking, if you don't use sulfur, then it isn;t black powder. And although there are some mixtures that don't contain sulfur that do burn, give off color, flash, or sit there...  none of them are exactly the same as BP.  So the question is this - what properties do you want your non-black-powder to have? There are a few black powder formulas that don't use any sulfur, hence they are called sulfurless powders . This was taken from page 55 of Ron Lancaster's book, Fireworks: Principles and Practice : Sulphurless powder consists of potassium nitrate 70.5% and charcoal 29.5% and is manufactured in much the same way [as ordinary BP].It is used mainly in priming and igniter compositions, particularily where they come into contact with magnesium. The sulphur in the ordinary black powder coupled with the moisture in the charcoal tend to accellerate the decomposition of the magnesium. As you can see, you can't really use sulfurless powder for something like lift, but it does have other uses. Stay green, Andrew K.