Do It Yourself Shooting - The Old Fashioned Way:

 A frustrated shooting mate has been picking my brain for clues about Do-it-Yourself shooting 'materiel' - if the gun banners keep on with their campaigning to remove everything useful from the retail life support system.

PERCUSSION CAPS and PRIMERS seem to be truly problematic for home manufacture .. whereas projectiles are easy-ish to cast from lead at home - as long as you remember that molten lead is damn hot and that the fumes will give you lead poisoning . 

Don't drip sweat or beer into molten lead .. KAPOW.. Owh  !!!!!! 

-  Black-powder  antique propellant is simple chemistry mixing of 3 obtainable constituents Potassium Nitrate KNO3 - Charcoal, & Sulfer. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7msEfWXdQU

- My guess is that an average IQ combined with reasonable mechanical ability & hand-eye co-ordination is all it takes to weigh - mix - compress - dry and granulate gun powder SAFELY - using only non-ferrous spoons, containers and scoops etc ... most of which are in your kitchen already.

Darwinian Natural Selection will ensure that humanity will somewhat benefit from the home manufacture of  GUN-POWDER  

 Ignition  seems to be the main ISSUE to sort when black powder shooting.

The early 'originals' used a burning stick then graduated to a red hot poker followed by a really clever smouldering 'SLOW MATCH' of salpeter impregnated cord. - Then some true "smart-arse" devised ways of holding shaped FLINT in vice-jaws and spring-scraping it down a hard steel 'frizzen' face above the TOUCH HOLE.

FLINTLOCKS still work fine once you get used to their little foibles - but they are not that easy for smart phone addicts to learn ..

Percussion Caps & 'Primers'

A non-toxic primer composition suitable for use in rimfire ammunition comprising, by dry weight percentage, dinitrobenzofuroxan salt, as the only primary explosive, in the range 25 to less than 50%, an oxidising agent in the range 10 - 40%, and a friction agent in the range 10 - 40%, said composition being free from tetrazene.

A priming mixture comprises aluminium silicate as the sensitizer, advantageously in a percentage higher than 10%, not exceeding 30% and preferably included between 15% and 25%. Combined with said sensitizer, the-mixture may further comprises a potassium compound, preferably potassium nitrate.

Link to an interesting piece with much information about primer manufacture .. there are lots of questions and answers for the truly curious and persistant:

Useful Link:

https://www.bevfitchett.us/ballistics/priming-compounds-and-primers-introduction.html

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Here's a challenge for an adventurous couple ... Rise at daybreak and both of you dress, each wearing ONLY a woolen blanket held by a length of string - shut the door behind you and stride bare-foot into the great outdoors. Make a kete basket to carry your foragings fruit and berries etc while hunting down a rabbit or two, or a few lizards, by throwing rocks ... you'll get better with practice eh. - Raw rabbit meat would be great tasting after a day or three of trying ... No 'Road-Kill" allowed.

What a wonderful exercise that would be for 'Gun Control' & pudendum expert  HERA COOK and Adjunct Associate Professor 'expert' about everything PHILIP ALPERS.

This academic-intellectual couple might be contained in a wild'n'wet Fiordland location by approved police methods and located after ten days by their fitted R/F ankle bracelets to appraise how successful their "armless" food harvesting and shelter building has been.

If at the first ten day inspection they seemed to be hungry they are to be supplied with a frozen Possum carcass - a real flint and steel striker fire making kit .. and the thirty page application forms for their Firearms Licences

- At a further ten day check they may be offered a pen to complete their firearms Licence Application Forms and - if eventually successful - be rented a flintlock or .22" rifle with five rounds.

.. DREAM ON

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The best kind of toy shops may stock imported toy caps .... for building home crafted percussion caps - punched from recycled aluminium soda cans ..

https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/search?search_string=toy%20caps

In olden times - matches could be found that were "Strike Anywhere" and contained White Phosphorus - which material might be extracted and used for ignition.

Wax Vesta matchworks, located in Dunedin made these until they were 'Banned' in 1911 for "safety reasons". Factory phosphorus residues likely resulted in an emergency call-out there as recently as 2022 ..

https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/it%E2%80%99s-match-phosphorous-dump-linked-factory-100-years-ago

"Phossy Jaw" - Phosphorus  needs very careful handling as it is not only very inflammable ... but it is an invasive chemical in our bodies - as are many substances .. LINK:

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/AS18980723.2.58.40

- In the first world war - women munitions workers were soon called Canary Girls from contact with TNT.. Their skin and hair turned YELLOW, they suffered deadly toxic liver diseases - and had babies that arrived BRIGHT YELLOW at birth.

Don't get careless when using strange chemicals - especially stuff that can go BANG.

Marty K.