Maybe I should address this question to our Canadian friends, but others may have an experience with this. Has anyone noticed a change in flintlock performance at really low temps? I rarely see below zero temps in Indiana, and if I do probably choose not to head for the range. I'm particularily interested in spark production at zero or below. Any thoughts??
Regards,
Pletch
Pletch,
In theory here.
Black powder is still used as an intermediate primer in large-caliber artillery and high-altitude aircraft ammunition because of its ability to ignite and burn at low temperatures where it becomes most difficult to ignite smokeless powders.
But! The thing with ignition and combustion of black powder is that you have to "pump heat into it to get heat out of it".
With BP you must heat the potassium nitrate to its melting temperature and then keep heating it to its decomposition temperature where it will then release oxygen to support additional combustion. So to get it going at low temperatures it take more calories of heat to reach the decomposition temperature. So as the temperature goes down it will slow down the ignition phase of the powder combustion.
I have never seen anything published as to just how much the ignition and combustion is slowed. I would imagine that the slowing is greater when the powder is burned in the open, as in a flintlock pan, versus in a closed tube, as in the barrel.
Oh No! Another project in the thinking stage?
Bill K.