Curtis and Harvey were one of the companies that merged after the First World War to form Explosives Trades Limited. This new company then changed its name to Nobel Industries; as Nobel's Explosives was the largest of the constituent companies. Following other mergers to form Imperial Chemical Industries Nobel Industries became the ICI Nobel division of the new company.
ICI Nobel concentrated explosives manufacturing, including black powder, at the old Nobel site at Ardeer in Scotland. Black powder production here ended in 1976, although the site continued to manufacture other explosives. ICI Nobel still sold black powder, but it was manufactured in Germany.
There was a major fire at Ardeer in 2007, when a large store of nitrocellulose went up, but there were no serious injuries. It was nothing to do with the IRA and it was 30 years after they'd closed down black powder production.
Many of us mourn the passing of Curtis and Harvey's TS6, although I still have a small amount of TS2.
That's a brief over-view. With luck Bill Curtis will be along to fill in the gaps.
Gentlemen I asked this question on another forum, because I to used Curtis's and Harveys Black powder as kid in the 1970s when it suddenly disappeared from down under.
Cheers
Heelerau
Thanks for the history lesson, Heelerau. The Curtis and Harvey powder Taylor and I used in our cannon in the late 60's at $0.95cents per pound was in the same cans we bought in the 70's for our rifles.
At that time, Lyman came out with it's first Black Powder Handbook, wherein it described the Curtis and Harvey powder as developing less pressure and velocity than-did Dupont or GOX they used in their book.
We have been told for decades that the Curtis and Harvey #6 was the very best powder made back in the late 1800's for BP ctg. guns & that THAT powder was the one most BP ctg. guns were regulated for.
If one reads testing by modern people, they will find that until Old Enysford and Swiss powders became available, BP Ctg guns would not regulate with any of the other powders available, including GOEX, which is more powerful than the Curtis and Harvey powder we had in the 70's.
In my recent testing against what Lyman chronographed data back in that first book, my .58 rifle with 24" barrel delivers, & 75gr. of 2f, slightly more velocity than Lyman's identical bl. length .58 with the same patch and ball, but with 110gr. 2f GOX. In other data, their GOX was far and above faster than the C&H they also tested.
D/phar has noted here, time and again, that the 1970's era C&H 3F was of slightly less power than GOEX 2F and their C&H 2F was closer to low grade musket powder in power.
On the other hand, I found that C&H to be quite accurate in my .58 S. Hawken Taylor built for me, however it would not shoot well at 100 or 150yards with less than 140gr., 22 thou patch and .575" ball. "Quite accurate" is roughly 2" groups off bags.
