The experiments upon which I have been engaged for some time past, in connexion with the manufacture and properties of gun-cotton, have brought under my notice some interesting points in the behaviour of both gun. cotton and gunpowder, when exposed to high temperatures, under particular conditions. I believe that these phenomena have not been previously observed, at any rate to their full extent, and I therefore venture to lay before the Royal Society a brief account of them. Being anxious to possess some rapid method of testing the uniformity of products obtained by carrying out General von Lenk’s system of manufacture of gun-cotton, I instituted experiments for the purpose of ascertaining whether, by igniting equal weights of gun-cotton of the same composition, by voltaic agency, within a partially exhausted vessel connected with a barometric tube, I could rely upon obtaining a uniform depression of the mercurial column, in different experiments made in atmospheres of uniform rarefaction, and whether slight differences in the composition of the gun-cotton would be indicated, with sufficient accuracy, by a corresponding difference in the volume of gas disengaged, or in the depression of the mercury. I found that, provided the mechanical condition of the gun-cotton, and its position with reference to the source of heat, were in all instances the same, the indications furnished by these experiments were sufficiently accurate for practical purposes. Each experiment was made with fifteen grains of gun-cotton, which were wrapped compactly round the platinum wire; the apparatus was exhausted until the column of mercury was raised to a height varying from 29 inches to 29·5 inches. The flash which accompanied the deflagration of the gun-cotton was apparently similar to that observed upon its ignition in open air ; but it was noticed that an interval of time always occurred between the first application of heat (or incandescence of the wire) and the flashing of the gun-cotton, and that during this interval there was a very perceptible fall of the column of mercury. On several occasions, when the gun-cotton, in the form of “roving,” or loosely twisted strand, was only laid over the wire, so that it hung down on either side, the red-hot wire simply cut it into two pieces, which fell to the bottom of the exhausted vessel, without continuing to burn. As these results appeared to indicate that the effects of heat upon gun-cotton, in a highly rarefied atmosphere, differed importantly from those observed under ordinary circumstances, or in a very imperfect vacuum, a series of experiments, under variously modified conditions, was instituted, of which the following are the most important.
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