I am considering modelling a dynamite factory on a future layout based on a prototype, the Atlas Powder Company in Senter, Michigan. This factory ran from 1910 to the 1960s, but I am planning on modelling it either in the 1910s or the 1930s (I haven't decided completely on that). As far as I can tell, the manufacturing process would require the importation of blasting caps, nitroglycerin (NG), soda, and dope (some sort of bulk stabilizer, I believe sawdust was the norm), and ship out finished dynamite to the region's mines. As far as I can tell the NG was somehow produced on site, although I am not sure of the process or the constituent components. I'd assume that most of the materials could be brought in and out via boxcar, but I am not sure. Does anyone know of any good texts or resources for modelling this rare subject?
First of all, you want to keep blasting caps as far away from dynamite and other explosives as possible. They are NEVER storred or shipped together and only brought together when setting up a shot.
As far as dynamite is concerned, it is nitroglycerine added to a non-explosive material to reduce its notorious insensitivity. Nitro is produced by adding glycerine and acids together
"The industrial manufacturing process often reacts glycerol with a nearly 1:1 mixture of concentrated sulfuric acid and concentrated nitric acid. This can be produced by mixing white fuming nitric acid—a quite expensive pure nitric acid in which the oxides of nitrogen have been removed, as opposed to red fuming nitric acid, which contains nitrogen oxides—and concentrated sulfuric acid. More often, this mixture is attained by the cheaper method of mixing fuming sulfuric acid, also known as oleum—sulfuric acid containing excess sulfur trioxide—and azeotropic nitric acid (consisting of about 70% nitric acid, with the rest being water).
The sulfuric acid produces protonated nitric acid species, which are attacked by glycerol's nucleophilic oxygen atoms. The nitro group is thus added as an ester C−O−NO2 and water is produced. This is different from an electrophilic aromatic substitution reaction in which nitronium ions are the electrophile."
Depending on the era, these components with either be shipped in carboys in boxcars or tank cars.
aa46eddc477f7877b7ebef31a479a648.jpg (800×373) (pinimg.com)
SOLD OUT: UTLX “Hercules Powder” 1949+ GA 1917-design 10000 Gal. Tank Car | Tangent Scale Models
"Dynamite is an explosive made of nitroglycerin, sorbents (such as powdered shells or clay) and stabilizers. It was invented by the Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Nobel in Geesthacht, Northern Germany and patented in 1867. It rapidly gained wide-scale use as a more powerful alternative to black powder."
"To solve this problem, Nobel sought to combine it with another substance that would make it safe for transport and handling but yet would not reduce its effectiveness as an explosive. He tried combinations of cement, coal, and sawdust, but was unsuccessful. Finally, he tried diatomaceous earth, fossilized algae, that he brought from the Elbe River near his factory in Hamburg, which successfully stabilized the nitroglycerin into a portable explosive."
"Dynamite was first manufactured in the U.S. by the Giant Powder Company of San Francisco, California, whose founder had obtained the exclusive rights from Nobel in 1867. Giant was eventually acquired by DuPont, which produced dynamite under the Giant name until Giant was dissolved by DuPont in 1905.[11] Thereafter, DuPont produced dynamite under its own name until 1911–12 when its explosives monopoly was broken up by the U.S. Circuit Court in the "Powder Case". Two new companies were formed upon the breakup, the Hercules Powder Company and the Atlas Powder Company, which took up the manufacture of dynamite (in different formulations) subsequently.
Currently only Dyno Nobel manufactures dynamite in the US. The only facility producing it is located in Carthage, Missouri, but the material is purchased from Dyno Nobel by other manufacturers, who put their labels on the dynamite and boxes."
The solid, non-explosive filler components, heavy paper to make cylinders that will be filled to make sticks and wood and fasteners to make boxes and crates would come in via boxcar
The crates of dynamite would ship in boxcars. The loaded cars would have to be separated from the locomotive and caboose by a number of "cover" cars
"As a cover car...the FRA requires at least one non hazardous car between the locomotive and any hazardous loaded car...five non hazardous cars if available or depending on what the hazardous car contains"
Depending on the era, special smoke stacks (steam) or spark arrestors (diesel) would be required on locos servicing the plant. One possibility that was often used was a "fireless" steam locomotive
Fireless locomotive - Wikipedia
A conversion kit is available in HO for a Bachman switcher
Building an HO Scale Fireless Steam Locomotive - YouTube
Your tax money at work - US Govt film on dynamite
https://youtu.be/rUP3IhbCuq8
allegedlynerdyallegedlynerdy wrote the following post yesterday: I am considering modelling a dynamite factory on a future layout based on a prototype, the Atlas Powder Company in Senter, Michigan.
Welcome to the forum! Your first posts are moderated, but that will clear up after you post several times.
Be sure to post more! We are always interested in new layouts and questions about anything to do with model railroads.
York1 John
Google 'kieselguhr' for an idea of the original material Nobel used for phlegmatizing. An interesting discussion of dynamite composition is found in the patent discussion here:
https://patents.google.com/patent/US4595430A/en
which also mentions 'ethylene glycol dinitrate' (EGDN) as a desensitizer.
Ammunition production often involved considerable physical separation between steps in explosive or propellant preparation. I would expect this for industrial explosives as well.
Initiators like caps usually use a completely different chemistry, and while a company like Hercules or Atlas would have branded versions of dynamite and caps, they would almost surely not co-locate manufacturing for the two.
Nitroglycerine will seperate from its desensitzers over time. If the outside of a stick of dynamite shows dark spots, the nitroglycerine has seperated, this is called weeping. You DO NOT want to handle a bad stick of dynamite with anything but kid gloves. It is VERY sensative, just looking at it and it could blow up in your face.
A dynamite factory will recieve clay (stbilizer/binder), glycerine and acids (nitric and/or suphuric) plus any packing material and will ship out spent acid and maybe boxed dynamite (output could be all by truck.)
An explosives factory would recieve ammonium nitrate and fuel among other chemicals.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
A small tangent to this interesting thread.
Upon America's involvement in the second world war. Boxcars hauling munitions had a large white wash X painted on both sides of the car denoting it's very hazardous cargo. It was later removed due to the ease of targeting such cars by somebody who didn't approve of the involvement or enemy saboteurs. Instead notes were pinned to the tack boards. Flat switching was advised over humping munition laden cars.
This was before the implementation of hazmat placards.
Pete.
I had an O-scale Lionel exploding boxcar that was painted red and had EXPLOSIVES on the side in big white letters. Yeah, I was just a kid then.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Yes, based on the research of the specific prototype that is inspiring putting this industry in, the storage site was quite far out.
Here is the best map I have been able to find of the factory itself. (Note: the narrow gauge rail was added in the late 1950s and ran on battery powered 2' gauge locomotives. Before that they used horse drawn carts to transport materials on site).
Also the 1954 USGS quad, to give a better sense of the scale of the operation.
Suffice it to say, having far apart loading and unloading facilities, and a wide area for storage, is an ideal. Some selective compression will, of course, occur, but this will be a larger industry if I end up including it on the layout.
Hazmat placards were in use since at least WW1. They weren't the same as modern ones but hazmat rules were used and developed by the AAR Bureau of Explosives.
dehusmanHazmat placards were in use since at least WW1.
Spotting this car right outside the depot (and probably the agent's home) was probably not too comforting to know.
Ophir_Colorado_RGS by Edmund, on Flickr
Ophir_Colorado_RGS_3721-crop by Edmund, on Flickr
Cheers, Ed
There were exceptions to the rules for handling explosives for narrow guage railroads but the restriction about leaving cars of explosives next to stations or under bridges was not among the exceptions.
On the other hand if they are unloading the car into the freight portion of the station, does it matter?
By the way, if anybody wants more info on per-1970's hazmat, a copy of the presentation I made to the OpSig is on my website.
PowerPoint Presentation (wnbranch.com)
and the video of the presentation is on You Tube:
2020-10-25 Virtual Meetup - Hazardous Materials by Dave Husman; Lee Nicholas' Utah Colorado Western - YouTube
Thanks Dave.
Was there a placard size rule or a placement regulation? I once had a yellow with red lettering 5 inch by 5 inch card that said explosives. My childhood friends dad was a railroad cop and would bring us stuff for our train rooms. (Basement).
Dupont was a big explosives maker in the US. Researching them might be useful. Shane
A pessimist sees a dark tunnel
An optimist sees the light at the end of the tunnel
A realist sees a frieght train
An engineer sees three idiots standing on the tracks stairing blankly in space
wrench567Was there a placard size rule or a placement regulation? I once had a yellow with red lettering 5 inch by 5 inch card that said explosives.
Thereare are all sorts of placards for all sorts of packages and vehicles, that might be a placard for a package rather than a railroad car. Yes the railroad placards have minimum size, similar to today's placards and the size changed over the years.
NVSRRDupont was a big explosives maker in the US. Researching them might be useful.
Dupont had a gunpowder works north of Wilmington, DE. It has been preserved as the Hagley Museum and Library (an EXCELLent resource for industrial research, with an extensive on line image gallery). They also had a cellulose nitrate (gun cotton) explosives plant at Carney's Point, NJ.
At some point the Dupont's sons had a falling out because one wanted to fous on blasting powder and the other wanted to focus on dynamite, so they split up and the dynamite brother founded the Hercules explosives company. Later they reconciled and Hercules was merged into the Dupont family of businesses.
In Wilmington there was a company called National Pyrites. Pyrite, also known as "fools's gold", seemed like an odd thing to be working with. While researching industries in the area I found that if you cook pyrite with steam, the sulfur comes out and gives you sulfuric acid. The sulfuric acid was shipped to Carney's Point, where it was cooked with nitrates, giving nitric acid. Cotton waste would be cooked in nitric acid to create gun cotton. Gun cotton was the used in explosives, propellant in artillery and naval guns and cellulose nitrate which was used to make early film. If you look south of the mouth of the Christiana River in Wilmington DE, you can still see the the remains of the Pigeon Point car float slip for the car float to Carney's Pt., NJ (also visible on the other side of the Delaware River). If you look about a half mile or so south of that you can just make out another pier that used to go out in the Delaware River. That is the Deep Water pier. It was used to load ships with explosives so they wouldn't be in downtown Wilmington.
Dave.
Was that the pier that exploded? The History Guy on YouTube did an episode about an exploding pier.
Thanks for the info.
Not that I know of. Numerous other piers exploded, and the gunowder works exploded a couple times, but not the pier.
wrench567Was that the pier that exploded?
July 17, 1944 Port Chicago, California?
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/port-chicago-disaster
December 6, 1917 Halifax, NS?
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-great-halifax-explosion
Wikipedia probably has more information.
I live not far from the decommissioned Ravenna Arsenal which was situated between the B&O and the Erie east-west main lines. There were a few mishaps there but nothing too disastrous. A box car did roll over one time (note explosives plackard again) but I cannot find any other details about the incident.
NYC_xm2 by Edmund, on Flickr
I also recall a boxcar explosion that a hot brake shoe had set the wood flooring on fire. If I recall correctly a rail enthusiast tried to warn railroad officials but communication took a little longer than what we're used to today and the resulting explosion was devastating.
More here:
https://www.insensitivemunitions.org/history/railroad-train-fires-and-munition-explosions/
Good Luck, Ed
Could it be the Black Tom explosion during 1916, in New York harbor, caused by German sabeteours trying to deny munitions to the Allies or, as Ed posted, Port Chicago, in 1944? A more recent disaster and the one Ed refers to was the 1973 detonation of bombs in Southern Pacific's Roseville Yard, in Antelope, CA. It was caused by sticking brakes igniting the wood floor of a boxcar. The Roseville disaster is well documented on Youtube.
NVSRR Dupont was a big explosives maker in the US. Researching them might be useful. Shane
I believe, based on the research of my prototype, that the dynamite factory prototype that I am working off of was a collaboration between Dupont and one of the local mining conglomerates, in fact. In that case I am assuming that they'd be shipping in blasting caps, glycerine, acids, and the dope, and shipping out the final assembly dynamite for delivery to the local mines. Does that seem like a reasonable I/O flow for such an industry to you fine folks?Additionally, how would the glycerine and sulfuric acid be transported in bulk? Would they be using chemical tank cars in the pre-war period?
It was the Black Tom explosion. The History Guy did a great story on it. THG has quite a few railroad history stories if you ever want to look him up.
We should probably start another thread. My heartfelt apologies to the OP.
Blasting caps would not be anywhere near dynamite manufacturer, storage or transport. The quarry I worked at blasted at least once a week. The detonators would not arrive until the amonium nitrate truck has left the property. The shot was initiated remotely and traveled through plastic tubing to each hole. The shot couldn't go off without a delegation of officials.
I'm sure the rules were similar in earlier eras.
wrench567 Blasting caps would not be anywhere near dynamite manufacturer, storage or transport. The quarry I worked at blasted at least once a week. The detonators would not arrive until the amonium nitrate truck has left the property. The shot was initiated remotely and traveled through plastic tubing to each hole. The shot couldn't go off without a delegation of officials. I'm sure the rules were similar in earlier eras. Pete.
That may be true of modern safety standards, but the historic site I am looking at had a blasting cap storage site.
allegedlynerdy In that case I am assuming that they'd be shipping in blasting caps, glycerine, acids, and the dope, and shipping out the final assembly dynamite for delivery to the local mines.
Are you modeling an explosive distributor or a manufacturer? A manufacturer probablwouldn't have blasting caps anywhere near their facility. A distributor might get in blasting caps and packaged dynamite and then distribute that to the mines. Remember explosives are used in relatively small quantities. A 70 ton tank car of glycerine, a 70 ton car of nitric acid, a 70 ton covered hopper of clay is going to make LOT of dynamite. A stick of dynamite weighs about 1/3 to 1/2 pound. 210 tons is equivalent to 800,000 to 1,200,000 sticks of dynamite. 210 tons is the bomb load of a dozen B-17's. That's a LOT of dynamite. They might have recieved carloads of feedstocks, but they probably weren't using spots every day, maybe a a couple times a month or so.
Going to Historic Aerials, they have an image of the plant from 1938 and the only place it appears there are railroad cars is over by the magazines, there appear to be three of four boxcars.
Yes it's rail served, but it doesn't appear busy from a rail traffic standpoint.
The arrangement is very similar to the DuPont facility at Hagley, even to the narrow gauge railroad.
Which leads me to ask if its a dynamite or a blasting powder plant? The reason I ask is on the map shows "soda storage". Soda (sodium nitrate) is more associated with blasting powder. They might not be making dynamite at all.
I guy I worked with 40 years ago was from Houghton.
Based on my research of the site, the location is described as manufacturing both dynamite and blasting powder. If I pursue this further I will be in contact with archivists at the university in Houghton, which has a collection about the company. In short though, the mining in the copper country was quite intensive at the period when the factory was originally constructed, accounting for 95% of copper mined in the US and the largest single copper mining region in the world. However, due to its isolation, there was a lot of high overhead cost from shipping in necessary materials, which is part of why the Atlas Company was built, to replace an older factory which had a poor safety standard and outlived its useful life. I believe that the spur in the north-east quarter of the map was used to provide coal to the factory's on-site powerplant. The primary loading/unloading would, I believe, be done off of the switchback in the south-west.
Ya I think blasting powder / gunpowder is more in demand than dynamite sticks. But then, Wikipedia does mention that when DuPont's monopoly was broken up between Atlas Powder Co. and Hercules Powder Co.:
" Atlas received the explosives manufacturing portion of Du Pont's business (including the facilities acquired from the Giant Powder Company), while Hercules received the gunpowder portion."
Since the factory in question is an Atlas one, it does seem likely it is doing dynamite rather than powder - but more research is needed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hercules_Inc.
Getting back around to the original point of this thread:Inflow to industry:Glycerine (low volume)(tank cars)Dope (medium volume)(box cars?)Blasting caps? for distribution/constituent components to assemble blasting caps(explosives-marked box cars)Coal for the on-site power plantOutput:Dynamite (explosive marked box cars)Blasting caps (explosives marked box cars)