People should know that they shouldn't open the top right away after cooking their char. It's hard not to take a peek but if you do it will start to burn and turn into ash. Wait at least 20minutes for it to cool.

The time you invest into making these projects is immensely beneficial for others who want to make their own blackpowder. In other words, Thank you!

Have you read Like Fire and Powder by Brett Gibbons? It’s about the historic production of gun powder at the Waltham Abbey gunpowder mills. Goes into detail about the manufacturing processes they used. Gets fairly specific on the ingredients they used. There’s a whole chapter on charcoal. Really short but interesting read.

I've been binge watching your channel for the last several days. I started black powder activities during the covid crap in 2020, but life got in the way. So now I'm back to my adventure to turn my money into smoke and noise. I'm learning from your videos. Thank you for your work. Subscribed.

During the late 1880's they started making brown powder for Naval cannons. They would make charcoal but stop before it turned black. Supposedly they also eliminated most of the Sulphur. Supposedly it was slower burning which gave higher velocities in longer barrels. Without the Sulphur it was harder to ignite but that was offset a little bit by brown charcoal being a little easier to ignite since it had more volatiles left in it. I'd love to see you experiment with some. Maybe even do a series where you experiment with making charcoal anywhere from still brown to ultra cooked and see what differences you get.

I’ve been making small batches of charcoal for drawing or to make black grain filler for decades. You can make small test batches with an Altoid mint can. In winter, I put it in the wood stove and remove it when it stops venting.

I’m a machinist for a lumber mill and have access to unlimited amount of pine shavings. I have wondered how pine would work for a long time.

I’ve even made charcoal by purchasing a grape vine wreath at hobby lobby. Breaking it up, throwing in the retort (can with hole) and cooking it. Works pretty well!!

What if you made charcoal out of some weird stuff like particle board, balsa wood, twigs from trimming the hedges, a book, toilet paper, cardboard, puzzle pieces, cereal boxes, oh you get the idea.

Making the charcoal is the hardest part. I like to ball mill it into powder by itself first as it is less likely to explode in the mill. I also separately mill the KNO3. The Sulphur is usually already a fine powder. Milling it aa together takes a bit less time if everything is fine dust.

Good one Jake, I have the sherwin williams model pyrolyzer myself. For sure you want to get the bark off as usually there is a lot of sandy grit that accumulates there as well as its typically the most sapiest part.

I've used a metal paint can alot of times for charcoal, but I would start with the hole down and after the steam boils out, it becomes a flamable gas (cars, generators can run on it) and so provides a lot of it's own fuel and when that flaming slows, then I would flip it over so could tell better when it is close to done. Then I put a penny over the hole so no oxygen can get into the charcoal and form ash, until it's cool. Some times when when charcoaling sawdust and shavings, I would put a can or jar in the center because that part would sometimes not get done and that took care of that.

One of the cool things about this is grabbing a little bit of the charcoal for your flint and steel fire kit and lighting your campfire by putting a small piece of charcoal in your unloaded flintlock pan and tossing a spark on it to light the tinder that lights the campfire you use to roast your dinner on after a day in the field.

I’m gonna save y’all a lot of time with this tip… I make my charcoal with Cedar picket fence slats from Home Depot. Be selective when picking slats. Avoid knots! I shoot my BP firearms with my own self made BP ONLY! I have never used commercial BP, or Pyrodex. Good BP must be made from “Softwood” charcoal (Coniferous wood), with a few hardwood exceptions. Willow is actually considered “Hardwood” but does make excellent charcoal for BP.

Some of the guys that I know that make their own also made basically a thermocouple controlled Kiln. They can hold temp between 530 and 550 all day and do about a 2 pound batch at a time. Another easy to find item that works good for powder is Sumac (non poisonous) and Heavenly Tree; although heavenly tree can make some VERY light powder and pretty much requires pucking.

Yes it was very helpful thank you so much. I've got all kind of Grapevine around here and in my vicinity actually all over the county so I'm going to give that a try and see how it works. Thanks again for the video it certainly was helpful. Keep ye powder dry!

Very similar to making biochar. I was told to take it to 800o for three hours when making a 55gal drum full inside of 400 gal oil tank.We used very dry wood or chicken manure. I knew the gasses were volatile so tried it next time with a copper tune running from the barrel . Lit it and it burned the wood gas for over an hour.

You taught me alot. Thanks keep it up . Always looking forward for your videos.

I really want to say thank you. Before i saw any of your videos my blackpowder was not very good. Worse then goex. But what i have learned threw you. My powder its so much better.

Good to know about using grapevine. I have mountains of that. Thanks for the video.

Your video definitely doesn't suck and I have it a thumbs up.

Great information. I like to put my retort (I think that's the official name of the cooking vessel) in the center of my fire pit. I also typically use very dry, spalted alder. There's something about the wood being on the verge of rotting that gives it some extra speed. Big leaf maple wood also makes some decent charcoal. The nice thing about not using propane is the $$ saved.

Thank you for taking the time to make this video. I found it very interesting and I learned a lot. Answered many of my questions.

I make mine on the grill using the cast iron pan heater. It’s also propane fueled. I use a large soup can with the lid cut off most of the way. Willow is what I have easy access too.

Since I have 2 face cords of split seasoned willow in the shed, I guess I am obligated to try this method. I'm basically sitting on a gold mine. Lol Thanks for another great video!

Really appreciate you doing these Jake. You are the guy I point people to when I get asked about this!

Thanks for this vid. I eventually plan on making charcoal on a modest scale, but using a paint can will work with what I have on hand right now. And I'm in luck...I have about 40 willows along my property line! Not sure which variety they are (northern Wyoming), but I do know the wood burns hot and clean, so bet it will make decent charcoal.

You should wash the charcoal with hot rain water afterwards you be amazed as to how much potassium hydroxide is left in the charcoal.great video 🤩

I use one of those giant Christmas cookie tins. I used northern catalpa wood, which is a fast growing, soft deciduous tree. I cook it in my outdoor fire pit. I haven't made any powder with it yet and will report back when I do. I've never heard of that species being used but it seems to fit the bill in terms of properties. I had a large branch of it that I trimmed last winter and figured I'd give it a try. I've got white pine, eastern red cedar and buckthorn in the area but the catalpa tree is actually on my property.

I have been making charcoal for along time and I have have found that using a large old dutch oven works really well. I use the charcoal for forging mostly and hard wood seems to be the best for that. I wonder if a small cast iron dutchy would work well for making finer softwood charcoal like you use in black powder. I have learned alot from your channel's videos and will try making my own powder for my rifles sometime. Thanks for the info.

Good video as always lots of knowledge there Thanks allot

I never thought about the temperature affecting quality. Hmm 🤔 Thanks for sharing your experience.

Good evening! The Chinese believed that the best gunpowder was obtained from the coal of the Chinese ash or Aylanthus chinensis (Fraxinus chinensis). It's a weed tree and not hard to find. You can use the core of Elderberry (Sambucus). You can use the wood of the Silvery Loch (Elaeagnus commutata). Its wood is similar to Sea Buckthorn.

I think you need a blend of charcoals hard woods retain a higher tannin resin content while the soft woods give a more pure carbon, but as you have found fouling issue. Tannins will also slow the burn, but should give a better polish. Have you tried tumbling with coal (anthracite) instead of graphite? Other things to try is a mix that has more external sulfur, like applied in the polishing tumble.. no sulfur polished with a sulfur mix?

Interesting as always, thank you Jake.

Getting really good results with willow but also have had pretty good results with cottonwood.

Good basic helpful info! Excellent!👍👍

I have never really compared, new to making my own, but I have made my charcoal with an electric smoker. Instead of the pellets from the store, I break up small bits of wood to smoke with. I have used wild cherry, muscadine(wild grape), and others, with good results as smoking wood. I have also used the charcoal afterwards for powder. Seems fine, although, like I said, I have nevger compared with other charcoals. Oh yeah, I know you already know, use green wood.

Based on your latest video, I expect that Swiss has some ‘secret recipe’ for their charcoal. There are so many factors, chip size, age, dryness, heartwood vs sapwood, temperature its cooked at, cook time, that dialing it in could get interesting. I do know that those IR thermometers are not particularly accurate, angle and distance changes the reading a lot. You might be able to find a cheep electric heat treat kiln that you could set exact temperatures on, and really dial in your results there.

Well done and good presentation. thanks

I was taught to put the can over smoldering black willow and then scrape the residue that collects on the inside of the can. Your way keeps your hands alot cleaner.

Thank you , that was a very informative video on making charcoal .

love your videos. Very Informative. And helpful. But I would like to mention something I was told by a 40 year veteran gunsmith of the air force. Black powder is not a propellent. It is an explosive. I am not nit picking here so please dont think that I am. I am just saying what he told me.

No buckthorn here in Michigan that I found...but I do have an abundance of willow. I have some weeping willow but I haven't been over to the "owner" of the shop that it's near to ask if I can pick up some of the fallen detritus from it. I do have a lot of Peachleaf Willow that I have access to and the bp i make from it has outperformed Shuetzin and gets real close Swiss.

Excellent tutorial and information! 👍

Disposable chopsticks used in Japan are made of aspen wood. It costs about 200 yen for 100 pieces. Paulownia wood is also readily available.

Hi, this is a great video and I appreciate all the info. Would Muscadine (mountain grape) vine work. I have never made my own powder but I'm really thinking of trying it.

Video didn't suck. Much appreciated. Getting low on 3F and not in the mood to order a 25-lb minimum of flaming dirt from the usual suspects when I only need a few pounds for the next year or two. Just made first charcoal with low-BTU turkey burner and popcorn tin. Used sheet metal shield around and on top to hold heat. Kept below 600 at bottom of can per IR gun. Used red alder (rough edge trimmings from cabinet lumber) for one batch and split/debarked standing dead chinaberry for the other (seemed like a good choice? Maybe not). The chinaberry smoke must have killed every mosquito within seven hundred yards, nasty stuff full of creosote who knows what kind of toxic sludge, made green smoke out the vent on the tin! Made nice charcoal in the end, though. Will report after milling some powder.

Great stuff, thank you for our great work

You have mentioned that you get your buckthorn Alder imported from Ohio. Is this a private connection or is it available to the public. I would be interested in some myself. Can't get it locally.

Very interesting 👍👍👍

I really like this channel.

We have tons of Alder here in WA but I'm wondering if Black Locust would be worth a try. It would be awesome to actually find a use for them crap thorny trees. They are a very dense tight grained wood.

My question is Why not buy a bag of charcoal briquettes? Or Chunk charcoal ? Great videos by the way.

Very informative and useful. Thanks

you know Jake blasting powder is a different mix to blackpowder it's 60, 20, 20 not 75 15 10! as for pyro powder i never did find a mixtario for it! i'd like to know what wood the Swiss use myself and their cooking method! i started out with the open fire myself but i've came to using a cooking grate or trivet over coals anymore, it takes a little more tending but you can affect the heat levels to a descent degree

The video didn't suck, and I subscribed lol. Now if I could make videos that didn't suck lmao it would be great! I guessing one could cook the can in or on a propane grill and use the thermometer on the grill itself to regulate teh temp... Gonna have to try this.

Great information! Thank you very much!

I use willow....strip the bark...do it like you do it.....run it through my coffee grinder and then ball mill it. I mix the weighed saltpeter....which was ball milled and then sulphur all weighed in grams figured as the percentage basis and then ball mill it again. I mix the combination with some 91 percent alcohol so it ends up like wet clay and then run it through a screen to end up with 3F grade and when it dries it is virtually explosive. I use 40 grains in my .40 caliber using round balls. I love the smell of black powder in the morning. LOL

Good morning, I'm from Brazil. I don't speak English, I'm using a Google translator I would like to make this gunpowder, but I need the proportions. Do you use 77 charcoal, 13 potassium nitrate and 10 sulfur? It will help me a lot if you can pass it on to me.

Very good info, thanks.

Ever try anything other than wood? As I watched this, my mind went to char cloth. I wonder how charcoal from something like a cotton rope might work.

Have you tried Eastern Red Cedar (Juniperus virginiana) charcoal? It certainly performed best for fireworks making than anything else, I never tried for shooting. Steve

Never have used it but have heard that some pyro suppliers use corn stalk charcoal........suppose to be quite fast .........but the true test is in the rifle with a coronagraph..........

I have a question about sieving the powder after you puck it and let it dry. What sieve should I use to get 2F and 3F I have 10, 20, 30, and 40 mesh sieve's. I would hate to buy a pound just to check the size of the granules. Thanks in advance

I think In alaska they have public use kilns that you can take your green wood too to dry to 20% (cuz green wood doesnt burn .. the same as dry wood/govt reg wood stoves) So i wonder if youd recommend “dehydrating” the wood? Apparently can test with a probe, split a log and drywall moisture sensor i think All just i hear tho Ive never made my own bp but would love to some day. Oak and pine near me

I found it helpful.👍🏻

Have you tried cottonwood for charcoal. It seems to like moist ground similar to willow and alder buckthorn.

Interesting would be red charcoal it was used for hunting powder and compressed for battleship gunpowder. it was made with overheated steam and wood. It is richer on hydrogen and burns much faster.

If you have not tried Bamboo charcoal we seriously urge you to try it. Initial testing for fast BP performs better than willow.

Have you used box wood I have lots of it where I live wondered if it would work well

Yea I make cooking charcoal in a 55 gal drum basically the same way.

I look forward to seeing how it performs.

Thank you. Taofledermaus sent me. Glad I arrived.

I wonder how charcoal made from cotton, either cotton balls or simple cotton cord, would work?

Green wood contains the most liquid form of tar. When you dry the wood, some of the tar evaporates, but the rest solidifies and produces the matter for fouling. How about putting green wood in acetone for several weeks to dissolve and remove the most of tar while it is in liquid form and not hardened? I bet that would produce much cleaner-burning charcoal. There are other chemical ways of producing even cleaner cellulose as the source of charcoal, e.g. boiling it in alcali to obtain merserised fibers.

How grind charcoal faster ? What machine to use ? Or what methode ???

Have you tried cotton wood? If so how did it work? If you haven't, please do a video on cotton wood BP test.. I plan on starting making BP this coming summer just wondering on the cotton wood. Ty

Question, what do you use to powder the toilet paper charcoal? I tried using a hand blender and even cut off some of the plastic so the blades could work the charcoal. Not real effective. Hope there is a better way. Thanks!

Did this method perform better? Or was it about the same? As always thanks for the time and effort you put into this.

I just cooked a log of willow Ive had laying around for about 7 years.... it turned out great..... it was a little punky.... which made me think,,,,, what if..... dried 1 year olds mullein stalks I wonder if they would work..... nice and light

I have European buckthorn. And it should be removed anyway . Close enough?

William what is your proses for pulverizing / crushing down your charcoal, and should it be in a powder form….

The only wood that's readily available in my area is Juniper, Pine, Tamarack, and Red Fir. Would any of these make a good "propellant"?

I have two separate questions... First, would it be a good idea to attempt to burn the smoke coming from the container as the wood cooks? The reason for that is because I make a lot of charcoal, and on windless days the smoke hangs, and kills my lungs. The second question is: The reason I make charcoal is primarily for both my grill, and to make activated charcoal for water filtration. I know that using activated charcoal may be pointless for black powder, but is there a possibility that it makes a difference in the end result in making black powder? Does anyone know if it would ruin it, or possibly make it work better?

I'm new to this thoroughly enjoyable channel and I have a question or two. Firstly, is there any merit to using saw dust of the desired wood type? i e. Intentionally cutting the wood for the purpose of generating and cooking the resulting chips/dust/shavings as they're already sort of "powderised". I'm thinking this might make the egress of tars, resins etc from the wood better or faster? Or secondly, would the resulting saw dust being cooked tend to mat down, clump together in the cooking tin and thereby negate the perceived better tar, resin egress idea? I appreciate the work you're doing 👍🏻

Great videos, subscribed!

I think you hear this all the time but I'm going to ask anyways. Could you do a few episodes where you do a Taofledermaus type thing. Where you explore alternative ammunition to LED. That would be very interesting. Maybe go a little end of the world mad Max with it. Best gunpowder best alternative ammo. Just a thought

Excellent video. Do you happen to have a video on milling/making a ball mill? I'm just getting in to making blackpowder having shot BP guns for a few years now, and being tired of overpaying for something I can make myself plus I already have 25lbs of both pure sulfur and nitrate sitting in the garage that i use for other projects

Why does the milling time change the flash point? I'm not sure if "milling" is the proper terminology for what the Rock Grinder performs.

Charcoal from Alder buckthorn increase speed of burning up to 30% against others woods. Confirmed in BP end burner type rocket engine.

I have a lot of standing dead ash on my property. Would it make good charcoal? Thanks for your video!

I cut a 3foot pine or spruce 2x4 in little strips following the grain its easy with just a knife , burn then real fast and put a lid or something to cut the air , 5minutes and its done

Dude great video and awesome channel

Do you think that the fast buring result can vary if you would use birch or oak?

I was looking in the comments to make sure that I'm not asking a question that someone else had already posted. Would it be ok to use scrap pine contruction lumber? I wasn't sure since its been kiln dried.

Retort can. Burn off paint. Scrub insides with sand. Ready to use ( only twice). Seal lid with real clay. Punch hole in top. Bake entire vessel of dry, Barkley’s, seasoned twigs w/out knots ( I use black willow). Vapor cooks off first and then volatiles. Ignite the latter and wait until flame tuckers out. Try reigniting. When it no longer burns…bury it right away with sand for 24 hours. Voila

Thank U for sharing those tips, I have experimented with white pine as I have a few of those trees on my property that always drops branches, what is ur opinion on white pine for charcoal?

My last batch of charcoal, I tumbled for 24 hours instead of grinding it. Man it came out really uniform and fine. Just saying.

Where do you source your wood? I've heard that dogwood and willow is probably the best available here in the US since alder buckthorn isn't native to the US (even though it has been introduced to the eastern US).