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Ragnar' s Guideto Horne andRecreational UseofHigh ExplosivesRagnar BensonPALADIN PRESSBOULDER, COLORADO

- IAlso by Raan r Ben.son:Action Careen.Breath olt!w Dragon: llomc:buill FlamethrowersBull'a Eye: Crossbows by Ragnar Bc111011Fire, Flash, and Fury: The Oreatesl F.xpi06IOIII or HistoryGlllll'\lllnln& (Qr Fun and ProrilH&rd·Cofe PlliChfngHomemade C-4, ,\ Recfpc for SurvivalHomemade Grenade launchers: ComllliCting II Ultunate llobby WeaponUve Off lbe Land In theOry and CounlryWarning untrapplnllModem Wui"JJII Caching: A I Dwn·IO-Eanh Approach10 Bcatlnalhc Go\errur.:nt Gan GrabThe M Oangtrous Oame: Advanced Manlrapping TechniquesRagnar's Big Book of llomCitllde Wupons:Bulldina 111d Kupina Your Arsc:rul SecureRagnar'a Ten lbl Trap& And a Few O:hcn That Are Damn Good, TooSurvival PoachlnsSurvivalbr'a Medicine ChClllThe Survival RetreatSwilchblarlc: 1l1c Ace of Blade Ragnar's Guide to //om andRccreatwnal Use oflligh F:.xpw. ivrsby Ragnar BensonCop)Tight 1988 by Rugnar BensonISBN 0-87364-478·6Printed 10 the Unucd States of AmericaThe procedures discussed in this book and the resultingend product are extremely uangerous. Whtmever dealingwith high explosives, speciul precautions should befollowed in accordance with industry standards forexperimentation and production of high explosives. Failureto strictly follow such industry standards may result inharm to life or limb.Therefore, the author and publisher disclaim anyliability from any damages or injuries of any type that areader or user of information contained within this bookmay encounter from the use of said information.Published b)' Paladin Press, n di\·ision ofPaladin Enterprises, Inc., P.O. Box 1307,Boulder, Colorlldu 80306, USA.(303} 443-7250Direct inquiries and/or order: to the above address.All rights reserved. Except fnr usc in a review, noportiCln of thJ!i book may bl· reproduced in any formwiUJoulthc express wnucn pcnnission of the publisher.Neither the uuthnr n()r I he publisher assumesany respnnslbilily for the u c or misuse orinformation contuincd in thi book.lllustrallons by Bill Border.111

ContentsIntroduction1Chapter 1Historic Perspective of High Explosives7Chapter 2Obtaining Dynamite and Other Explosives13Chapter]Storage and General Safety23Chapter4Basic Procedures29ChapterSDoing the Work51Chapter6Ammonium Nitrate79Chapter7Sugar Chlorate Powder85Chapter8Improvised Detonating Caps93Chapter 9Jmprovised Explosives101Chapter 10Recreational Use of Explosives109vJ

Intro(d uctionThe summer I was thirteen I went to work as a roustabout for the local contract blaster. Like so many small,rural communities at the time, ours had the requisite resident powder monkey. My job was to lift and haul the thingsthe old gent no longer could nor wanted to Uft or haul.Even in those pre-OSHA (Occupational Safety andHealth Administration) days, the job was probably a bitmore risky than those with which most thirteen*ycar-oldsget involved. Our first piece of work was taking out somegreen stumps in the woodlot where the new church wasgoing to be built.My folks figured that since this was "church work," itcouldn't come to naught. The fact that the powder monkeyfor whom I labored was an elder in the church made it evenbeuer.Our first piece of church work just about wiped out ourold '38 Chevy ton-and-a-half powder wagon. The incidentcould have been predicted but it wasn't, principally becauseI was inexperienced and my employer was tight as a turtleshell.We used a long-haft, inch-and-a-half dirt auger to boredown under the stumps. The hot, sticky June days in Iowamade this the most disagreeable part of being a powdermonkey. Sweat rolled off our brows in rivulets.Once the bore hole was properly excavated down underthe stump, we used an old rake handle to slide a capped1

stick down to the bottom of the auger bole.The charge was known as the bore-hole or sprung-holecharge. With il, we produced a chamber under the stumplarge enough to accommodate enough powder to throw thestump out on the ground. A single stick of 40-percentpowder in the black, sticky, Iowa loam soil produced justthe right sized hole into which to slide the main charge.One only learns this from experience.Fony-percent dynamite throws more than it cracks orblasts. The exploding charge thumps rather than booms,even when six or eight half-pound sticks are detonated together. A boom signals excessive wasted powder, according to my powder-monkey mentor.We fired the single charge by backing up the '38 Chcvnear the stump and using drop wires to electrically fire thecap from the truck's battery. It was a good enough system,since we always knew how well the battery was chargedand the six-volt battery was safely sufficient for a singleblasting cap (or even two or three caps if called upon}.The problems started when my mentor insisted onbuying electrical caps with four-foot rather than six-footleadc;, because they were a penny or two cheaper. He paidme twenty-five cents per hour. Obviously those pcnnie could really add up, especially when we did not invest inconnecting wires, as was true in this case.Sometimes the four-foot leads-which are no longeroffered commercially-worked just fine. Sometimes, however, the blast chewed a bite of three or four inches off ourdrop wires.As a result, the drop wires got shorter and we had toback the flatbed Chev closer and closer to the blast site.One of the problems faced by all blasters is plugging orstemming the charge hole. In this particular case, the chargehole was quite large because the small green piss-elmstump had not adequately contained the first bore-holecharge. We thought. we solved the problem by rolling ahuge rock over the carefully tamped bore hole. It took twoof us with pikes just to roll that massive piece of granite towhere we wanted it.The powder monkey carefully backed the truck near the2set He climbed out and propped open the heavy, bonnettype ho Xi with the steel rod provided by the maker.Firmly gripping the drop lines, he crawled in under theho Xi to the location of the battery. The engine on that oldtruck was as huge as the hood covering it. He touched thewires to the battery.At detonation, the charge thumped nicely, but that's allthat went wellThe massive stone slowly rose into the air as if somegiant hand had tossed it. After rotating once, it flew thefifteen or twenty feet back-landing squarely on the rearthree feet of the flatbed.Again, as if some ghostly hand had intervened, the frontof the truck rose up off the ground four feet or more. Whenthe truck slammed back down, the hood thundered downmercilessly on my diminutive employer, who ended uptrapped between engine and bonnet hood of his selfpropelled dynamite detonator.The man lived through the episode. Now in his nineties,he still remembers the incident.The go Xi news, as he told it, was that the big old stonethat we were going to have to break with a mud-cap chargewas conveniently loaded all in one piece, saving the priceof the powder, caps, and fuze and the work loading itSome glitches notwithstanding, being assistant powdermonkey was a go Xi job, lasting most of the summer. As aresult of that experience, I have always had lots of powderaround, as well as the expertise necessary to make it go off-usually when I wanted it to.One day, when I was fifteen, go Xi old Charlie Bettenstopped by to tell me that a big flock of crows had becomeaccustomed to sleeping in an old gnarled oak in the bayouby his river-bottom field. Charlie was wondering if thestories were true about stringing dynamite in a crowroosting tree and firing it off at night when the crows wereall sleeping.Being one who is always anxious to prove or disprovealmost any good theory regarding explosives, I threw a caseof dynamite and a roll of primer cord in good old Charlie'spickup truck:. Primer cord i nylon rope-looking stuff that3

explodes.We motored back to the bayou and spent the dayworking in the hot sun until the big old oak looked like aChristmas tree. It was crisscrossed round and round withprimer cord, to which we attache randomly placed sticksof Mr. DuPont's finestBy evenmg we were out of dynamite, primer cord. andenergy-and we could hear the crows coming.They squawked and hollered by the thousands 'lil it waspitch dark. When they finally settled down, Charlie lookedat me and I at him. By some now-forgotten, prearrangedsignal, we knew their time had come.Not wanting to repeat my mentor's trick, I gingerlytouched the ends of the two drop wires to the battery inCharlie's pickup. Even from our safe position lhree hundred yards away, the noise was deafening. It was worse forthe crows.At first light we were back in the bayou. We found outfirsthand that the stories about dynamite and crows areabsolutely true.Not a leaf remained on the mighty oak, and only a fewstragglers bung on some hapless elms that were so unfortunate as to have been standing nearby.I don't know if any crows survived. If they did, theycertainly were deaf. A huge number, as evidenced by thebodies scattered around the bayou, didn't make it throughthe blitz. We collected almost seven bushel baskets of thepesky critters.Good old Charlie griped about having to dump the messbut later be was laudatory abouL the crop of mallards he gotnext spring wilhout so many molesting crows around tobother the nests.1 don't immediately recall at which age we found outabout using dynamite to fish with. The method was surelythe most effective we youngsters knew about.One time my brother and I got tired of Grandma gripingabout not having any fresh flsh in the bouse. It was themiddle of one of those god-awful Midwestern winters thatonly people who have endured one can really appreciate.We gathered up our gear anyway.4Back on the river, my brother and 1 chopped four smallholes in the ten-inch ice. They were about thirty feet apartover a good fishing hole. On each stick we tied a rock withbaler twine. We left about six inches of twine between thedynamite and the rock so the dynamite -which tends tofloat-could stand off the river bottom and have moreconcussion effect.Brother started out lighting fuzes at one end of thestring of holes and I at the other. The situation becameominous when Brother got one, two, and three going while[was still trying to light number four.1 finally got number four going. Desperately I threw thelighted charge at the hole. It missed and went skitteringacross the ice toward Brother, who calmly picked iL up,carried it to the appropriate hole, and dropped it in.As he did, number one went off, showering us with icechips and freezing water. Desperately, Brother ran forshore. But it was not to be. Two and three went off, cracking the whole slab covering the fishmg hole. Brother'sweight tilted the slab so he was now trying to run uphill onthe ice, which was threatenmg to dump him back on top ofcharge number four.Just when things looked darkest, number four went off,throwing Brother ass-over-appebte into the shallow water.Fortunately he was able to walk through the smoking,roiled water to shore.We gathered a couple of gunnysacks full of carp andsuckers, which made Grandma smile. Later in life, whenmortar rounds were dropping around him, Brother said hedidn't mind a bit "Just like flShing back on the farm," healways said.As kids, most of our fish-gathering efforts weren't sofortuitous. Many of the Midwestern pond we shot werecrammed full of stunted. two-inch bluegills that were atleast ninery-seven years old. We blasted pond after pondand got nothing but pound after unusable pound of thosetiny bluegills.At times, the situation was interesting. Old Man Terrel,for instance, had a large, deep pond hidden way backbehind his north eighty that he swore housed dozens of5