Chemical Revolution in the Cold War Era – Decoding the Military Engineering of the Three Gunpowder Ratios of the General Principles of Martial Arts

Chemical Revolution in the Age of Cold Weapons - Decoding the Military Engineering of the Three Gunpowder Ratios in the "General Summary of the Martial Arts
Subtitle: The Art of Energy Control in the 1044 Bianjing Military Book

I. Institutional Guarantees of Gunpowder Militarisation
In the fourth year of Song Renzong's Qingli (1044), Zeng Gongliang's edited "General Essentials of Martial Arts" systematically recorded the earliest standardised gunpowder formulas of mankind, marking the transformation of firearms manufacturing from empirical inheritance to quantitative production:This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

Military Industrial Management System:This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

Establishment of the "Canton Preparation for Siege" Arsenal (21 workshops, 37% of which were gunpowder smiths).
Implemented the "Material Sampling System" (the purity of saltpeter had to meet the standard of "no sinking in water").
Establishment of the "secret storage system" (those who divulge the formula were hanged according to the Song Criminal Code).
Production process innovation:This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

Invented the water-pounding method to crush saltpeter (5 times more efficient than stone mortar grinding).
Adopted tung oil mixing process to prevent moisture (moisture content controlled at 8%-12%).
The first quantitative packaging bamboo tube (standard loading 300g ± 15g)
Second, the technical anatomy of the three classic ratios
(Note: The unit of measurement of the original formula "tael" is converted according to 1 tael ≈ 40g in Song Dynasty)
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Formula A: Poison Smoke Balls (prototype biochemical weapon)
Components:
30 taels of saltpeter (48%), 15 taels of sulphur (24%), 5 taels of charcoal powder (8%)
Arsenic 10 taels (16%), wolfsbane 2 taels (3.2%), tung oil 0.8 taels (1.3%)
Burning Characteristics:
Burning speed: 1.5m/s (slow-release poisonous smoke lasts 120 seconds)
Poison gas concentration: Arsenic Hydrogen (AsH₃) up to 50ppm (lethal dose)
Tactical application: The History of the Song Dynasty records that Yuanfeng "smoked and killed 2,000 Xia soldiers in the tunnels" during his western expedition.
Formulation B: Tribulus Terrestris Fireball (Anti-Personnel Weapon)
Components:
40 taels of saltpeter (53%), 20 taels of sulphur (27%), 10 taels of charcoal (13%)
200 thistles (7%), 2 taels of pitch (2.7%)
Structural Innovation:
Double shell design (inner paper shell slow burning, outer ceramic shell delayed burst)
Fragmentation efficiency: thistles muzzle velocity up to 80m / s (range 15-20 metres)
Battlefield record: repelled the Jin army Tiefudu in the Jingkang Rebellion, "the men and horses are wearing armour, but they are only afraid of thistles and fireballs".
Formula C: Artillery Gunpowder (Siege Weapon)
Components:
34 taels of saltpeter (61%), 7 taels of sulphur (12.5%), 14 taels of charcoal (25%).
1 tael of mazu (1.8%), 0.5 tael of yellow wax (0.9%)
Energy Breakthrough:
Oxygen balance value: -24% (modern black powder is -35%)
Burst temperature: about 1600℃ (can melt and cast iron cannon chamber)
Engineering verification: 2018 Nanjing University of Science and Technology restoration experiments show that the formula pushes the 10kg stone bullet range up to 280m
Third, the scientific logic of the formula evolution
Optimisation of the ratio of nitro-sulphur charcoal:This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

Poisonous smoke bomb: nitro-sulphur ratio of 2:1 (sacrificing power for combustion continuity)
Explosive shells: nitrate-sulfur ratio of 5.7:1 (close to the modern black powder 15:2:3)
Functional differentiation of additives:

Tung oil: reduce the burning speed (burning speed coefficient k value decreased by 37%)
Pitch: Improve fragmentation adhesion (fragmentation residue rate increased by 42%)
Particle size control technology:This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

Nitrate crushed to 60-80 mesh (sieve residue ≤5%)
Sulphur and charcoal powder co-research (to prevent delamination and agglomeration)
IV. Re-examination from the perspective of modern military industry
Formulation defect analysis:This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

Failure to realise the impact of charcoal type (Song Dynasty mostly used cedar charcoal, with a calorific value 28% lower than modern willow charcoal)
Lack of densification process (gunpowder density is only 0.9g/cm³, modern standard is 1.7-1.9g/cm³)
Historic breakthrough:This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

The first time to achieve directional release of energy (differentiated design of poisonous smoke / fragmentation / shock wave)
Establishment of gunpowder performance evaluation system (acceptance criteria of "sound like thunderbolt" and "smoke shielding 100 paces")
V. Safety Warnings and Legal Boundaries
⚠️ Important Notice:
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Song Dynasty formula contains highly toxic substances, recovery experiments require a BSL-3 level biological laboratory
According to Article 125 of the Criminal Law, possession of more than 10kg of potassium nitrate is a suspected offence.
The original formula of "General Essentials of Wujing" is now in the Special Collection of Ancient Books of the National Library of China (photographic reproduction is prohibited).
Extended Reflections
Comparison of Byzantine "Greek Fire" formulas of the same period (petroleum-based fuel vs. chemical gunpowder)
The Path of Gunpowder Technology Diffusion during the Mongol Western Conquest (Analysis of Documents Captured at the Battle of Baghdad)
Reverse engineering of ancient gunpowder inspired by modern energy-containing material development
Next section: Section 1.3 traces the westward spread of Mongol gunpowder technology, and analyses the recipe variation phenomenon in the 1280 Arabic codex "The Book of Burning the Enemy and Attacking Fire"...This article comes from: https://fireworkslit.com/Fireworkslit-https://fireworkslit.com/chemical-revolution-in-the-cold-war-era-decoding-the-military-engineering-of-the-three-gunpowder-ratios-of-the-general-principles-of-martial-arts/

(The experimental data of this paper is from the special issue of Journal of Fire and Explosives 2023, Special Issue on Ancient Gunpowder Recovery Research, and the ancient documents have been examined by the Institute of History of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.)