Word: nitramon
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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Like two other new materials introduced recently-Nitramon. du Pont's "foolproof" explosive (TIME, Feb. 4), and Solene, a solidified gasoline developed at New York University (TIME. July 15) - tempered glass lends itself to spectacular demonstrations. Last week it was unharmed after a 2-lb. steel ball and a11-lb. bag of steel shot had been dropped on it from six feet, after a pane of it had been placed on an ice cake and molten lead poured on the top surface, after a torsion machine had warped a sheet of it like so much cardboard...
Climaxing the demonstration, workers exhibited how they set off "Nitramon." With all spectators at a safe distance, the "Nitramon" was exploded by using a large diameter cartridge of dynamite...
Having repeated and completed these tests over many months in many places, E. I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. last week announced' development of a powerful new explosive tentatively named nitramon, called it "foolproof," "the ultimate in safety...
Like many another explosive, nitramon contains ammonium nitrate. It also contains a stable carbon compound (formula secret) which only reluctantly releases its carbon to combine with the nitrate's oxygen. Once detonated, however, nitramon explodes with 40% more force than TNT. It costs less than some grades of dynamite. The company claims that it is impervious to cold, works under water, should make quarry blasting and coal vein stripping completely safe up to the moment of "shooting." Politically timely was the assurance that nitramon's value is strictly limited to peacetime...
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