A smokeless powder composed of nitroglycerin, guncotton, and mineral jelly, and used by the British army and in other services. In making it the ingredients are mixed into a paste with the addition of acetone and pressed out into cords (of various diameters) resembling brown twine, which are dried and cut to length. A variety containing less nitroglycerin than the original is known as cordite M. D.
A British type of smokeless power made in long thin cords. Often encountered in fiction as "the smell of cordite". No longer in production.
explosive powder (nitroglycerin and guncotton and petrolatum) dissolved in acetone and dried and extruded in brown cords
A type of smokeless nitrocellulose powder which was used widely in British military and sporting cartridges. Cordite grains usually resemble very thin strands of spaghetti but sometimes have other forms.
A nitroglycerine propellant, so called because of the powders cord-like shape. Is was used principally in Great Britain.
The main British service explosive of World War I.
Trade name for a long, tubular-grained, double-base powder used mainly in Great Britain, and one of the earliest smokeless propellants. The granules are often as long as the powder space. Core The interior part of a jacketed bullet; usually a lead alloy in sporting ammunition.
Cordite is a family of smokeless propellants made by combining two high explosives: nitrocellulose and nitroglycerin, that is it is a double-base propellant. However, Cordite N, a triple-base propellant was developed during World War II and is now used in large guns (see below). Cordite is legally classified as an explosive but it is normally used as a propellant for guns and rockets.
