General Description of Compounds Used in WWI & WWII Major Military Explosives
by Nathan Okun (11/28/2018)

Lead Azide &
Fulminate of Mercury:
     These two very powerful, but extremely sensitive, high explosives are relegated to very tiny amounts
     used in the fuzes/pistols of projectiles, bombs, missiles, and underwater ordnance.  They are set off
     by physical impact of a moving firing pin or by an electrical spark to begin the fuze firing sequence
     that results in the explosion of the main explosive charge in the weapon.  Only tiny amounts are used
     as the primer or detonator of the fuze.  The detonator is the final stage in the fuze itself to set off the
     main filler charge if sensitive enough, though with low explosives like black powder or guncotton (see
     below) this is an "igniter" (these explosives do not detonate) and the fuze, in US military terminology,
     is called an "ignition" fuze, not a "detonating" fuze.	If an insensitive -- impact shock will not set it 
     off reliably, at least in a full-power detonation, in most cases -- high explosive is used (TNT, Explosive
     "D", and so forth), as was the case in very many WWII fillers in armor-piercing (AP) and semi-armor-
     piercing (SAP or, in naval terminology, base-fuze Common) projectiles, detonator blast had to be
     strengthened enough to thoroughly shock main filler charges into full detonation, so "boosters" (US
     terminology) or "exploders" (British terminology) charges, sometimes added to the upper end of the
     fuze itself and sometimes as a separate container stacked onto the end of the fuze, were added after
     the detonator, being small enough to be themselves reliably set off by the tiny lead azide or fulminate
     of mercury detonation and yet large enough to set off the large main filler charge of the weapon.  The
     booster had to be small and powerful for use in AP projectiles due to the powerful forces on the shell
     as it pushed through thick armor, requiring the most powerful explosives available that were safe to
     use in very small quantities but larger than the maximum safe weight of lead azide or fulminate of
     mercury -- eventually the powerful explosive Tetryl (see below) became a standard for this use in
     several nations after WWI -- while for high explosive/high capacity (HE/HC) projectiles not designed
     for penetrating a significant thickness of armor, larger boosters of more conventional and less
     powerful explosives (TNT, for example, was a standard here) could be easily used for this purpose. 
     The term "primer" comes from the explosive used to set off the propellants in guns, these also being
     lead azide or fulminate of mercury in most cases, when struck by the firing pin.  It was added to the
     terminology of weapon fuzes when delay-action fuzes were developed early in the 20th Century for
     AP/SAP shells (eventually most such shells used them).  In the optimum -- eventually standard --
     design of such fuzes, the delay element (usually a thin layer of black powder in a small capsule) was
     added between the lead azide/fulminate of mercury charge set off by the firing pin in the fuze and
     another one used to set off the booster charge.  Since the term detonator was already used for the
     fuze element with the latter purpose, another name had to be used for the former and primer was
     the natural pick.  Note:   During WWII the US Navy noted that fulminate of mercury was unstable and
     tended to degrade in power when stored inside a fuze for long periods, especially in the hot regions
     of the South Pacific, so it was declared "Unserviceable" and lead azide was used in all new and older,
     reconditioned fuzes for all purposes -- I assume that the US Army followed suite then or shortly
     thereafter.

Black Powder (Gunpowder):
     10% Sulfur/15% Charcoal/75% Potassium Nitrate (Saltpeter) finely ground and mixed together in
     some water to form a thick paste, which was thoroughly dried and then ground again into a black
     powder black mixture that burns so extremely fast that when tightly confined so that the pressure
     inside the mixture can get high enough, it would provide a rather low-power (by current explosive
     standards) explosion (not a detonation, as with later "high" explosives like Nitroglycerine (see below)
     and its successors).  The sulfur and charcoal provided the fuel and the Potassium nitrate provided the
     oxidants (oxygen and nitrogen) that it burned with, no outside fuel or air required.  The limitation
     here was that the fuel portion was not an explosive by itself and not chemically part of the oxidant-
     supplier, so the potassium nitrate could just make it burn very fast, never truly detonate -- that is,
     never create a supersonic shockwave in the explosive to drastically increase the burn rate and do
     much more damage to the surrounding area).  Used as a fireworks explosive in China for centuries, it
     was also used sometimes as a weapon of war, but not until it was introduced in the 1500s into
     Europe that the development of cannons and, eventually, muskets, pistols, rifles made it the primary
     basis of warfare as a propellant for cannon balls and bullets.  In the early 1800s development of
     powder time fuzes set off by the flame of firing the gun allowed black powder to also become a major
     danger as a blast, incendiary, and fragment source where it eventually made wooden ships too
     vulnerable to fires and required iron and steel armor to protect warships and, after WWI showed that
     guns could stop anything not protected from them, tanks and armored personnel carriers.  Black
     powder was replaced by the more powerful, safer-to-store, less-affected-by-moisture, less-smoke-
     generating, and slower-burning, more controllable nitrocellulose (smokeless) powders in the 1890s as
     a gun propellant and by the high explosives noted below as a shell filler in most projectiles of any kind 
     by the middle of WWI.  A few old projectiles still in service continued to use it even in WWII, though 
     in the US Navy those projectiles primarily the 5" (127mm) Mk 15 Common projectile using by the 
     5"/50 and 5"/51 high-velocity guns used as old destroyer  and new submarine deck guns and as 
     secondary armament  in most US Navy WWI-era battleships, though many were replaced by the more 
     useful  5"/38 dual-purpose gun mounts during later overhauls.  These 5" shells used a unique US Navy
     blend of black powder  mixed with a small percentage of granulated TNT (see below) for added blast 
     power, but the shells still acted like regular black-powder-filled shells otherwise (no detonation and 
     similar, but faster-moving and so more dangerous over a wider area, large fragments).  NOTE:  There
     was one situation where black powder could have a "pseudo-detonation".  When it was used in a
     large-filler (10% black powder) British WWI-era Common, Pointed, Capped (CPC) shell that hit thick
     armor at near right-angles.  These shells were very long to keep their weight up to that of the same 
     gun's APC shell to allow a single range table to be used at the expected battle ranges or nearby, with
     spotting to adjust fire needed anyway for that and other ranges no matter what shell was used.  They
     had a thick, hardened APC-shell-type nose and AP cap to allow the nose to remain more-or-less intact 
     on hitting face-hardened side armor, though the shell was supposed to only be used against armored 
     cruisers with rather thin face-hardened or, usually, homogeneous, ductile side armor that they could
     completely penetrate and still remain in one piece afterwards.  Testing against thick face-hardened
     battleship-type armor after the rather poor showing of British APC shells at the Battle of Jutland gave
     unexpected results.  Due to the use of non-delay fuzes and 3.3% Lyddite fillers, British APC would 
     almost always explode while halfway through or just after penetrating such armor, but it was
     expected that the black powder filler of a CPC shell would be set off but not explode until the broken-
     up CPC shell, due to its light construction collapsing like an accordion inside the plate, was passing out
     the far side of the plate, throwing large projectile and armor chunks and flaming black powder out 
     the plate back, but with little explosive force remaining.  This did not happen.  The shells punched
     through the plate due to their strong nose and decelerated drastically in a few inches, as did the APC,
     from over 2000 ft/sec (656.2 m/sec) to roughly 1000 ft/sec (328.1 m/sec) at the far side of the plate.
     As the nose was exiting the far side of the plate, the CPC shells exploded with such power that they
     actually split several of the heavy face-hardened plates in half due to brittle fracture of the cracked
     hard, brittle face layers, something that even only a few APC shells, with their powerful Lyddite fillers
     detonating at the same place, could cause.  This amazed the test personnel.  What was happening, I
     believe, was that the triple weight of black powder compared to the Lyddite, being made up of three
     separate fine-grained powders mixed and pressed tightly together rather than one solid material
     such as Picric Acid, still had a large amount of empty space between the irregularly-shaped tiny 
     grains, so when the enormous impact deceleration occurred against the thick armor, the entire large
     volume of black powder was thrown forward with such violence that it literally squeezed itself into
     the forward half of the explosive cavity just behind the thick nose, where the projectile body was
     reinforced enough to keep itself in one piece for a short time.  This violent forward motion caused
     compression and friction throughout the entire volume of the black powder simultaneously, so it
     began to burn everywhere at once instead of from one or a few points when set off normally by a
     fuze.  This simulated a detonation very well (a pseudo-detonation, as noted above).  The power of
     this explosion was only about one-third of Lyddite per unit weight of explosive, but there was three
     times the weight of explosive compared to a Lyddite-filled APC shell and three times the weight of
     gas formed due to the explosion, so the pressure confined by the thick armor on the sides and heavy
     projectile nose in front and the strong forward inertia of the explosive at the rear was much higher
     and longer-lasting than with a very-short-lived Lyddite detonation, splitting open the already-
     weakened plate.  This shows how unexpected results can occur from even well-known sources and
     thus that tests must ALWAYS be made to verify expectations, no matter how "obvious" the results are
     expected to be; the universe simply does not care about your expectations, it has its own plans.  This
     is termed an "Emergent Phenomenon" (makes sense later, but totally unexpected before discovery).

Nitrocellulose (Smokeless Powder, Guncotton):
     This low-power explosive (somewhat more powerful than Black Powder, but just as difficult to
     detonate, which made it much safer than any later explosive as a propellant) was the first in the
     chemical series that quickly created the high (detonable) explosives Nitroglycerine (see below) and its
     many successors.  It was simply finely shredded wood pulp free of any impurities (so that it was much
     like white cotton, hence its nickname) that was soaked into hydrochloric acid until it was a thick white
     paste, with the acid then washed away by pure water and some small amounts of chemicals added to
     soak up any residue acid to keep the powder chemically stable (this turned out to be rather difficult
     to get right and unstable powder caused many disasters).  It could be used much like black powder in
     guns, but could be made to burn more slowly, allowing improved gun designs with higher muzzle
     velocities to be developed (long-barrel breech-loading rifled cannons).   Used primarily as a gun
     propellant replacing Black Powder (see above), it was used by itself (single-based powder, as used by
     the US and French Navies) or, more widely, mixed with Nitroglycerine (see below) for added power
     (smaller size of charge needed for a given gun muzzle velocity, the most famous being British Cordite
     propellants) or, in WWII, other additives for flash reduction for night firing (blinding the crew did not
     help fight a battle!), these being double-based powders.  Using nitroglycerine in the propellants made
     them much more dangerous if they were set afire by a hit from any enemy weapon, so the navies of
     the US and France never used the Nitroglycerine-type aboard ship, though the US Army did so in its
     guns (dragging around things on a battlefield required minimizing the weight of everything, including
     the propellants for the guns).   Guncotton was employed as an explosive filler in the first self-powered
     torpedoes, since it could be exploded even if wet by a powerful fuze detonator, unlike black powder.
     When the high explosives came into use, they replaced guncotton here too.

Nitroglycerine (Dynamite):
     The original "High" explosive capable of detonation (shockwave propagation); used commercially
     mixed with clay in sticks and as a component in many double-based gun propellants to increase
     power (British "Cordite"), but not used much in military explosives due to its extreme sensitivity to
     shock and heat resulting in serious difficulty in safe storage and controllable effectiveness on targets.

Trinitrotoluene (US TNT, British Trotyl, French Tolite, Japanese Type 94 Explosive, etc.):
     Widely used commercial and military explosive (used by itself and in many mixtures).   This explosive
     was so widely used that it became the "Standard" high explosive that everyone measured all other
     explosives against, even nuclear explosions in megatons of TNT.  TNT was used in large-size boosters
     for nose-fuzed HE/HC shells with no problem, but the US Army and US Navy, not liking Picric Acid for
     any purpose, attempted to use small TNT boosters to set off their extremely insensitive Explosive "D"
     (see below) fillers using it, with no more luck than the Germans and British had with Picric Acid, since
     these explosives were simply not powerful enough in small quantities to reliably set off Explosive "D"
     or TNT main fillers.  The US Army base fuzes had such things as up to six rings of TNT wrapped around
     the detonator in the base fuze so that when they all exploded, there was now a much better chance
     that at least one of them would "take" and, by statistics, set off the main filler properly.  This was still
     a roll of the dice and duds and low-order explosions were common, but at least the shell could
     completely penetrate armor and not blow up halfway through like British Lyddite, French Mélanite,
     and Japanese Shimose almost always did.  Tetryl (see below) replaced TNT in US Army and Navy base
     fuze boosters in 1918 and 1928, respectively.  Note that due to its low, but not completely inert like
     Explosive "D", sensitivity to impact shock, some cushioning was necessary in shells designed to
     penetrate armor and then explode by fuze action only.  The Germans used pre-formed, stacked TNT
     blocks in the cavity of its SAP and AP projectiles, with felt and cardboard cushioning each block from
     the shell and other blocks and with a large wooden cushion in the cavity tip.  This used up about 15- 
     20% of the cavity in inert material (better than the Japanese WWII TNA (see below) filler that needed  
     33-40% of the cavity filled with inert cushion on all sides of the filler!).  The British in their SAP/SAPC
     and AP/APC shells added about 3-5% Beeswax into the heated liquid TNT filler before pouring it to 
     desensitize it and a had small (~5%) plaster-of-Paris cavity-tip cushion (so, for example, a  2.5% TNT
     filler in a 3.3% cavity if it was only pure TNT); there was a small volume surrounding the base fuze
     made of pure TNT with no Beeswax to act as a second booster when set off by the CE (see Tetryl
     entry) booster on the tip of the base fuze.   The US Army and Navy refused to allow any cushions in 
     their filler cavities, using Explosive "D" fillers that were impact-insensitive enough to not need any. 

Trinitrophenol (Picric Acid, see text for national nomenclature):
     Shock-sensitive but, prior to the strongest new post-WWI HE fillers, powerful (10% more than TNT
     (see above) in brisance) military explosive used by itself as the main explosive in most projectiles of
     the following nations during the 20th Century in their SAP-Common and AP shells: British Lyddite (to
     1917), French Mélinite (to 1920), and Japanese Shimose (to 1931), but in some new SAP/AP shells
     after that only used in mixtures:  British Shellite (70% Picric Acid/30% Dinitrophenol (see below)) in
     large-caliber APC shells except for the 16" (406mm) Mk IB APC Shell used in the HMS NELSON and
     RODNEY after WWI, which used TNT/Beeswax, as was also used in all smaller British SAP-type
     Common naval shells through the end of WWII, and French "Mélinite fondue DNN" (M.F. Dn.) (80%
     Picric Acid/20% DNN (see below)) used in large-caliber French naval AP projectiles exactly like British
     Shellite.  The Japanese retained Shimose fillers in many medium-caliber SAP-type Common shells
     from the WWI era in its older warships through WWII and they also used Shimose in new HE shells
     (Type 0) for its cruiser and battleship guns as well as in the small HE "can" in the base of its unique
     WWII Type 3 Incendiary/Shrapnel Bombardment projectiles for its large-caliber guns.  This explosive
     was also used as the booster in German WWI-era (WWII?) TNT-filled SAP/AP shells, being the most
     powerful explosive at the time safe to use in large-enough weights; it, like all other booster explosives
     used by all nations through WWI,  did not work well with their later insensitive explosives, since TNT,
     like them,  was insensitive to armor impact (the reason such fillers came to be used) or to small-size
     booster blast shock too, which resulted in a rather large number of duds and low-order explosions
     (never a problem with British Lyddite fillers then in use, though they also exploded inside most thick
     armor plates hit, precluding any delay-action fuzes being used, which had become a British AP fuze
     design requirement during WWI); I think, but do not know, that German (and French) AP shells
     switched to Tetryl (see below) boosters to fix this reliability problem sometime after WWI like Britain
     and the US did, but I have no solid data. 

Trinitroanisol (TNA, Japanese Type 91 Explosive):
     German and Japanese naval military explosive, originally developed by Germany for mines and
     torpedoes, but in 1931 also adopted by Japan to replace Shimose (see above) in its new Type 91 AP
     shells, since they finally were forced to give up on using Shimose against heavy face-hardened armor
     due to its sensitivity to shock (which the British and French had recognized much earlier during WWI)
     but the Japanese still wanted an explosive similar in power (about 105% of TNT (see above)).  Highly
     toxic, so only the Japanese widely used this explosive after WWI.  TNA was almost as sensitive as
     Shimose, but could barely be cushioned enough to remain inert when 33-40% of the cavity was used
     as a jacket surrounding the actual filler, with a thick plaster case all around the TNA and a thick wood
     and aluminum cushion filling the upper end of the cavity.  Why all this work to retain these very
     excessively sensitive fillers in SAP and AP shells long after everyone else had switched to the much
     less sensitive kinds of high explosives by the early 1920s in all new ammunition seems to be a
     psychological problem because Shimose had been highly successful (for the time) against the
     Russians in 1904-5 and the Japanese Navy simply could not make itself let go of what was once a
     good thing, even though now it was a liability in new ammunition because delay-action fuzes could
     not use Shimose when hitting heavy armor.  TNA was the next best thing in 1931 (RDX (see below)
     had not yet been introduced, or it would have been attempted for this purpose, I am certain), no
     matter how much was compromised by using such large amounts of inert material instead of filler,
     reducing the damage-causing ability of the shell.  "Good enough for Grandpa" taken way too far!  

Ammonium Picrate (US Dunnite or, usually, Explosive "D"):
     US military explosive about 10% weaker than TNT but virtually immune to impact shock when packed
     into the cavity properly (the first shells using it by both the US Army and Navy had incorrect packing
     procedures and were subject to internal explosions when the gun was fired or on shell impact prior to
     fuze operation -- fixed by the beginning of WWI) and, usually, to detonating when a projectile filled
     with it is set on fire.  It was the main explosive filler in most US Army and Navy gun projectiles from
     the late 1890s until after WWII -- except for the 3"-and-up Proximity-fuzed AA shells introduced later
     in WWII where more power was desired to widen the danger zone against enemy aircraft from near-
     miss explosions, so Composition A-3 (91% RDX (see below)/9% wax) was substituted in them only --
     and also used by most projectiles manufactured by the US for other nations during WWII, such as the
     380mm Mark I MOD 0 AP Shell made by Crucible Steel in 1943 for the French battleship RICHELIEU
     when it escaped after the German invasion, called by the French the "O.Pf(RC) KMle 43" and used by
     both RICHELIEU and JEAN BART after WWII.  This filler was difficult to set off by the early boosters
     used by base fuzes in SAP-type Common and AP shells and it was not until Tetryl (see below) was
     introduced in 1918 (US Army) and 1928 (US Navy) that it could be reliably set off in a complete high-
     order detonation of those shells.  Large TNT boosters in nose-fuzed HE/HC shells -- these shells did
     not need to worry about damage when hitting armor -- had no problem detonating Explosive "D".
     NOTE:   Explosive "D" reacts with iron alloys so the cavity had to be painted with a thick layer of
     lacquer.  This caused a problem with the complex oblique-impact design of the new Mk 21 Base
     Detonating Fuze introduced for most AP shells in the US Navy in 1941-42 to replace the defective Mk
     11 BDF for AP shells issued in 1937.  The new base fuze had an intricate safe-arm system and a special 
     locking mechanism to hold the fuze delay element in place when undergoing the high sideways forces
     when penetrating thick armor plate at high impact angles (these AP shells were proof-tested at up to
     40 degrees obliquity from right-angles, well above the test standards of any other nation in WWII),
     while the fuze's 0.033-second delay ran down to allow deep target damage.  This design worked
     perfectly when new, but fumes from the Explosive "D" filler could very slightly corrode the surfaces 
     after about 6 months in storage and this was enough to cause malfunctioning in this complex
     "Chinese puzzle" fuze design (earlier designs were not so "finicky").  Discovered during Operation
     Torch in 1942, this problem caused about half of the naval AP shells using this fuze if over 6 months
     old to fail to explode properly (partial explosion or a dud).  A crash program to solve this was initiated
     and in mid-1943 the solution was found:  Dip the entire fuze in liquid plastic, Bakelite, to seal it before
     shipping and the fumes no longer had any effect.  Problem solved.  (A small observation:  Since
     around 1900, when the Mark/MOD identification system for all Navy material was introduced in the
     US Navy, all fuzes were under the same Mark system, no matter where they were located on the shell
     (nose or base or auxiliary) or what they were for (impact, time, VT (proximity), or auxiliary (nose fuze
     safety backup), and detonating (HE) or ignition (black powder)).  Since the Mk 11 BDF was first
     introduced in 1937 and had been in development for only a few years before that -- the rather unique
     and original design concept was OK but attempting to manufacture it as designed turned out to be
     too expensive and reducing the cost also reduced reliability to the point that there were too many
     failures in acceptance testing -- it demonstrates how few fuzes of any kind were developed for US
     naval ammunition between around WWI and the mid-1930s.  Yet, between the time the Mk 11 was
     assigned its ID Mark Number and 1940, when the Mk 21, its replacement, was ready for manufacture,
     the number of US Navy gun projectile fuzes of all types had nearly doubled and by the end of WWII
     the number of US navy gun projectile fuzes (to say nothing of rocket, bomb, and underwater 
     ordnance fuzes) was in the hundreds (though admittedly many of the earlier fuzes were no longer in 
     service).  An amazing explosion of fuze types in a mere ten years!)

Dinitrophenol:  
     Much weaker, but much less sensitive to shock, reduced nitrogen form of Picric Acid (see above).
     British Shellite (70% Picric Acid/30% Dinitrophenol) replaced Lyddite (see Picric Acid) in most large-
     caliber British APC shells after WWI, except for the 16" Mk IB APC Shell, which used TNT (see above)/
     Beeswax, like the smaller post-WWI British cruiser SAP-type shells did.

Dinitronaphtaline (DNN, in several chemical variants):
     An industrial chemical that in one of its forms has a low-power explosive capacity, somewhat similar
     to Dinitrophenol (see above).  Used in mixtures with other explosives, especially by the French
     (Schneiderite (12.5% DNN/87.5% Ammonium Nitrate (see below)) and M.F.Dn. (see Picric Acid entry
     above -- this is the French version of British Shellite, but 80% Picric Acid/20% DNN))

Hexanitrodiphenylamine (HND, see text for nation nomenclature):
     German and Japanese naval military explosive used only in mixtures, primarily in Hexanite (German
     Hexanit) and Japanese Type 97 Explosive (also called Seigate) (both 60% TNT (see above)/40% HND),
     and Japanese Type 98 Explosive (70% TNA (see above) and 30% HND). 

Cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine (US Cyclonite, British and US RDX, French Hexogène, German Hexogene):
     Extremely powerful explosive introduced in WWII by the US and British for naval mines and
     torpedoes, medium-caliber anti-aircraft projectiles, and very powerful aircraft bombs; used by itself
     only when desensitized by mixing with a small amount of oil or wax  or similar material (the "plastic
     explosives",  US Navy AA Common shell filler Composition A-3 (RDX 91%/Wax 9%), and many of the
     WWII US Army/Navy A, B, C, etc., series of explosives), and widely used in many mixtures with other
     explosives such as French WWII Hexolite (TNT (see above) 50%/RDX 50%), with many very powerful
     variations to the present, the most famous being Torpex (RDX 42%, TNT 40%, Aluminum Powder (see
     below) 18%), used in later WWII US and British mines and torpedoes and in very powerful aircraft 
     bombs (British Tallboy and Grand Slam, for example).  A huge upward step in explosive power over
     TNT-level explosives of 40-60% by any measure.

Ammonium Nitrate (AN):
     A widely-used fertilizer, it also has a powerful explosive capability when mixed with other materials
      that can provide the fuel to which it can rapidly add oxygen and nitrogen to a detonation wave;
      explosives made with it are less powerful than TNT (see above) or Dynamite (see above), but very
      cheap, so it has become the most widely used material in explosive mixtures, such as ANFO (94%
      AN/6% Fuel Oil (the fuel used in large Diesel engines and also in steam engine boilers until recently)).

Aluminum Powder:
     Many explosives, even the most powerful, were found to either not have enough internal chemical
     fuel to completely burn with all of the oxidants (oxygen and nitrogen) that the chemical can supply or
     have not enough of those oxidants to fully consume all of the fuel portion of the chemical.  In black
     powder (see above), the sulfur and charcoal provided the fuel and Potassium Nitrate (PN) provided
     the oxygen and nitrogen that it burned in, no outside fuel or air needed.  The only limitation here was
     that the fuel portion was not an explosive by itself so PN just made it burn very fast, making a low-
     power explosion (compared to the detonations of "high" explosives).  Using Ammonium Nitrate 
     (see above), for example,  as an oxidant supplier allowed many rather weak explosives to become
     powerful enough for commercial or military use (for example, French Schneiderite (see DNN above)).
     For TNT and RDX (see above), though, the opposite was found to be true and the explosives did not
     have enough fuel in their molecules to use up all of the available oxygen and nitrogen, so their power
     was lower than it could be.  By adding very finely divided Aluminum Powder to even several rather
     powerful high explosives, such as Torpex (see above), that contained TNT (see above), RDX (see
     above), or other fuel-deficient explosive, the Aluminum Powder would be vaporized by the white-hot
     detonation shockwave as it moved through the mixture, instantly combining with any free oxygen
     and nitrogen, releasing a large amount of heat, and thus considerable blast power as a result (if you
     have ever seen magnesium burn in its white-hot manner, you get an idea of what aluminum can do 
     too).  The blast power (concussion shock strength termed "brisance") of the explosives could go up by
     40-50%, making it much better as a ship hull or building "buster" when that blast was transmitted
     through the water or ground, especially solid rock or rigid concrete, even from a rather far distance.
     Just close near-misses were usually enough to wreck targets of British 12,100 lb Tallboy or 22,000 lb
     Grand Slam Torpex-filled bombs during the latter part of WWII (spectacularly, when TIRPITZ was sunk
     by several near-misses and hits by Tallboy bomb explosions that literally blew a huge main gun turret
     completely off the ship).

Trinitrophenylmethylnitramine (US Tetryl, British Composition Exploder or "CE"):
     Tetryl is usually only used as a booster (British "exploder") that takes the tiny primer/detonator blast 
     and amplifies it to be strong enough to reliably fully set off the high explosive filler of the weapon or
     commercial blasting load (such as TNT (see above) or other high explosive).  Black powder does not
     need  such a powerful booster and some, but not many, high explosives did not need one either,
     Picric Acid (see above) being one that was so sensitive that it did not need a booster, using a small
     black powder charge in the tip of the fuze, just like the previous black-powder-filled shells did.
     However, even with explosives that not always needed a booster , using one made them act more
     reliably:  For example, the post-WWI insensitive filler Shellite (see above) in most large-caliber post-
     WWI British APC shells, originally had no booster with its Number 16D base fuze, retaining the same 
     small black-powder exploder that the previous Lyddite-filled shells used, but experience showed that 
     using a CE booster of the kind that was already being used with smaller British TNT-filled SAP-type 
     shells, made the average explosion more powerful and resulted in fewer duds.  Trying to use TNT or 
     even Picric Acid as the booster failed frequently, even when multiple TNT boosters were stacked 
     around the fuze (US Army base fuzes before 1918 used up to six TNT rings surrounding the detonator 
     in the hope that at least one would "take" and fully detonate the Explosive "D" (see above) filler).  
     This use of a main charge high explosive filler type as the small booster for a similar filler had spotty
     success in all nation's base-fuzed ammunition, where fuzes and boosters had to be small to remain
      functional after armor plate impact.  In 1918, the US Army came up with a booster design (externally,
      it looked like a small steel tuna can added to the tip of the fuze) that ended the reliability problem.
      However, it was not a simple as it looked.  The US Navy and the British Navy did not allow Tetryl as a
      booster until new boosters were developed in 1928, considering the US Army method unsafe.  The
      problem is that some explosives have a maximum weight as one solid piece that must not be
      exceeded or the explosive becomes dangerous to handle, much less use in a gun projectile.  The filler
      used as main filler charges in larger gun projectiles, bombs, torpedoes, and mines has this weight
      very large (the Torpex (see above) filler in the British WWII Grand Slam SAP bomb was 11,000 lb
      (4989.6 kg)) in one piece, for example), but the extremely powerful explosives that can be used as
      reliable tiny boosters in AP projectiles cannot be very large.  Tetryl is not safe in a single piece at over
      about 0.0355 lb (16.1 grams).  This small size limit is shown in WWII 20mm US HE/HE-I projectiles
      which used Tetryl as their main filler charge and in no case was a single piece allowed to be greater in
      weight than that -- bigger Tetryl fillers were divided up into two or three small sections, separated
      by thin partitions.  Even here, the shells were considered sensitive and special handling was to be
      used when storing, transporting, and loading them into the guns.  To get around this in boosters,
      which needed more Tetryl in larger shells, the British separated it into layers with metal foil spacing
      the layers apart, in compressed cardboard cans put on the end of the fuzes much like the US Army
      design (I assume that the US Army boosters used something like that, as they were too large to be
      safe, otherwise).  The US Navy design was different:  The upper end of the fuze had two small holes
      drilled into it on opposite sides just below the end.  These holes were shaped like funnels or rocket
      nozzles, being 180 degrees apart pointed sideways into the lower portion of the filler (the fuze
      stuck up into the Explosive "D" filler like a short finger, looking like a lipstick can).  When set off on
      the inner tip by the detonator, usually with TNT-filled tubes connecting the detonator to the
      boosters to give the Tetryl itself a good "kick", the Tetryl plugs that filled these pits fired needle-
      shaped jets of concentrated Tetryl-powered blast into the filler twice, once per side, to absolutely 
      make sure that the filler would go off successfully as long as the fuze itself worked properly (fuze
      reliability is another subject altogether!).  I do not know what other nations used Tetryl boosters or,
      if so, when they were adopted (I think Germany and France adopted Tetryl boosters for AP shells 
      after WWI, but I cannot be sure), though I know of no other booster explosive available for proper
      reliable high-order detonation of the more insensitive explosives by small base fuzes through the end
      of WWII.

THE END