Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 58.djvu/512

504 recovered, had the Maximite adhering to them like mortar to a brick. Another 3-inch shell was filled with picric acid, fused and fired in exactly the same manner as were the Maximite shells. The picric acid detonated with great violence, breaking the shell into small fragments. This test determined the superior insensitiveness of Maximite, and its absolute safety against even very severe shocks.

In order to effectually detonate Maximite, it must he confined in a very strong steel shell, and set off with net less than 100 grains of fulminate of mercury, reinforced with not less than 1,000 grains of some form of picrate, dry guncotton or similar substance.

In the recent tests made by the British government upon the old battleship, the "Belleisle," great havoc was found to have been wrought by the Lyddite shells whenever they penetrate through the ship's side at unprotected points, but all such shells which struck upon the armor plate exploded on impact, and did no damage. Had Maximite shells been used in this test, they would have passed through the armor plate and exploded inside the vessel.

Maximite is an entirely new chemical compound. Nothing like it, to my knowledge, has ever before been produced. Its production is based upon an entirely novel theory of detonation, which, together with the formula for the material itself, is kept a Government secret.