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Originally Posted by Raellus
Does anyone know roughly how long explosives in things like land mines remains viable? Is there an expiration date, or does the stuff last forever? Similarly, is there a best-used-by date, after which the explosives become less... explosive (or more unstable, perhaps)?
I reckon it's a good long while, given how carefully unexploded ordinance from WWII is dealt with when an antique air-dropped bomb is discovered during construction or whatever.
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It depends on the explosive. We were shooting ordinance from WWII in our howitzers and it went bang every time. I have shot 100-year-old rifle ammo with NO ISSUES.
On the other hand... I have witnessed 20-year-old commercial dynamite "sweating" (leaking nitro from its casing) in Africa. It was so sketchy, that we just put a brick of C4 on it and sent it on its way. I also know that they blow up 20-year-old detonators (the pressure kind you screw into landmines) in the Army. But I have seen 50-year-old Composition B bricks used to demolish a bunker.
The issue with explosives, especially COMMERCIAL EXPLOSIVES, isn't that they won't go "boom," the issue is that they MAY GO BOOM from just being handled!