English

Noun

carbonite ‎(plural carbonites)

1. An explosive manufactured from a variety of materials, including nitroglycerine, wood meal and nitrates.
   • 1898, Federated Institution of Mining Engineers (Great Britain), Transactions of the Federated Institution of Mining Engineers, Volume 14, page 398,

     He was pleased with bellite, he found that carbonite made more fumes than bellite, but the explosive he liked best was ammonite.

   • 1909, Journal of the Iron and Steel Institute, Volume 79, page 550,

     Although this proved safe in the usual pit gas mixtures, yet it was found impossible to manipulate it, so another explosive, carbonite, made by the same firm, was tried. This was safe in small charges only ; improvements were made, and in September 1887 a carbonite consisting of saltpetre, cellulose, nitro-glycerine, and sulphuretted oil was found to be absolutely safe.

   • 1921, Ettore Molinari, Treatise on general and industrial organic chemistry, Volume 1, page 306,

     Even these explosives are, however, dangerous if the charges are large (above 300 grams for roburite and westphalite, and above 1000 grams for the carbonites), since then a momentary pressure on the air is developed (especially if the velocity of explosion is high) and a decided rise of temperature.

2. An explosive composed of nitrobenzene, saltpetre, sulfur, and kieselguhr.
3. A naturally occurring carbonaceous material formed from coal, natural coke.
   • 1889, Charles Edward Groves, William Thorp, Friedrich Knapp, Chemical Technology, page 119,

     In some Scottish localities, in the neighbourhood of trap dykes, coal is found to have been changed to coke ("carbonite"). Similar effects have been noticed (1882) in Midlothian, Chesterfield Co., Va., where the carbonite seam is 15 feet thick.