im sure everyone has seen sticks on dynamite in movies and history documentaries. they even used it in myth-busters a few times i think, but how much force would it really take to set it off?
In: 4
In high school I would make Nitro.
We would detonate it by layering water and oil on top if it (in a glass container. Then we would set a sliver of metallic sodium on top.
the sodium would sink in the oil, and meet the water with violent results.
The detonation time could be set by the depth of the oil sitting on top of the water.
We had occasional unwanted detonations from shock. it was always surprising how little of a shock it took to detonate, but then surprising how dropping a container (5 ml) did not cause it to go off. I think this is why it is called “unstable”, you don’t really know what will cause it (minimum force accidental) to detonate.
We also played with [picric Acid](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picric_acid) which was in a solution or under a liquid. Some times the crystals would grow dangerously large. I’m told that it can detonate under gravity pressure within the crystal structure. We never had any unwanted detonations with this or [ANFO](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ammonium_Nitrate_Fuel_Oil).
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