newbe needs help

[nekshot]

I have a bunch of questions about this black in a cardridge. I have a 98 mauser with a 1 in 48 twist barrel on it that I made a reamer out of a 9/16 drill bit(I shaped the bit to the specs of the case). For a case I took a 300 rem ultra and cut it 2and5/16 inch long. The design of the reamer has no free bore as I wanted a lip for the case to headspace on. Every thing works beyond my wildest desire so far, I really was not sure I could pull this off. I knew with no free bore the boolit would have to stay in the cartridge. I have LEE 250 and310 real boolits and of course rb,s but they need a gc!! I size the Lee real boolits down and lube them and shove them in the case. Of course the 310 gr takes up more powder space than the 250. My question is how hard do you smash the powder down, and is it ok to use cornmeal for lighter loads and is egg carten material soaked in crisco/olive oil ok for the over powder wads. If using a light powder load should a wad go on top of powder and then on top of cornmeal? I need each load to have the same length of boolit protruding out of case to help it feed into chamber. Anything else I need to know? This sure is fun but I am going to wait for cooler weather to develope loads.

[Chill Wills]

What is the caliber? 45? 50?

You are very creative.

Maybe a fifty now that I am thinking about with a ML barrel chambered for BPCR. Sounds interesting.

For just gun range fun, skip the grease wad stuff and load powder, then a dry wad or even no wad and then your bullet with good (real) black powder lube. Shoot the heaviest bullet the 48 twist will support.

Either wipe barrel with damp patch between each shot
OR blow tube if you are in shade and the temp is less than about 85f. 5 long slow breaths will do. Easy, no?


As to compression, depends on the powder. Good powder = little or no compression. Some other powder 1/4 to 3/8 inch. don't use the bullet to compress. If you are a machine shop guy, which sounds like you are.... make a compression plug to screw into the press. Also about 0.001" neck pull or even try zero(slip fit) for Bullet / Case fit
-Chill Wills

[Southern Son]

Nekshot,
You don't HAVE to mash down the powder. Start by filling the case with you powder so that the boolit just compresses the powder, maybe 1/16 of an inch. See how they shoot. Then add powder, say 2 or 3 grains, and then compress it down to the level you need to seat your boolit. See how it shoots, then add another 2 or 3 grains, and so on and so forth.

How much you can compress the powder, will be depend on many things. Not the least of which is you case capacity, if you have used one of the RUM cases, you will be able to push the powder down alot more than in a Hornet case. Some powders in some cases love to be compressed, some don't, and how you find out is trial and error.

As Chill Wills said, don't use your boolit to really compress the powder, you can damage the boolit. If you can make a reamer from a drill then chamber a rifle, then a powder compression die will be a before breakfast job. Think along the lines of a Case Mouth Expander die, but without the flare to expand the case mouth, and a flat end on the rod so that the powder is pressed down flat.

With the wads and the case filler, I don't have any experience with fillers (at all) or wads in a bottle neck case. I have used wads in my 45/70, and if you thought that the answer to "how much compression for the powder?" question was loong winded, wads are just a bad, hell the only thing that is worse is "what lube is best?"

Good luck and post a photo of your rifle, and the case.

[nekshot]

Thanks fellas, this case is straight walled because I cut the neck off and I definetly was compressing too much and I was pushing on the boolit. I detembered a die yesterday so today I will chamber the die and then I can seat the boolits in my press. I was not using magnum powders and they worked fine, saw Lyman info was with magnum primers but if they go off I guess thats what counts. I am redoing a surplus military stock for this action because the barrel is bigger than the smokeless barrels for this reciever. I was expecting more recoil and did not expect as much muzzle blast but it all adds to the fun factor. It simply is a glorified 50 cal muzzle loader in a brass container!

[nekshot]

ooops, senior moment above-I meant magnum primers not powder!!

[bigted]

kewl ... glad you posted here. you have a very cool wildcat going there and it sounds like a grand 50-90 capacity case.cant wait to hear how it shoots for accuracy. are you going to scope it or try with irons?

[nekshot]

bigted it will be scope for now(for me and my eyes) but my son wants a peep site eventually. Should have some pictures in a couple days.

[Southern Son]

Nekshot,
The Magnum primers are not needed for Black Powder. Alot of old books will say that you need them (some seemed to believe that the extra boom in the primer would help burn off some of the fouling), but most of the top shooters now are using conventional primers, some even use a paper wad over the primer to reduce the flash even more (some are using pistol primers). I have tried the paper wad and found that in my 45/70 it reduced extream spread and standard deviation.