Accurrate 5744 for 45/70 trap door

[GARD72977]

I'm ready to start shooting my Springfield Trap door.

I'm leery about using fillers. I never
never loaded using them. Looking for a powder that will not need any filler. I have an old Accurrate powder manual that list 5744 with low P.S.I.

Just wondering if any one else using this powder

[shutinlead]

Gard,
I use this powder in several different vintage rifles of this caliber, including a Trap Door that I shoot occasionally in a service rifle match- (the folks shooting AR's chuckle and gig me until the scores are tallied) Rapid fire takes some concentration... What bullet are you using? I'm using the Lyman 500 grain - don't recall the mold number in a 16:1 alloy. Don't let anyone talk you into a wad or card - it's not needed. If you use a chronograph, keep it around 1100 fps which should be about 20-22 grains. In breezy conditions, the folks shooting squirrel guns whine about the 600 yd scores, I get the last laugh.
Greg

[knifemaker]

I do not use that powder, but have had excellent accuracy results using IMR-4198 powder in three different 45/70 rifles. If you go to the Hodgdon reloading website you will find loads with that powder for the trap door, lever action rifles and rifles that can be loaded up to high pressure. I do not recall any fillers for the trap door rifles. In my 1874 Sharps by Pedersoli, Marlin 1895 and my Siamese mauser rifle I was able to obtain 3 shot one inch groups at 100 yards with that powder in all three rifles.

[Tom Herman]

I'm on the same path: I was remarking to one of my friends the other day about having to use fillers for the 4198 in my '68 Springfield (.50-70) due to the powder being position sensitive, so he suggested 5744 which doesn't have that issue for him.
I'm going to load up a half dozen shells today and hopefully have definitive proof later this afternoon or morning (heavily weather dependent, living in the Pacific NW).
As an aside, I've been rolling up three sheets of TP, then using a cable cutter (Tin snips or scissors should work as well) to cut off the roll about 5/8"-3/4" long, and inserting that into the case on top of the 4198.
For my 71/84 Mauser, I've graduated to using part of a starch (dissolvable) packing peanut: I'll cut or break it for length, then roll it in between my fingers like a hearing protector, then insert it into the case on top of the powder.
I may continue this, it all depends on if the bullets drop deeper into the case (I'm not neck resizing after firing).
I'm really enjoying the .50-70: It's a pussycat to shoot, the cases are cheap and easily obtainable, the dies work right off the shelf...
The Mauser has some quirks I have to overcome (about 10% of the cases have light firing pin strikes not resulting in ignition, and not the same ones each time), the seating/crimping die doesn't crimp right ( a $100 or so cure from C4HD), even when tightened right to the shell plate, and there seems to be a lot of crud in the chamber making inserting the following rounds difficult to impossible. Not something you want to stake your life on... And shell cases are ridiculously expensive ($3.50-$8.00 each), and totally Unobtanium locally. At least the bullet mould for this caliber is cheap...
Best of Luck!

-Tom

[Tatume]

According to Ross Seyfried, Accurate 5744 was originally formulated for loading black powder cartridges.

[shutinlead]

Years ago when I converted over from shooting black my go to powder was 5744 - I tried several other but came back to this. I had it in my mind that the powder had to be kept next to the ignition source. I used a 1/4 sheet of toilet paper stuffed gently down on the powder then a .030" card set just inside the case so that the bullet pushed it down - this method of thinking was so the base of the bullet wasn't deformed by the powder burn... A fellow shooter had a fit when he found out that I was using a card and filler on top of this powder - he explained that it could create a pressure spike- one time he saw it in the chamber area - once down the barrel following ignition... his claim was the spikes he saw weren't dangerously excessive - but they existed when a filler was used and non-existent when no filler was used. His source of data was from a "Pressure Trace" system with a strain gage applied to a modern highwall. I'm not convinced yet, but I quit using any kind of filler with my loads and I noticed groups and performance was unchanged, in a 38-72 Win, performance improved. I discontinued using a card also following an experiment that allowed me to recover bullets with minimal distortion. There is not the combustion condition with this powder like there is with black, I saw NO evidence of marking or distortion to the base of the lead bullet - in fact some of the unexplained fliers went away - may have been the card sticking to the base of the bullet for part of it's flight? I have purchased a pressure trace system and I plan to do some research of my own when the weather improves... next summer???

[GARD72977]

Had to Google the Pressure Trace system. That looks very interesting.

[shutinlead]

So did I after the fellow shooter explained it, then I had to have one... just took me a couple years. Am I helping you spend money yet???

[6.5 CM]

Afraid of fillers ? No reason in a straight case. My most extreme is .458 round balls covered with Lee lube. 10 gr of TrailBoss, Coarse corn meal, a wad, the ball with a light crimp. 10 in 3" @25 yards. (You can also load 2 or 3 balls for a home defense load in your trap door carbine.)

[GARD72977]

Im going to start with NOE 378gr RN

[shutinlead]

Is the NOE a gas check? My experience with them is they have been very accurate in a lever gun I have. cast dimension about .460"? Have you by chance slugged the bore to get an idea of size - my TD ran a little large, at about .4595" and the mold dropped them right at that size so I didn't size them any and it was my first experience using the pan lube method that Texas Mac described on his website - got me experimenting with making lube too. What lube are you using? I initially was using SPG but being the tightwad I am - make my own now and have had considerable success.
Greg

[uscra112]

According to Ross Seyfried, Accurate 5744 was originally formulated for loading black powder cartridges.

?????? MP-5744 was a double-base military powder, made by Hercules. The Army didn't like it. When it hit the surplus market, it turned out that it worked well for cast bullet loads in large volume cases such as .30-06 and .45-70, without needing fillers. BPCR guys ate it up. The surplus supply ran out, and somebody had it replicated in Europe. Accurate marketed it here as XMP-5744. I burned pound after pound of XMP in the early 00s. It worked great with gas-checked bullets at 1800 fps and up. It did NOT work well at plain-base pressures, (~14,000 psi). Left a lot of unburned kernels in bore and chamber.

Sometime later Accurate redesignated it as just 5744, and I read claims that it's different, although it uses the same data. The Schuetzen guys I now correspond with say 5744 still leaves unburned powder when used for black-powder pressures with plain base bullets. I still have several pounds of the XMP variety, so I just don't know. I'm no longer loading for the .30-06 class of rifles, cast or otherwise.

In any case, 5744 was never "originally formulated for black powder cartridges". Wonder where he got that idea?

[uscra112]

BTW Charlie Dell and Wayne Schwartz proved conclusively that chamber ringing in our rifles is caused by wads pressed down on the powder, and nothing else. Unfortunately the book, "The Modern Schuetzen Rifle" is out of print and unobtainium today. In any case, NO WADS.

The biggest advantage that XMP-5744 offered was/is that it is not at all position sensitive. I tried to improve SDs by using kapok filler with it, and got absolutely nowhere. Don't bother.

My last go-round with cast bullets in a high-pressure military cartridge was a K31 Schmidt-Rubin. On the recommendation of a friend, my loads used......(wait for it).......Blue Dot. That worked so well that I never thought of trying the XMP-5744.

[rfd]

aa5744 is a very accurate "bpcr" smokeless powder. i used it before coming to my black powder senses.

no wads and no fillers. the quigley match flat out forbids the use of wads and double base smokeless powders ...

"Smokeless powder is allowed for modern reproduction rifles using safe published data. No over-powder wads are allowed if using a double-base powder (over-powder wads are cotton or Dacron or similar wads pushed down into the cartridge case over the powder column with the intention of holding the powder column tight against the primer and leaving an air space between the over-powder wad and the base of the bullet or card wad at the base of the bullet). The most popular one used at the Quigley Match is Accurate Arms 5744."

[BigAl52]

Ive never used any in the Shiloh 45-100. Just lots of good ole 1FG black. But Ive burned my fair share of 5744 in the 38-55 leverguns. About 18 grains of it under a 245 lead bullet and its pure fun shootin. Not bad in the accuracy dept either.

[GARD72977]

The reason Im wanting to use smokeless is because the bore is large. I'm planning on shooting the bullets as cast .462 and powder coated. The mold is PB. The only sizer I have is .459

I'm sure I will end up using BP. I only have 3F now. I order BP 10lbs at a time and not ready to invest in m ore right now

[NSB]

I shoot the 45-70 quite a bit. I've used 5744 in this cartridge and it gave reasonably good accuracy results. It does leave unburned granuals of powder in the barrel, but they don't seem to get any worse after the first shot. I've played around with fillers to a degree, but have never used wads. There's a wealth of info out there on how to ring your barrel written by guys who did it deliberately and know what they're talking about. It's considered reasonably safe to use dacron if it's lofted up to its maximum and you use only a very small amount of it. Lyman used to list loads in the manual that filler of this type could be used in. Their later manuals have removed reference to using fillers, probably because too many loaders don't know the difference between filler and wads. Or they were "packing it down" on the powder. Anyway, after a lot of time loading and testing I found very few loads that actually significantly benefitted from the use of fillers. I can tell you that 5744 wasn't improved by using them. My favorite powders for the 45-70 using smokeless are: Rel7, 4198, 2400, and Unique for light loads using cast bullets.

[McLintock]

I used 5744 for years in both single shots and lever guns in 45-70 and did quite well with it for Cowboy Action Long Range matches. Writers such as Mike Venturino recommended 28 grs with a 400 gr bullet, but I got a recommendation from a local reloading shop owner and started loading with 22.5 to 24.5 grs and saw a considerable improvement in accuracy. Velocity was about on par with a normal black powder load. Won the lever action big bore title at Winter Range, the US Championship match, in the mid 2000's with my Browning '86 and that load; 10 shots, all hits in about 21.5 seconds at 180 yards. I thought it was and is an excellent round.
McLintock

[dlbarr]

I've used a 25-26gr load of 5744 in both my 1895 & handi-rifle 45/70. 400gr CB. Very accurate load.

[outsidebear]

Used a Farmingdale, NY Shiloh .45-70 military carbine for caribou, early 1990's in Alaska, with 26 grs 5744 under a 405 gr cast bullet, worked fine and made meat aplenty. I much prefer hunting game close, rather than merely shooting from a distance.
25.0 grs 5744 beneath a 450 gr cast bullet in a .50-70 Peabody carbine performs well also.
I'm liking it's use in a Marlin Cowboy .38-55.
I've found 5744 not complicated to use and it works safely in a variety of c'tridges.
Yes, it leaves some unburned powder kernels in the barrel...but so?