Surplus Powder for 30-06

[Rattlesnake Charlie]

Anyone familiar with this powder from River Valley Ordnance?
Surplus Powder for 30-06
M2 Ball Ammunition
Lot Number BAJ47288

I'm working up some loads for 150 gr flat base FMJ designed for 30-06. Seems to be taking a lot of powder to get velocities up to normal. 53 grains to make it to 2500 fps.

Looking for other's experience with this powder.

Attachment 294439

[FLINTNFIRE]

Mine was rvo-62 and some other powders , been a long time ago now there are data sheets if you google for them

https://www.shootersforum.com/thread...inance.240464/

Mine was good stuff , wished I had bought more .

[Jaaymar]

Sounds like it is burning too slow.

Do you have a moisture sensor?
Could be the powder picked up too much moisture to maintain a good burn.
Johnny’s reloading bench on YouTube did a velocity test using “damp” powder (sorry, I can’t find the video).
The powder was left out for a few day then loaded & velocity’s recorded.
I believe he is located in Missouri, 60-70% humidity can go as high as 80%.
After which he uses desiccant packs to dry it (30%) and the test was repeated.
It showed a gain of velocity. I don’t remember how much.

Maybe through some desiccant in the keg & retest in a few days.
Or could be some 50BMG powder got mislabeled.

Jaaymar

If you make people think they are thinking they will love you.
If you make people actually think they will hate you.

[Rattlesnake Charlie]

Jaaymar
It was an unopened jug with seal I had to peel off. Moisture in my house is usually 16%. I do keep the jug closed tightly.
Charlie

[Rattlesnake Charlie]

FLINTNFIRE
The data in the link you sent appears to be mirroring what I'm seeing. Thanks for that info.
Charlie

[Rattlesnake Charlie]

I did more googling and found what I was looking for on a CMP site. Turns out it does take a lot of powder to get things moving.

Attachment 294440

[unique]

I have a bunch of that powder with that lot number from RVO. Here's what I can tell you. The powder was made in 1973 for military contract.

I use Win785 data for 30-06 and use H450 data for 7x57m & 6.5x55 swede. Both powders are similar but I suspect the H450 varied over time as different lots were purchased by Hogdon. The powder is very temperature sensitive; a load that is normal at 60F will be very mild at 30F and cratering primers at 90F.

This powder has a good feature and that is it produces great accuracy even though it is temperature sensitive. I use magnum primers with it or otherwise I will get an occasional click-boom which is never good. Looking over my notes I see that this produced the best accuracy in 30-06 with 165gr running between 2550 fps and 2750 fps temperature dependent.

All in all I really do not like using this powder since it is finicky and I recently been thinking about making some rocket engines out of it.