My 1st experience with triple 7

[semtav]

This sport is supposed to be about having fun, trying new ( to you) things and learning.
If one only learns by listening to others advice online, he really has no knoiwledge basis to advance.
Like the 45-120 prospects that jump on here all exited, only to be shot down as idiots, by the more experienced, so go the BP sub and SP users.
I think you should get out there and try it all, and develop your own opinion.

I'm fortunate to live and shoot in an area where nothing is sacred. Bring what you got and shoot it. How you do will dictate how good it is.

I started with smokeless and it only took me 6 months to Develop a liking for BP only.
Never tried BP sub, cause I figured it would be like kissing your sister, close but no cookies.

Have fun shooting the triple seven. When you get to the BP part, you can look back and know why its not recommended by the experts instead of just wondering.

[roaddog1m]

Semtav, Thanks, I knew nothing about 777 but tried some loads and posted the results. I didn't ask for any advice, just letting people know what my findings were. I got flamed by one of the big fish in the fish bowl and decided not to converse with that particular individual any longer.
I will say that after seeing what it will do to my brass alone, I'll be cutting back on the 777 and cleaning the heck out of the brass I used to shoot the stuff.
I do like to research stuff before jumping in so I sat in the back ground and just read other peoples posts for a while before really commenting much. I can't say that I was greeted by the welcome wagon.
The day I showed up to boot camp, there was a guy there who had long hair, tatoo's and a leather biker jacket. He looked pretty intimidating. After about the 1st day, we all lost our clothes, hair and our individuality. We had to all shower together and that's where I discovered that he was just a fat guy with some junky tats and an under developed manhood. Since then, I don't get very intimidated by the big fish in the small pond.

[Smoke-um if you got-um]

Roaddog - As a brother LEO(retired) of 30 yrs my story is pretty much the same as yours. Although never did have to kill anyone in the line of duty. Everything else is about the same. Been beat up, beat on, stabbed(through the top of the foot of all places, hurt like ****!), shot at, at least a half dozen times (one time by a guy hiding in the woods line with a bow/arrow) , shot with a double load of 7 1/2 from a sawed off double barrel 12. Should have been dead at least a dozen times I know of, 3 horrendous car wrecks, delivered two babies, even did CPR that actually worked twice. You get the story cos your still there. I also refuse to be talked down to and will respond in kind when provoked. In the same breath I will treat with respect anyone who responds with respect. I've been called down by a moderator and even the forum owner/administrator? 45Nut for calling out a few who seem to think it's their calling to belittle others posting's. My reasoning is if we tolerate those people it diminishes the experience and enjoyment of this forum for all. I have no qualm taking those to task that insist on being rude and demeaning where most will not. Most on this forum are good folks who share willingly their experiences and knowledge, expecting nothing in return. I respect these people greatly and value them and their knowledge. Those that seem unable to have a decent and/or positve attitude are simply put on my ignore list. Some have an obvious dislike for LEO's in general. This should not be an unfamiliar experience for either of us,or the other LEO"s on this forum. It's how we handle ourselves that is important. Pls continue your postings with the knowlege that the wise guys are in the minority. Those that know will see them as they are and us for what we are and represent.
Best of luck to you,

Mike

[BSkerj]

Roaddog, I guess I will put my .02 worth in . I have just ordered a Shiloh Sharps from Big Timber and have 2 yrs to wait. I have been reading everything, including visiting different sites. Like you , I am just learning about BP and what brought me to this thread was you using 777, not the fact that you could not find BP. I wanted to know your opinion on it, so for what it is worth thanks for your input. Even though you may not have 1000's of posts you brought some info that others wanted to know. That is the main reason that I visit this and other sites like it. The knowledge is tremendous and you, as well as Don, have added to mine.

[roaddog1m]

Wow, thanks guys! I'm out working and decided to find some internet signal and see what's going on out there. It's been pretty quiet on the rez so far tonight but in about a 1/2 hour all h3ll will break loose I'm sure.

If all you can get are the substitutes, I've tried pyrodex and 777 both. In my opinion, 777 is better of the two but it sounds like it's pretty hard on brass. I suppose a person has to scrub the heck out of everything when you get done with it.

Bskerj, you sound like the kind of guy who knows what he wants and is willing to pay for it and wait if necessary. You might want to just search out about a case of the black stuff and stock pile ahead of time.

I've always been a "run and gun" kind of shooter. I have shot mostly IPSC, high power and tactical matches. Mainly though, I just like shooting! There's a group of guys not far from here who shoot some BP long range stuff so I'm going to get into it a little. I picked up a Navy Arms Rolling Block with a Shilen heavy round barrel. Its a lot of fun to shoot and I'm already hooked! Doubt if I'll win anything but I'm sure I'm going to learn a lot! I think I'm going to take someones advice for now (till I get my BP) and just go back to Varget. It's clean and easy to load. Lots of fun and 42.5gr. is a relatively light load that seems pretty accurate. (I have a butt ton of Varget)
Well, I better get off here and go top off my tank before the fun starts!
Thanks for the positive comments guys!!!
Tom

[StrawHat]

I have looked at 777 and Trail Boss as being reincarnations of what used to be called "bulk smokeless" or "semi smokeless" and as such want to try them to see what they have to offer. First time I have heard or considered the corrosiveness of 777. Thanks to the poster who brought that to my attention. Now I need to research and find some of the solutions to treating that problem.

I still like and use black powder but some of my firearms won't tolerate it.

[bob208]

if you read the books the bulk and smmi smokeless was very hard on barrels. ned roberts talks about washing out a barrel in a few months.it was a 32-40.

real black is as close as the little brown truck.

[The Double D]

Actually T-7 shoots quite well, it is an accurate powder and delivers good accuracy. I started using it in 2001 or 2002 the year it came out. It really got some rave reviews when it come out

The first thing that was learned about it was the infamous crud ring and how to deal with it.. This was a hard fouling ring the showed up in the throat. I had to use steel wool wrapped around a bore brush to get it out. It was a very hard gritty fouling and showed up after the gun was cleaned. Others were reporting it also. It was discovered that the ring was minimized by using smokeless powder bullet lubes instead of black powder lubes.

All the substitutes have potassium perchlorate in them---I think the exception is APP.

I have seen the same decomposition in brass back in the old day with corrosive primed ammunition. It was covered in college and was explained as the Potassium perchlorate residue attacking and breaking down the metal used to alloy copper into cartridge brass--I believed it is the zinc in the alloy that is attacked. This is not something unique to T-7 . I had some 45/70 cases that were also destroyed this way that had only shoot Pyrodex.

I have tried the subs. But once I found and figured out how to get black powder I moved on and never looked back.

Good luck with you tests.

[roaddog1m]

I had twenty rounds loaded up with 777 and we were in a blizzard warning so I decided to get out and shoot em up before the weather got bad. It was 12 degrees and the wind was picking up pretty good which lead to some flyers. I had the 1st batch loaded with 50grains and this batch was loaded up to 52.5 grains. I used a mix of 70% bees wax and 30% olive oil for bullet lube. The interesting thing about it was I didn't gain any speed with the added 2.5 grains of 777 (1425fps.) I shot at 100yrds, off hand and I was impressed with the accuracy. I had a few flyers but out of the 15 rounds I shot on paper, most were in a four inch group. Recoil was pretty mild and clean up was fast again. I ran a patch of hot soapy water through it followed by some dry patches. When it looked like they were clean, I ran my bore snake through it. I soaked the brass in a mix of hot water, Dawn and white vinager. I should be getting my BP pretty soon so I'm going back to the Varget until I get it.

I posted this just to let people know what my results were. So please, no hate mail or death threats.

Tom

[Chris Smith]

I might have overlooked it but did you have to use magnum primers? Sounds like it works pretty good for you, I might should invest in a pound to try in my toys.

[roaddog1m]

Sorry, no I just used large rifle primers. It was a pretty moderate load with no signs of high pressure. I used cards cut from a box of saltine crackers that measure .030 exactly. I used a 45ACP empty and rubber mallet to cut the cards out. It worked best to use my deburring tool on the outside to sharpen it a bit. I used a 45-70 case that I had drilled out the flashhole to nearly the same diameter as the primer pocket to cut the boolits out of the lube. I ground the point off of a 16d nail and used it to push the boolit out of the case each time. You might have to tweak the "cookie cutter" brass a bit to make it fit just right over the boolit with out being too tight or loose. If you're interested in hearing how I did that to mine, just PM me. I might have found a relatively easy way to do it.

Also, remember not to compress 777 or leave any air space. It's really not that hard to do with this load since pouring it through a drop tube (made from an aluminum arrow shaft) and then tapping a couple of times, it's the perfect height in the case so as to allow the .030 wad and light compression.

Again, it seems to be a very accurate load and I haven't even started tweaking my boolit alloy. Just using lino right now. Zero leading and after running a soapy patch followed by dry ones and bore snake, my bore was shiny as a new barrel!

What I have done is segregate the brass that I used to test 777 and those will be used only for 777. That way, I can track degradation of the brass.
Again, I soaked them afterward in hot water, Dawn and white vinegar.


I wondered why there wasn't more info posted about people using/testing 777, but after getting flamed, now I know why they don't do that. lol It's like if you admit that you tried/tested it, you all the sudden voted for Obama and changed gender. I thought for a while I had accidentally logged on to "blackpowderonly.com" after verifying that I was still on the correct forum, I thought maybe I was in a time warp and back in 4th grade and an 6th grader was wanting to fight me because my lunch box wasn't as cool as his.
Fun testing things and posting results and now I seemed to clear the thread of bullies after only a couple of verbal assaults. ahhhhh, life is good!

[Chris Smith]

I got some of that first few post too. And all I did was name my rifle. Some folks. I have a 45 cal. wad punch that I bought from Dixie Gun Works several years ago. I want to try the powder in question in my trapdoor and a 71/84 Mauser I have. Most of my bullets are cast from wheelweights. I ride my bicycle a lot and find PLENTY on the side of the road.

[Kenny Wasserburger]

I tend to stay away from the subs, even living in arrid Wyoming I have seen a fine fine Snover Metford rifled barrel ruined using subs, even when and a good cleaning was given to the barrel before my friend put it up for the winter. We were all learning back then, after that we all stuck to straight BP.

My friend was sick when he saw his barrel in March pulling it out to get ready for the season, and found deep pits in it from the Pyrodex.

Actually I think a fella would get more response over on the Single shot Forum, as they shoot smokless most of them. And this semi-smokless stuff subs while not BP they are not Smokless either. Actually they are worse then either in their ability to attack ones brass and barrel.

BP loads like softer alloys, where again smokless one tends to get along better with harder stuff like wheelweights. Nothing is etched in stone of course.

KW
The Lunger

[gunplumber]

i tried 777 in my ml a couple years ago and on the first shot found out its quite a bit hotter than bp, i guess the label says to reduce starting loads by 15% or so. the accuarcy wasnt there for me like it was with bp so i never used it again. after that i found powder inc and started getting black shipped to my house with no hassle.

[roaddog1m]

Yep, I haven't really heard a good story about a sub yet. I have had good luck so far but don't feel like I want to push my luck. Of course, my barrel isn't an original, it's a Shilen, so it will most likely take a little bit more abuse than an original would have and they make new barrels every day for that matter. One of the things I learned shooting wildcats was that barrels have a gas tank and when it's empty, you get a new one. Life is short and I don't plan to take any of this stuff with me when I go. I'm just having fun shooting every thing including IPSC, 3gun, Tactical and archery 3D. Now I'm gearing up to start shooting cowboy long range. I'm not a gun snob like a some guys can be. If all we got is a Marlin .22, lets go shoot that thing! The guys I shoot with the most are tactical types and when they find out what my latest project is, they just stare at me blankly. Gun people though are a strange crowd. It's similar to the truck crowd where one guy has a Ford and the other a Chevy. I don't mind a fun little banter over rival weapons but snobs suck just like mean cops do! LoL
If my buddy don't get his butt busy and get me some BP, I'm calling the little brown truck myself!

[semtav]

I just ordered a case from Powder inc. cause my local dealer forgot to renew his BP license so now he has to go thru the whole process again. Their price was reasonable. Especially since you can mix and match a few different types. I know $3-500 is a lot to shell out, but you will eventually, so just as welll do it right off the bat, that way you will have a good supply of one lot #.


I don't think Don's origial reply to you was that out of line, he just tried to give you a direction to go if you want to buy a little quicker. He didn't say a bad word to you. Try asking for a reduced load for a 45-120 sometime

[Smoke-um if you got-um]

Don's replies (plural) were condenscending. I've noticed that others are now chiming in with their experiences with BP substitutes w/o worrying that someone will demean or belittle their experience or efforts. I enjoy seeing a wider variety of experiences and I say this having no personal interest in black powder cartridges. No one should immediately chastise me because of my "lack of interest" or any other reason. Their is no room for someone who insists on " it's my way or the highway" regardless of their tenure on the forum. Good natured joking and horse play is fine, but to be challenged simply because you may be doing something another chooses not to partake in , is not. I believe in this concept as I also believe the silent majority of the forum members here do, as well.

Mike

[Don McDowell]

Don's replies (plural) were condenscending. I've noticed that others are now chiming in with their experiences with BP substitutes w/o worrying that someone will demean or belittle their experience or efforts. I enjoy seeing a wider variety of experiences and I say this having no personal interest in black powder cartridges. No one should immediately chastise me because of my "lack of interest" or any other reason. Their is no room for someone who insists on " it's my way or the highway" regardless of their tenure on the forum. Good natured joking and horse play is fine, but to be challenged simply because you may be doing something another chooses not to partake in , is not. I believe in this concept as I also believe the silent majority of the forum members here do, as well.

Mike

I'ld sure be thankful if you'ld care to point out anything in ANY of my posts that will back up your inflammatory statements.
If you have no interest in black powder cartridges, I have to wonder what in the samhell are you doing here besides trying to stir up trouble?

[The Double D]

Just remember what you type doesn't carry voice inflections or facial expressions. You may be commenting in good humor, if the other guy doesn't know it you could be read as sarcastic.

If you guys would stop picking at the scab and just share your experiences with the sub and where to find Blackpowder.

[Don McDowell]

Just remember what you type doesn't carry voice inflections or facial expressions. You may be commenting in good humor, if the other guy doesn't know it you could be read as sarcastic.

If you guys would stop picking at the scab and just share your experiences with the sub and where to find Blackpowder.

Did all that already, explained twice there was no flames, etc intended.
And pointed out the bit about the expense, fouling , brass killing tendancies of the stuff, and lack of accuracy, and that still apparently wasn't good enough for a couple of these twits.
Will also throw in that as well as I know the folks the OP is shooting around, if they haven't GIVEN him a pound or more of blackpowder to shoot, there's likely a problem that's showing up about as well or more clear than it's showing up here.