MORE THAN A MOUSE FART , experiments in power pistol

[GREENCOUNTYPETE]

I have read through the 30-06 mouse fart sticky , some very good info in there

I need to get a pound of bullseye but the store was out last i checked

so I did some playing around with what I had , and there is lots of unique data but very little power pistol data for cast bullet loads especialy in 30-30 or 30-06

my 2 test guns were a HRA M1 30-06 and a Marlin 336 30-30

test boolits were tl314-90swc sized to 311 and a c309-170rf that drops at .310
both fairly soft air cooled roughly 50/50 soft lead pipe and clip on wheel weights I really didn't get to hung up on alloy for these tests , this is what I cast most of my pistol bullets from and it works i drop a muffin of each in the pot when it is time to refill but they vary in weight from muffin to muffin

I had been reading about Larry's experiment in using # drill bits to find a point where the primer no longer wanted to push the shoulder forward and back out of the primer pocket on rimless cases I didn't have a #29 but I looked it up on a drill chart and found it was .136" I saw 1/8 was .125" and I figured well I can always go buy a drill bit later and make it bigger if it doesn't work I did run it back and forth a few times after getting though to make sure if anything I was on the big side of .125"
well it seems to work it definitely lights the powder better
I had originally needed to use 4.5 gr of power pistol to get clean good burn , after opening it up i worked down to 2.0gr that was the smallest I could through with my measures.

at 2.0gr power pistol I seem to get fairly clean burn with a few granules of powder in the barrel but just a few about 3 from what i can see

but it is definitely louder than a cat sneeze , power pistol appears to be sort of a blasty powder which makes sense since it is designed to give the function a semi auto pistol needs to cycle well

previously I had been using c309-170rf over 6.3 gr power pistol for 50 and 100 yard plinkers with no gas check these gave fine 50 yard accuracy they opened up some at 100 but some of that is probably my ability to see with iron sighs , but I could shoot at a 9 inch steel plate at 100 yards and hit it all day if i had that many rounds loaded

I think I will dedicate 25 pieces of brass to enlarged flash holes and see what I can work up or down from my 6.3 gr load


in either barrel the 26 inch M1 or the 20 inch 336 they were louder than I was looking for and possibly even super sonic , I have no chronograph but they are about as loud as a 22lr , hit with more authority and cost less than even than any 22lr i have been able to find so when I get them on paper I will see what they look like at 25 and 50 yards

[shredder]

Hello , I have the same interest at heart but with different powder so thought I would chime in and share a bit. I have used Herco and Red dot (and a few others that did not work as well) for those type of 30-06 loads, but really prefer Herco. I have not tried them all but happened to have these on hand.

Though it may not qualify as mouse fart or cat sneeze, 8 grains of herco with a 160 grain plain base round nose is my go to load for fun. I enlarged the flash holes on 20 rounds of new brass and dedicated them to this task. I would have to dig out my load notes to see qwhat the size of the drill bit was but it sounds like you have that under control. I imagine they will outlast me as that is all they will ever be asked to do.

Be sure to mark the cases permanantly so they never get full house loads by mistake. I filed a small groove across the rim with a triangle file so they can never be mistaken.

[GREENCOUNTYPETE]

I will have to see what the LGS has ,maybe some clays , my dad has a 1/2 of an 8 pounder of clays I tried to talk him out of from our shot shell loading days , but he said with powder availability he was going to keep it encase he needed to fire up the Mec again for some shot shells.

the LGS gets some new stuff in every week I will see what they have this week maybe I can score some bulls eye or clays

I also used a saw file and filed a groove across the head so they are easy to identify .

I should have said that I was using large pistol primers also

exces 650 which of the powders you listed meters the best in an auto disc measure , i load on a Lee classic cast turret and if I can drop the powder through the auto disc and rifle charging die it works very well

the power pistol being one of the least expensive powders i can normally find it meters very well and does very well at the supersonic light loads and is very economical , and I can use it in cast 9mm, 40,45,44 and reduced cast boolit rifle rounds

[GREENCOUNTYPETE]

well no bullseye , no clays . no solo1000 but they did have tightwad and it was only 16.75 so I bought it

tried it in a 30-30 modified (flash hole drilled out to 1/8") and unmodified case starting at 2.1 and working down 1.7 then 1.2 gr all work in either case but the unmodified case got more sooty

I also tried 2.1 in a modified 1/8" flash hole 30-06 case it also fired fine

all were with the tl314-90swc sized .311

all loads were louder than I was hoping for , and 2.1 hit with the authority to blow right through a 2x4

I haven't got a chronograph but can see i may need one when funds allow

for rough comparison a factory 85 gr 32S&W fired from a 3 1/3 inch barrel buries it's self in a pine 2X4 but doesn't go through , while these 90gr go right through tossing the chunks of 2x4 flying I know not terribly scientific

neither is my noise test i fired a 30-30 round then a standard bulk 1260fps 22lr the 22lr was louder but not by much

[GREENCOUNTYPETE]

I have a big log as big around as a 55 gallon drum with a smaller log about 12x12 inches in front of it , I shoot up the smaller logs and when they get far enough gone i replace the smaller log.

when I first tried the 6.3gr power pistol and a c309-170rf in the 30-30 i learned 8 inches of oak log wasn't enough to stop it

my wife doesn't even notice me shooting any more.