Smokless loads for 8mm kropateschek

[Mgvande]

I'm getting into loading for the kropateschek rifle. I have a leaning for PP projectiles. Just wondering about powder and bullet diameter combinations. I will be using 348 win brass. Thanks in advance

[barrabruce]

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?227072-Another-Odd-One-The-8MM-Kropatschek

[salpal48]

You can Use Loading data for 8mm Lebel.. . It is basically the same. I happen to use surplus IMR7383 surplus which is Barletts powder.
this is similar to 4831 less 15%
But again any 8mm lebel will do

[Mgvande]

Thanks for the info.

[salpal48]

Looks Like another Black powder praiser . Don't use smokeless Danger , If They had smokeless powder in the early days They would have Dumped Black years ago

[salpal48]

The Kropatchek 8x56 R was always Designed as a smokeless Load. The previous Loading 8x60R was the Black powder load For there single shot Rifle.. the model 1886/98 became the standard In 8x56R
If you Buy an original Of the box of 10 8x56R the headstamp is dated beteen 1910-1924 pull the Bullets and you will Find smokeless Powder
If you buy an Original pack of Ten Blanks these are 8x60R blanks and are black powder.
I am Currently using Imr7383 surplus. I have used in the past 4831 with good Results.
I have shot both Modified cast and Reclaimed Factory Bullets .
I have converted all my Age Of Transaction Rifles to smokeless without Problems. with a little experimentation They are exc shooter
I have 4 Kropatcheks , Rifle, Colonial, Short Rifle and Carbine. Each do perform Differently with the same load.

[Mgvande]

What do you guys think about using FFFg in this chambering? Or duplex loads? I heard that the 8mm could get quite dirty with black powder. There just isn't allot of info floating around so I thought I would ask around. I want to use a PP 247gr bullet with 348 brass. I checked my bore and I'm thinking 320 to 321 diameter would be good. I just have to get a custom mold made. I'm not sure the best outfit to do this though as I always found something on the online catalogs from Accurate or Buffalo arms.

[Mgvande]

The Kropatchek 8x56 R was always Designed as a smokeless Load. The previous Loading 8x60R was the Black powder load For there single shot Rifle.. the model 1886/98 became the standard In 8x56R
If you Buy an original Of the box of 10 8x56R the headstamp is dated beteen 1910-1924 pull the Bullets and you will Find smokeless Powder
If you buy an Original pack of Ten Blanks these are 8x60R blanks and are black powder.
I am Currently using Imr7383 surplus. I have used in the past 4831 with good Results.
I have shot both Modified cast and Reclaimed Factory Bullets .
I have converted all my Age Of Transaction Rifles to smokeless without Problems. with a little experimentation They are exc shooter
I have 4 Kropatcheks , Rifle, Colonial, Short Rifle and Carbine. Each do perform Differently with the same load.

What type of bullet are you using?

[salpal48]

What type of bullet are you using?

Since I have a Complete set of Rifles. i have not slug the bore. . I started using a Jacketed 170 Gn. speer .323 ( 8mm )
bullet. Then changes to RN to feed in the mag.
The basic Charge is 38.1 Gn IMR 7383 . I used Lee data from There 8mm Lebel using 4831 less appox 15%. All shoot well and Decent group @ 100 yds. military Rifles are what they are and these are No different

[salpal48]

I have researched this cartridge , Even though I stated I use a .323 Bullet all the surplus ammo I have pulled apart , The bullet Diameter Is .319- 320.
The surplus ammo Is Packs of Ten. with Portuguese writing that states Cartridges 8mm Model 99 . all headstamp 1919 . I do have ammo dated 1924 But have not Pulled them to check
from the Pull The powder Is Extruded rods
Pulling The blanks even Though there 8x60R . The wood Bullet Diameter Is appox .320 with Black powder

[Mgvande]

It's interesting that 4831 would be a powder choise for this rifle as it is fairly slow compared to let's say 4895 or something similar.

[salpal48]

The only Reason why I chose This Is That Lee uses this In the 8mm Lebel Load data . I have a lot Of Imr 7383 like i said In the above post.
There were other Powder Listed . But this is the one I chose. Info on this cartridge Is Limited . another Thing is that the surplus case powder Is Very course .and it looks similar to 4831 and fills the case to almost the top. This is not very scientific but works for me

[Mgvande]

Just received my pp mold for this rifle from Accurate. We will see how it goes. Hopefully have some time to fire up the pot this weekend.

[303Guy]

Looking forward to your results. I'm hoping to shoot off a few paper patch rounds this weekend. It's been a long time for me.

[Mgvande]

211071

[Mgvande]

213360

Been a while since I poured these. I was at work for a month. At any rate they are patched and ready to rock once it gets above freezing outside. I'm thinking I'm going the 3fg route first and see what's going on.

[303Guy]

Looking very good!

[Mgvande]

213472

I loaded a few. It looks sort of odd with the long bullet. They weight out at about 245 to 247 ish so they are long for a .320 diameter. I want to get these brass fire formed so I can figure out my paper thickness for best results. I did run some dummies through the tube magazine and I noticed that I am getting a very small 'slice' in the paper so something is sharp down there. It may mean I have to go grease groove but we will see.

[Mgvande]

So I shot off my first 10rnds with 3f and the fouling was so bad the paper was getting damaged when chambering. The group was about 2' across at 50m. When I cleaned the bore I found that the whole bore had a nice supply of lead along it is whole length. So I loaded up a few more with the same paperpatched projectile but lowered the 3fg charge by 10gr and added 4gr RL-17. This got me 1580fps and a grouping that I could work with. I actually got two consecutive shots in the same hole. I noticed that each round chambered with no damage to the patch and my spent brass seemed cleaner. When I got home I cleaned the bore with 4 patches. The historical load was traveling at 1700fps if I recall and my projectile is the same weight. So I am inclined to perhaps up the smokless by a 1/2gr and see where that takes me. Site won't let me upload my group photo but I will try later

[303Guy]

Sign on to Postimage - it's free - and upload the photos you to want to post. Post from there using 'hotlink for forums' under the 'share'.

Those long boolits look great!

[Ballistics in Scotland]

So I shot off my first 10rnds with 3f and the fouling was so bad the paper was getting damaged when chambering. The group was about 2' across at 50m. When I cleaned the bore I found that the whole bore had a nice supply of lead along it is whole length. So I loaded up a few more with the same paperpatched projectile but lowered the 3fg charge by 10gr and added 4gr RL-17. This got me 1580fps and a grouping that I could work with. I actually got two consecutive shots in the same hole. I noticed that each round chambered with no damage to the patch and my spent brass seemed cleaner. When I got home I cleaned the bore with 4 patches. The historical load was traveling at 1700fps if I recall and my projectile is the same weight. So I am inclined to perhaps up the smokless by a 1/2gr and see where that takes me. Site won't let me upload my group photo but I will try later

The fouling problem doesn't surprise me. It gave trouble with all attempts to make 8mm. rifles work with a larger charge and faster twist than the common black powder rounds. The largest powder grains you can get would probably foul less. The British probably got the best results in this type of project with a solid pellet of compressed black powder in the .303 Lee-Metford. I believe it was pierced up the middle, and probably originated in the technology developed for the Congreve rockets. That had been tried and found insufficiently accurate in the .577 Snider, but higher pressure might have made some difference.

I have loaded, many years ago, for the single-shot Guedes. The 8x60R it used is virtually identical to the 8x56R, and I don't know whether the chamber neck was shortened to prevent interchangeability. My groove diameter was a fraction under .331in., giving unusually deep grooves which were quite unnecessary and must have worsened the fouling problem considerably. It was designed around the idea of patching the bullet with copper foil, which was dropped because of irregularity in its detachment from the bullet.

I was impressed by my 245gr. gas-check mould in .330 diameter, from NEI. But that was before NEI went through a bad patch on the death of its founder. The business is currently inactive and for sale, and we must hope for improvement, since I believe most of its mould cutters are those Walt made. I also used Speer 275gr. .338 semi-pointed softpoints, which my Rockchucker press easily sized down .338 jacketed bullets with a simple ring die. They came out a thousandth larger than lead, so it is true that a jacket springs back from sizing, and the core presumably doesn't. With their long unsized nose, it is unlikely that the core wound up anywhere near that theoretically possible .0005in. off-centre. Anyway, there is no need to do this, as a cast gas-check bullet works well at Guedes velocities.

It was at a bad time for black powder supplies in the UK, and what I could get gave velocities of only about 1200ft./sec. The bullets frequently tumbled, for a bullet keeps its rotational velocity much better than its linear motion. This means they were less well stabilised than a bullet which has slowed to 1200ft./sec. at long range. I never tried Pyrodex, but I began with 24gr. of Reloder 7, giving about 1525 ft./sec. with the NEI bullet, at which it penetrated two feet of end-grain larch timber. So we have a better big-game cartridge than it sounds, ample for anything that is unlikely to eat you up or squash you flat. Approximately factory ballistics of1710 ft/.sec. and good stability were obtained with 30gr. of Reloder 7, producing very reassuring pressure indications, but I would not go over 28gr. with my sized-down Speer 275gr. semi-spitzers. These gave greater though not alarming primer deformation, probably due to friction and dimensions rather than weight.

I have seen a velocity of 2000ft./sec. quoted for the late Portuguese Kropatschek, but I don't know what bullet weight. I am sure this could be done safely, and wouid make it a very effective round. What's wrong with a high velocity .33 Winchester, which is very similar?

I have been shown a picture of a cartridge found illicitly with a metal detector in the Boer trenches at Colenso, from 1899. The bullet, too corroded to measure accurately, appeared to be of thin nickel rolled on steel, and the case was the shorter 5mm. length. Such a bullet would surely have worked very badly in the Guedes, and I don't believe the Boers had any Kropatscheks.

I have some 8x60R Kropatschek blanks, with headstamps from the late 1880s to about 1904. They have case lengths of about 56 to 60mm., probably just as they came from the drawing process, and not the common practice of the time, of making blanks from used bulleted rounds. They were loaded with very finely grained smokeless or semi-smokeless, a cotton wool filler and a hollow wooden bullet.I hoped to reload them, and the main reason I didn't was that many of them had split necks, even without insertion of a tight-fitting bullet. Very possibly they had been rejected for orthodox loading for this reason. They were also balloon headed and surely corrosive, so they didn't seem worth trying.

It is very unlikely that smokeless powder played any part in the design of the 1886 Kropatschek. It is very similar to Kropatscheks of the 1870s, when it couldn't possibly. The French invented smokeless rifle powder in 1885, and for some years French soldiers were threatened with ten years in jail for opening a cartridge - which being an anarchic breed, all of them probably did. The British had the French "chemical powder" very much in mind in deciding that the new Lee-Metford had to be a .303, but were just guessing when they made the sight graduations for a slightly higher velocity than black powder would give. Austria-Hungary, who made the Kropatschek, and Portugal, most unlikely to be of any help in the war France knew they had to consider, were probably even further from getting their hands on any. The Austro-Hungarians themselves had to replace the 1886 and 1888 Mannlichers, with their tilting-block locked straight-pull bolts, with the helical bolt-head 1895. They would hardly have got themselves into that expensive mess if they had known about smokeless in 1886.

[Mgvande]

Here is a link for the group ahttps://s20.postimg.org/829gj0uq5/IMG_6459.jpg (https://postimg.org/image/ktnmpj4i1/)t 50m and the state of the paper that I found on the snow.

https://s20.postimg.org/ajl7qamcd/IMG_6460.jpg (https://postimg.org/image/9u2fdxlsp/)

[303Guy]

A tip on posting images from Postimage - use the 'Hotlink for forums' and paste directly into the message. Postimage is great - I recommend it to all.

[Mgvande]

I have figured how to post with Postimage. Thanks

[barrabruce]

Looks pretty good to me.
Some areas that may need attention for better performance / loading ease and consistency.217666
You may see more improvement after the patches clean up the barrell more.
When I have a flyer it usually won’t shoot again till I put a patch through my gun to clean out the offending whatever it is that stops it shooting.
Hope it helps

[Mgvande]

I did notice that the bore seems to be getting smoother after each time I get out. I will try the same loads again but I'm thinking I should be adding a thin cork or something under the bullet as the lead is quite soft. These were rolled in a hurry so I believe that there is opportunity for improvement.