TightGroup burns pretty hot.

[fastdadio]

Going to the range tomorrow with a life long old friend of mine. I was scrounging the ammoe locker to see what I had on hand to take out, and came up with 100 rounds of 30-30, 170gr. Lee, loaded with 5.0 grs. of TightGroup. This should be a sub sonic load at about 1050 fps. Fun stuff. I've noticed when shooting these and others loaded with TG, of how quickly the barrel heats up, and it got me thinking. Is there any concern with premature throat erosion in our rifles due to using a powder that burns so hot? Should I be loading with a different powder that burns a little cooler for these light loads? What say the collective?

[358429]

Tightgroup makes my revolvers too hot to handle.

[fastdadio]

Tightgroup makes my revolvers too hot to handle.

Makes everything I load with it hot. Makes me wonder if we're doing damage. Heat is not our friend in the bore.

[BigAlofPa.]

Yes it sure is hot. I got leading with it when i shot coated cast. 9mm and .380 were real bad with it. I still use it with plated and jacketed. But take my time to keep the barrel cool.

[gnostic]

I've noticed TightGroup seems to heat up my CZ 75 and bullet lube oozes out of the barrel into my holster. Also, it burns cleaner than the Bullseye or Unique it replaced...

[cwtebay]

Interesting observation!! I can't say that I have noted that before. I planned on some range time tomorrow, I have 25 - 32 special rounds loaded up with Tite Group to see the effects.
Are you cycling these hard and fast? Normal range shooting? What sort of rifle (and other than OP's - firearms) are you getting this result from?

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[358429]

I believe you gun will be ok, 5 grains of tightgroup and a lead bullet is fairly low on power level and if the gun is clean to start with it should remain so.

My 357 mag ruger bolt gun barrel stays cooler longer with imr4227 vs tightgroup. Tight group is very energetic. It kinda blasty too a loud powder considering the tiny charge weights.

What powders do you have to play legos with?

How hot does the gun get if you feed it a hot lunch of corelokts?

[Forrest r]

Tried titegroup decades ago bought 1# of it and never bought any more. While it shot really well (38spl's) and the low charge weights preformed and extremely high levels. It heated the steel revolvers up in a hurry along with what seemed a lot more smoke from the NRA 50/50 lube I used back then.

Never did buy or try titegroup again after that. Other seem to like it and I'm glad the titegroup works out for them. Myself I stick with bullseye and clays

[fastdadio]

I believe you gun will be ok, 5 grains of tightgroup and a lead bullet is fairly low on power level and if the gun is clean to start with it should remain so.

My 357 mag ruger bolt gun barrel stays cooler longer with imr4227 vs tightgroup. Tight group is very energetic. It kinda blasty too a loud powder considering the tiny charge weights.

What powders do you have to play legos with?

How hot does the gun get if you feed it a hot lunch of corelokts?

Cleanliness is not the question. TG burns very clean, the boolits are PC'ed, I get zero leading, and the rifles are always cleaned after every outing. It's the heat I'm concerned with. It just makes sense to me that in order to get a barrel that hot after just a few rounds at a normal rate of fire, that that this stuff has to be burning twice as hot as anything else I use. To me, that's not good.

As far as other powders I have that are suitable for this application, I'm in pretty good shape. I have Unique, IMR4227, and 2400 on hand. I'm getting kind of low on the 2400 though.
A hot lunch of Corelokts? Never did it. When I feel the need for speed, I'll pick up one of my M1's or my 10/22. These light TG loads have been fired out of my 30-30 Trapper and my Vanguard in 30-06. Neither of which have ever had copper down their bores. Just casual bench plinking and usually single loaded when I do that. For a comarison, I have loaded reduced loads of H4895 in the Vanguard and racked a few quick mags out of it and it didn't get near as hot.
I doubt I'll load any more TG in these rifles, I have other choices. To me, it's just common sense that heat=erosion. How much or how fast? Anybody's guess. This is such an oddball loading that I doubt anybody has give their rifle a steady diet over the years and has the round count to say, yes, this is shortening throat life.

[1006]

Is it as much heat as a rifle powder produces at standard pressures? If not, why the concern?

I like it in the 9mm for midrange loads.

[35remington]

The heat that 5 grains of Titegroup produces at very low pressures in a rifle case is trivial and not worth worrying about.

Said by a guy who has used a lot of it in light charges in rifle cases. Full power 30-30 loads generate vastly more heat than 5 grains of Titegroup ever will. No harm will occur from using it.

Five grains is low pressure. Low pressure is low heat. Small charges of fast powder have less total heat energy than larger charges of rifle powder run at similar or higher pressures, which they generally are. Basic thermodynamics.

[Alferd Packer]

When I load Max loads they all burn hotter, especially with heavy bullets.
A cooler load and mainly more accurate load uses a lighter bullet over the minimum load listed in the recipe.
Just to punch paper or plink tin cans, it's easier on me and the gun.
The Max loads are for hunting or serious business.
I only shoot duty loads briefly and to remember.
I already know how to shoot them.
Rifles are made to shoot full power all the time.
Some heavy pistols are designed to shoot full power all the time.
If you are not shooting one of those pistols, you are creating unnecessary wear and tear on regular size pistols that are magnum rated, but are built lighter for every day carry.
Those pistols should be loaded with minimum loads for practice and reserve the duty loads for occasional familiarisation shooting.
Taught to me by my Dad growing up and later repeated by Army and Marine shooters and armorers that know their business.
Free advice.

[garrisonjoe]

TG has one of the highest levels of nitroglycerin of any double-base smokeless powder, at 40%. That is where the extra heat comes from. I'd not worry about that or any light cast bullet load burning up a barrel, however.

And it is not true thermodynamically that a single base (nitrocellulose only powder) will burn hotter than same weight of a double base powder. Double base powders with nitroglycerin were invented to contain more propellant energy than single base powders! And with more propellant energy comes more heat production.

good luck, garrisonjoe

[Soundguy]

Titegroup is my staple handgun powder..heat is relatively irrelevant unless you are practising mag dumps all day. I shoot plenty of wheel guns..no erosion issues so far.

[ShooterAZ]

Titegroup runs pretty hot, but I think Lil Gun get guns even hotter. Unless you are Jerry Miculek, I wouldn't be too concerned about it. I usually take out several guns to the range anyway, so if one of them gets really hot I will switch to another one and allow the other one to cool off.

[poppy42]

I have found titegroup to be dirty in light 9mm loads. After some research it seem that this is common when less than 50% of the case is full. For that reason I stopped using it for light loads.

[curioushooter]

I've never observed TiteGroup to be any hotter than normal. Then again I've only used it in low-pressure target load applications in 38 special for the most part. I have used to in 233 Rem of all things, where it does quite well at duplicating 22LR performance, never noticed any heat at all in my CZ527. I have not used TG in pistols for the most part, where is use PowerPistol or AA#5.

Lil'Gun is the powder that heats stuff up. Makes my contender barrels really hot. Noticeably hotter than other powders, even those that are pretty hot like Win296 and PP300MP.

[45DUDE]

I noticed it years ago in 45 acp pistol. When you reach a certain point it really takes off. Titewad seems to the same in 38 special. I still have some and it shoots good but I like it on the low side. If I saw Titegroup on the shelf I would buy some more. My shooting buddy uses it for shotgun. Powders are hard to come by in my area so I am not as picky as I was a few years ago.

[gpidaho]

TiteGroup has been a favorite of mine in handgun and cast rifle rounds. I love the fact that it can be loaded in such small volume without worries. I've loaded as little as 2.8gr in 223 cases for plinking rounds. As mentioned it does have a high nitro ratio and that's not a bad thing for low density loads. Gp

[Soundguy]

I love it for handgun.. just for economy. I mean look at loading imr 4227 vs titegroup.. you can probably get 3x the loadings out of titegroup

for instance.. barnes xpb 125gr 357 mag. max loading of imr 4227 is 15gr.. 5.8 of titegroup.. very similar fps... so 5 vs 15...

I could load 466 rounds with a pound of imr 4227 at 15gr (max)
I could load 1400 rounds with a pound of titegroup at 5grs and 1206 at 5.8grs (max)

[Walks]

I've loaded many, many 1,000's of .44Spl and .44WCF in 25yrs of Cowboy Shooting.
In a Uberti 1873 24" Octagonal bbl'd rifle in .44WCF after 9rds, I can say that bbl is almost too hot to touch. Almost, same with 5 1/2" bbl'd Colt's in .44Spl.
Still they are low pressure loads that leave the starline .44WCF cases blackened, but not the Better Quality REM brass.
My only problem with Titegroup is the high Nitroglycerin content attacks the plastic Powder hopper something fierce.