Hi guys have not been around for some time. Reading some of the post & same ole same ole I figured since they
are closing Goex plant, more folks wound be making there own. I try & get back more often.
Fly
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Hi guys have not been around for some time. Reading some of the post & same ole same ole I figured since they
are closing Goex plant, more folks wound be making there own. I try & get back more often.
Fly
Welcome back Fly.
DoubleBuck, I've noticed a drop in performance with one powder. It was my sodium nitrate test batch, quite the drop in velocity too. I figured it was the result of storing it in a ziplock bag in the storage box rather than in an airtight bottle.
Welcome back Fly.
We hope to hear from you often.
Brimstone;
It may have been from storage. At this point, I don't know what it was. I had weighed the powder in plastic vials, that have good seals on the lids. But, I was planning on shooting them within the week, and it wound up being a year. So that could have been a problem.
I'm not even sure it was an actual problem.
The powder was a different batch, from the test a year ago, with a different recipe. Last years was 75-15-10; this one was 76-14-10.
The 3fff tests of the two were not any more different, than I have experienced; shooting the exact same powder on different days, with different temperatures and humidity. This test was 40 fps slower, on an average of ten shots each; but again, was also a different recipe.
That tells me (I think), that it was not so much the powder had lost its umph, but something else.
I really believe the something else, is the test was 1.5f; duplicating Waltham Abbey's world class powder developed for the Enfield (1851?).
That powder had a light density of 1.5 grams per CC. Was made from 'brown' charcoal; and was sieved at <12 mesh to >20 mesh. Mine was >18 mesh. The light density made its flame front fast, giving an even surface spread; while the large grain structure gave it a longer burn time, stretching the pressure curve out. That rifle shot a 530 grain projectile.
So I'm shooting a 27" barrel .490 ball that weighs 177 grains. 177 x 3 = 531 grains. That Enfield is shooting exactly the weight of three of my balls, and doing it with a six inch longer barrel.
I think I could not get a close comparison test, because the 1.5f powder just would not burn fast enough to get velocity, on the ball. Had I used my .58 caliber with a 42 inch barrel and a 500 grain bullet, it probably would have launched it perfectly. Had I been thinking, that's exactly what I would have done.
I had tested a year ago, with both rifles. So, I wasn't thinking about the balls being a detriment to getting good velocity. My .575 balls only weigh 286 grains, or barely half of the 530 grain Enfield; so even they would not have given a good test. And, they didn't. Not even a year ago, with the 75-15-10 recipe. They shot very well, and I was happy. It's just when I got to comparing five years of tests on ten powders, things didn't add up.
I learned something over the two tests. There is a reason to use light density and a reason to use heavy density. There is a reason to use small grain structure and a reason to use large grain structure. And you can play with both, to dial in what you want to shoot. But, you can't compare apples to oranges and that is what I tried to do. But, it was FUN!!!!
Fly!!!! Welcome back!
Last edited by DoubleBuck; 04-13-2023 at 11:20 PM.
hey FlyOriginally Posted by Fly
good to see you again
I started this deal about page 50 or so - so much info it was confusing - so I decided keep it simple, I followed your posts like a bloodhound on the track - pretty much ignored everything else as noise in the signal - on the third batch I had good quality cartridge rifle powder - still wondering how come it wasnt harder to do .
Big thank you from me
Joe
you give great instructions without getting lost in the weeds
Fly, Goex is up and running and regular Goex powders are expected to enter distribution channels in the new two or three weeks.
Great to here that, for the guys that don,t want to make there own.
Fly��
Well, all of us here know what it costs to actually make, so at the current going price, they're making a fortune making it... (I haven't seen current pricing, but last I knew it was 20$ + per lb.)
Price gouging, as usual nowadays.
Vettepilot
"Those who sacrifice freedom for security, have neither."
Benjamin Franklin. (A very wise man!)
Mate u r gettin old (takes one to know one) cost of employing anyone that will actually do work these days plus cost of the stupidity red tape to get anything done legally - they pushing it uphill with a pointy stick before they start I reckon. All of which results in no competition so yeah open slather for screwin price as well.
The commercial Black Powder will have to come down a whole bunch in price for me to buy it anymore. Since my home made is sufficient for my needs and I also enjoy making it, buying commercially produced is likely not going to happen. The same with the caps.
I certainly hope they get production and distribution going soon so that the starving shooter market can feast on the stuff again. I am not a member of a shooting group, but I know of at least a dozen or more shooters locally that just do not shoot Black these days because of the limited supply of both the Black as well as the caps.
I do hope the price is at least reasonable when it does reach the distributors again.
73 de n0ubx, Rick
NRA Benefactor Life Member/VFW Life Member
Yeah, I have a little "Factory" that I'll save for comparisons. That's the last I'll ever buy thanks to this forum thread. Thank you to all whom have contributed to this super thread!
Re--> caps and primers; I got most of the way there towards making them too. Just a few little things to round up yet, but I've got some other "must do" projects that are presently taking up all my time, energy, and money. We'll "get 'er done" here soon I hope, though some emergency back surgery is on the horizon too now.
Anyway, hopefully factory BP becoming available will thin the herd of makers, which I see as good. Just one or two well publicized accidents and the government would take that right away over night. It's rather unbelievable that we can do it in today's world anyway.
Vettepilot
"Those who sacrifice freedom for security, have neither."
Benjamin Franklin. (A very wise man!)
They can't make my Match or Repeater powder. Not overly interested in downgrading to a lesser powder.
Doesn't take them a week to make either...
Shipping the stuff probably went up as well.
“It is not enough that we do our best; sometimes we must do what is required.”
― Winston S. Churchill
Shipping, taxes and price of production is up on everything, across the board. USPS is hiking the price of a first class stamp to .66 cents. Up 32% since 2019. Makes a nickel stamp letter look pretty good, today.
The dollar has been devalued four times since 2010. A 1970 20 dollar bill had the spending power of 205 dollars in 2022.
I ordered a 1972 Chevrolet short wide Custom Deluxe pickup from the factory, for $2,780. That same truck today is approaching $30,000. My son still has it. I wonder how many 2023 Chevrolets will be around in 51 years? I'm betting the only ones will be in a museum.
My 401K has lost 7.9% of its value, since January 1st.
So, yeah, Goex will cost more than it did when they shut down, no doubt aboot it.
Last edited by DoubleBuck; 04-18-2023 at 01:44 PM.
I remember lots of those nickel stamps and 2 cent ones if they went on a post card. My wife and I were talking about the price of newer cars and pickups this morning. All the bells and whistles that are "must haves" also increase the price and the government safety and emission standards cost. We have the GMC my wife's dad used to farm and feed with back in the 60's. It's a 1951. It was basically a very well used farm truck that I have been able to bring back pretty close to original.
Going back to the price of powder, yes it'll be more expensive. The reason I'm making my own and also my own caps and primers.
My dad told me about the wage and price freeze during World War Two, with minimum wage at 25¢ an hour. He was a college student on summer break working as an electrician at the Hanford, Washington, nuclear reactor, which at that time no one knew what it was. The rumor going around was the facility was for making windshield wipers and screen doors for submarines, which was the explanation used for all large government projects. There were somewhere around 44,000 construction workers at the site, nothing small about it! I have some letters with postage back from those days, with 3¢ stamps. One envelope from several years later contains my certificate of live birth and a photocopy of my birth certificate, the postmark is in June of 1950. I also have some letters mailed by a shirt-tail relative Civil War soldier, postmarks ranging from during the Civil War in 1862, to twenty-two years later in 1884, with postage of 2¢ and 3¢. Some letters mailed in 1862 have both 2¢ and 3¢ stamps, but it could be that whatever stamps were available got stuck on the envelope, so those stamps may not reflect the actual postal rates in effect. There was a war going on, and a soldier couldn't just run off to the nearest post office to get the correct stamp. Back then in 1862, a soldier was lucky to have a piece of paper and an envelope, much less a pencil and someone to take his letter to a post office. Or, even to have any money, back 161 years ago. Getting paid on time could be kind of "iffy".
My first job back in 1957 paid 75¢ an hour. By 1965 I was earning $1.25 an hour, hoeing weeds in a walnut orchard during summer break from high school, where at least there was some shade. My buddy and I determined that it was light enough to go to work at 5:30 in the morning, so we skipped lunch and quit for the day at 1:30 in the afternoon. What we didn't take into account was we also had to go to bed four hours earlier, too. We found out about burning the candle at both ends real quick!
Best investment I ever made was buying a bunch of Forever Stamps, back when postage was forty-something cents. So, on a $20-something investment, I'm ahead by - - - what, somewhere around two bucks by now? That's taking into account that I've already used up some of those stamps in the last ten years.
About my dad, back when I was 21 and 22 years old and still working for minimum wage while also going to college full time, it was pretty frustrating that I was working eight hours a day, where I was making less per day than my dad was making per hour at his job. He worked in the aerospace industry as a machinist making stuff for the Apollo Moon Landing Project. Those days are long since gone, and so are those kinds of wages.
~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+~+:/&\:+
There is no such thing as too many tools, especially when it comes to casting and reloading.
Howard Hughes said: "He who has the tools rules".
Safe casting and shooting!
Linstrum, member F.O.B.C. (Fraternal Order of Boolit Casters), Shooters.com alumnus, and original alloutdoors.com survivor.
Nothing is actually made here anymore. I do know that the Old Hickory knives are still made here, but for how much longer is the question. You will not find a single chainsaw that is made here. You will find things 'assembled' here, but all parts are made elsewhere. The false sense of security that people have in this country is absolutely mind shattering. I'm getting a ball mill. Especially in my case, with charges for large muskets and bore-guns....7 drams and up in some cases....it's way past time. Plus, the hazmat fees seem to have doubled...Dixie is wanting $40 hazmat just on musket caps. Shooting flint now to save my caps. I actually had to go back to my 'pirate' guns to beat the system. How ironic is that?
Last edited by Jungle Dave; 04-20-2023 at 09:42 AM.
Lots of stuff is still made here...I work in a large production machine shop and we ship almost 2 million parts a week all over the US. Only a small portion goes to Mexico or overseas. Manufacturing is still a major contributor to the American economy, although China and India have made huge strides in the past 40 years.
Good. There may still be hope. I know there is production in areas such as the automobile industry. Not saying that is your area, just adding this because I tend to omit that sector by choice, focusing mainly on smaller industry, such as the many household names we all grew up with. A lot of the little guys have caved in. The older generation dies and the young ones immediately sell it to offshore for a quick dollar, since it's not impacting themselves in any way, only the consumers like us. I'm reminded of Mrs. Baird's bread....they had the best cinnamon rolls. Now it has been sold to a company in Mexico, and they refuse to make the cinnamon rolls, and on top of that, their bread is now terrible. For me, that is the straw that broke the camel's back.
I've also gone to mostly shooting a flint rifle and pistol because of the limited cap supply. With the discussions on this page I've gone to making my own powder and now percussion caps and even reloading centerfire rifle primers. I refuse to pay their hazmat fees even when what you're looking for is available.
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