My homemade black powder

[almar]

I just got back from clearing out the brush 100 yards or so behind my workshop. There is an unused second level to my workshop that I would like to use as a blind and shooting station. There is 4 or so miles of uninhabitable land behind me and I'm clearing out a 12ft lane out to as far as I can so I can put a target out there. But this is Georgia, that is some pretty hard sub tropical hell bush. I got out to 100 yards today. I will go for 600 if I can. Then I'll make an opening in the back of the workshop with hinges. It sure beats sitting in a tree stand. Imagine, harvesting your deer or hog with bullet you casted over powder you made in a 1874 sharps. It sure doesn't get more self reliant than that boys. Taking it to the next level would mean making my own primers, I've done that but they aren't reliable. I might could revisit that subject sometime.

[LAGS]

The primer mix that I use is very reliable.
A little dirtier than factory primers.
But if cleaned right after shooting , my rifles are not damages at all.
At least that will save your factory primers for hunting.

[DoubleBuck]

Almar;
If we lived close, I would do it for you. I have a hundred horse tractor and a 10 foot Bush Hog that will mow it down to three inches, at about 8 miles per hour. haha.
Seriously, some guys usually do custom brush hogging, by the hour. You might look in local newspapers and nickel adds. If they have a two hour minimum and 80 bucks per hour, there you go. You may be doing it by hand, because you love it. I hope not. haha
This is my home made 600 yard pistol and rifle range, with a table and bench and portable steel targets. Since this picture, the table has been moved back 40 yards, to beside my house, about 25 yards. it has flags every hundred yards and another steel target. Sometimes it gets noisy. Always fun. There are not many places in this area you can shoot 600 yards.
I'm waiting for someone to donate us a concrete picnic table.

A buddy was visiting my son the other day, and snapped this, about 100 yards from my back door.

[almar]

Ohhh dang! You have it made! I wish I had machinery like that and that range. But I'll do it by hand, alot of trees are over 4 inches in diameter. I grew up doing this with my dad. If it wasn't for the thorn bushes it would be fine. If I can clear 100 yard a day I should be good.

[Dieselhorses]

Almost 100 fps faster with a 500 grain bullet is a good bit more energy. Nice!

1707 ft/lbs ---> 1940 ft/lbs.

http://www.ballistics101.com/muzzle_energy_calc.php

Vettepilot

There is an old timer on YT who started using 3F for everything since the 80’s (even for his pan) and claims to get more velocity and use less powder.

https://youtu.be/psB7tqDK2UE


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[LAGS]

I used 3f in everything from the early 80's.
But 54 was my largest bore.
Now that I have rifles in .61 and .75 so I have switched to 2f in everything larger than .50
But the flinters still get 4f in the flash pan.

[almar]

There is an old timer on YT who started using 3F for everything since the 80’s (even for his pan) and claims to get more velocity and use less powder.

https://youtu.be/psB7tqDK2UE


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I wonder if this is applicable to muzzleloaders only, I cant imagine that a harder smash against the lands would do any good for accuracy in cartridges. The idea behind larger grains is that it provides less of a peak pressure and pushes more gently but for longer Vs hard and for a short time.

[ChrisPer]

I find that bigger 3F loads build a fouling ring in the first 1/3 of the bore, and give less accuracy than 2F. For lighter loads and closer targets the 3F is best.
This is on paper, shooting three 13-shot strings in a normal competition, usually a 50m offhand precision, 50m timed and 100m prone or cross sticks or benchrest. Sorry I don't have much cartridge BP experience.

[Vettepilot]

I wonder if this is applicable to muzzleloaders only, I cant imagine that a harder smash against the lands would do any good for accuracy in cartridges. The idea behind larger grains is that it provides less of a peak pressure and pushes more gently but for longer Vs hard and for a short time.

Well, as usual it's slightly more complicated than that. Bore size, bullet size, hardness, specific application, etc., etc., etc. If your bore is really nice, and your bullet size is perfect, that's one thing. If you need the bullet to "slug up" on setback though, you might actually want a "sudden hit" from the powder.

As usual, the best answer is; "It depends...."

Vettepilot

[almar]

I made a tool that helps with loading my BP in a 45-90. On one end it's a powder compressing die, on the other it's a expanding die, the rcbs exppander doesn't quite expand enough. It's works quite well.

[ChrisPer]

Well done almar.
I just cast new sand/resin puck die pistons. The original ones did not perform well; the toothy top of the jack broke them out eventually, and they were always too tight being cast directly in the aluminum tube. This time I sieved the sand for a clean fraction, wet it and weighed it to determine porosity, and used the minimum resin to fill that porosity. I was disgusted that the prescribed 'sharp sand' had a coarse fraction so rounded that it was clearly very ancient beach sand; and there were so many fines that only about 20% made it into the 20-40# fraction I used to cast.
Also this time I cut paper liners for the tubes, then ran in some chain oil as release agent. it will be a little loose but I will try hard wax to make up the gaps instead of having an interference fit of resin+sand to aluminum.

[LAGS]

I made some pistons out of a scrap of Plastic counter top material I found on one of my jobs.
The solid molded type , not the particle board laminate.
I also tried a piece of plastic from toilet stall dividers that I found in the trash at our construction site.
I just ground them to shape on my bench disc sander.
But now I have two of Fly's pressing dies that I have had for a few years.

[Dieselhorses]

I made some pistons out of a scrap of Plastic counter top material I found on one of my jobs.
The solid molded type , not the particle board laminate.
I also tried a piece of plastic from toilet stall dividers that I found in the trash at our construction site.
I just ground them to shape on my bench disc sander.
But now I have two of Fly's pressing dies that I have had for a few years.

Wait… you just used wood lined with Formica for a piston? What you used for cylinder? I’m still search long for a die of some sort.


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[LAGS]

No.
The counter top material was Solid Molded Plastic.
Like Fake Stone countertops.
It was almost 1" thick same with the toilet partition material.
But have you tried taking something like a soda can metal.
Make a sleeve that fits inside your pressing die.
Then filling the liner with your Resin / sand mix.
If you put release on the outside of the liner and inside of the die , the resin should stick to the liner and form a piston that won't maul the die.
The die I was using at the time was a short section of 2 1/2" schedule 80 PVC pipe with a coupling section blued to the outside to make it even thicker.

[ChrisPer]

Wait… you just used wood lined with Formica for a piston? What you used for cylinder? I’m still search long for a die of some sort.

The die you need depends on the power of your press. My 50mm/2" dies give 3500psi with the 8 tonne jack in my press. That is plenty. If I went to a 3" die, it would be perhaps half that.

My first die was 50mm white pipe, with a joiner sleeve over its outside and Jubilee hose clips reinforcing it. The pistons were sand-filled cast resin, just cast in the same kind of pipe. The resin cost about $35 at the the big hardware shop. Those pipe dies, though, burst when I got the press screwed down and my effort ramped up the pressure. They took about 2000psi fine. My new ones are 2"internal diameter aluminum tube, about 1/4"(6mm) thick. New pistons cast to fit. The first ones were too tight, and also started to break up from the pokeys on top of the jack.
Seriously, Fly's die would be SO worth it - all that scrounging and fiddling around is costly in time and piece-by-piece expenditures.

[Dieselhorses]

Oh where art thou “Fly”?


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[Vettepilot]

I believe some have been using these since Fly became unavailable:

https://www.woodysrocks.com/store/p2...k_Press.html#/

Before I spent 35 bucks, (and more than once!), on resin, and deal with the mess, etc., I would be buying the aluminum raw materials for a die, and looking up a machine shop. (Try E-bay for aluminum stock, or "Speedy Metals")

Lastly, if you insist on resin, I think a puck made of resin and fiberglass flocking would be stronger/more cohesive. And just file or grind the pad of that jack smooth!!

Vettepilot

[Vettepilot]

Idea for a puck piston?? Shop around for an aluminum can that would work, and just cast your resin into that. Wouldn't an aluminum encapsulated resin piston work better??

Just some ideas for ya...

Vettepilot

[HighUintas]

Holy moly have you guys made some progress since I've taken a break! Thank you all so much for continuing to experiment and improve the knowledge base on making awesome homebrew BP.

It seems with almars building of a charcoal kiln, he's been able to confirm a lot of the stuff I was trying to create earlier this year! A lot of the same information I posted from old literature has been reposted but also confirmed as truth, so that's great!

I was wanting to build a firebrick kiln for charcoal making and almar did it!
Brown powder is faster
Denser powder is slower

Awesome job guys. I'm only on page 222, but hopefully I'll catch up soon. I'm really excited to get kiln materials ordered and get back to it!

I will have lots of questions soon.

A couple of projects I need to work on:

Making a kiln
Figure out how to get my dang puck die to quit allowing the meal/puck to flow out of the bottom between the pressing surface and sleeve. That was a huge area of inconsistency for me and it drove me nuts.

VP.... How does your sleeve plug with the set screws work? Well I hope?

[DoubleBuck]

HighUintas;
Great to see you back! I figured you would find what's been going on interesting!