My homemade black powder

[Vettepilot]

Yep, no steel balls for me.

Thinking of media erosion, here's what I did. I cut a crap load of 1/2" sections of 1/2" copper pipe. Then I cast each of those full of wheel weight lead, it being harder than the average lead used as ball media. And that's my media. Yeah, it was a bit of a chore, and I hated to use my precious wheel weight lead, but it made great media. I think it mills even more efficiently due to the sharp edges of the copper tubing, but I can't prove it.

I was going to go one step further and heat treat them, but never got around to that...

Vettepilot

[Vettepilot]

......

All good points, as always Indian Joe.

Vettepilot

[Nobade]

Yep, no steel balls for me.

Thinking of media erosion, here's what I did. I cut a crap load of 1/2" sections of 1/2" copper pipe. Then I cast each of those full of wheel weight lead, it being harder than the average lead used as ball media. And that's my media. Yeah, it was a bit of a chore, and I hated to use my precious wheel weight lead, but it made great media. I think it mills even more efficiently due to the sharp edges of the copper tubing, but I can't prove it.

I was going to go one step further and heat treat them, but never got around to that...

Vettepilot

That is a good use for those stupid 45 ACP cases that take small primers. Fill them full of lead and put a tight crimp on the mouth.

[dondiego]

That is a good use for those stupid 45 ACP cases that take small primers. Fill them full of lead and put a tight crimp on the mouth.

Great idea! I have a bunch.

[mmb617]

That is a good use for those stupid 45 ACP cases that take small primers. Fill them full of lead and put a tight crimp on the mouth.

There are those who think 45 ACP will eventually all go to the small primer cases. Whether that's true I can't say.

I started out using lead round balls as media and noticed significant erosion pretty quickly so I switched to FMJ 45 ACP bullets for my media and those seem to work well.

[Vettepilot]

Pistol cases full of lead. That's a great idea there. Wish I had known/thought of it before my 1/2" copper pipe exercise. I've got a big 6" diameter mill jar, so I needed a lot of media. I wanted the little tubing sections to have curled edges, so I used a pipe cutter to cut them instead of whacking them off with a chop saw or similar. I just got set up and cut them while watching TV. Then casting all the little buggers full of lead was interesting too.

If wanting to go this route, another option would be to fill pipe lengths with lead, then saw off your 1/2" sections. Then take a socket or something and hammer crimp the ends for lead security/retention.

But I think the shell casings full of lead might be the best option. Be sure all the primers are dead!!

Vettepilot

[Vettepilot]

I'm a curious sort. We did some discussion on milling a ways back. There's cascading, rolling, and falling action going on in the mill. Mill speed, etc., determines the percentage of each.

If I were more ambitious, I would set up my clear sided case washing mill jar, and observe the difference in milling action between perfect round balls, and the cylinders we're speaking of here. But while curious, I'm just not quite that ambitious at this point.

My hard won milling cylinders mill just fine. As I said, and others have mentioned, perhaps even better than balls.

Vettepilot

[indian joe]

Pistol cases full of lead. That's a great idea there. Wish I had known/thought of it before my 1/2" copper pipe exercise. I've got a big 6" diameter mill jar, so I needed a lot of media. I wanted the little tubing sections to have curled edges, so I used a pipe cutter to cut them instead of whacking them off with a chop saw or similar. I just got set up and cut them while watching TV. Then casting all the little buggers full of lead was interesting too.

If wanting to go this route, another option would be to fill pipe lengths with lead, then saw off your 1/2" sections. Then take a socket or something and hammer crimp the ends for lead security/retention.

But I think the shell casings full of lead might be the best option. Be sure all the primers are dead!!

Vettepilot

This might work
Stand lengths of copper tube upright (need bottom end plugged) fill im up carefully with lead (need to be real careful doing that bit) then cut with a roller pipe cutter

[Vettepilot]

This might work
Stand lengths of copper tube upright (need bottom end plugged) fill im up carefully with lead (need to be real careful doing that bit) then cut with a roller pipe cutter

Yeah, there's definitely more than one way to "skin a cat". (I wonder where that saying came from...)

For casting lead into my 1/2" pipe sections and to hold them while doing so, I did the following: I took a 6" x 6" piece of aluminum block that's about 1" thick, and using a 1/2" mill bit, milled a series of blind holes in the block.

These blind holes both held the tubing sections for casting, plus sealed off the bottom. When each set was done; filled with lead, I would dump that batch into water, then reload my custom casting block with tubing sections. It worked quite well, actually.

Vettepilot

[Super Sneaky Steve]

That is a good use for those stupid 45 ACP cases that take small primers. Fill them full of lead and put a tight crimp on the mouth.

Not sure if you shopped for primers lately but LPP are the hardest by far to buy. I'll trade you piece for piece LPP 45 Automatic for SPP 45's.

[Super Sneaky Steve]

There are those who think 45 ACP will eventually all go to the small primer cases. Whether that's true I can't say.

I started out using lead round balls as media and noticed significant erosion pretty quickly so I switched to FMJ 45 ACP bullets for my media and those seem to work well.

The only reason 45 Automatic uses a LPP is because the old crappy 1911's had all interchangeable parts and they couldn't hit the small one with their firing pin. SPP's give better accuracy.

[KenH]

Yeah, there's definitely more than one way to "skin a cat". (I wonder where that saying came from...)
Vettepilot

From my short research the saying seems to date from either 1830/40s with another source dated 1854. Here's a link with interesting reading.
https://grammarist.com/phrase/more-t...20Seba%20Smith.

[Vettepilot]

Hmmm... yeah, interesting and thanks.

Never thought about the catfish angle. That's a rather more "palatable" way to think of it! (HA!)

Vettepilot

[KenH]

OK, back to topic. I wish to confirm my thinking on grading BP size. If I stack up a 12 mesh on top of a 16 on top of a 20 mesh.

After breaking up the cakes of dried BP, and run thru pepper grinder. This ground BP I pour thru the screens. The 12 mesh will stop grains larger than Fg, and will have Fg laying between the 12 and 16 mesh. I'll have FFg laying between the 16 and 20 mesh? With FFFg and smaller going thru the 20 mesh?

Am I anywhere close to understanding?

"IF" this is correct, should I "rub" the large grains laying on top of 12 mesh to get them broken up to go thru? OR, would it be better to run thru pepper grinder again?

Thanks again to all for suggestions and guidence.

Ken H>

[HighUintas]

OK, back to topic. I wish to confirm my thinking on grading BP size. If I stack up a 12 mesh on top of a 16 on top of a 20 mesh.

After breaking up the cakes of dried BP, and run thru pepper grinder. This ground BP I pour thru the screens. The 12 mesh will stop grains larger than Fg, and will have Fg laying between the 12 and 16 mesh. I'll have FFg laying between the 16 and 20 mesh? With FFFg and smaller going thru the 20 mesh?

Am I anywhere close to understanding?

"IF" this is correct, should I "rub" the large grains laying on top of 12 mesh to get them broken up to go thru? OR, would it be better to run thru pepper grinder again?

Thanks again to all for suggestions and guidence.

Ken H>

The way I had done it last year (need to get back to making some sometime soon!), I would collect what stayed on the screen above my target size, so in your case I'd collect the 12 mesh stuff, I'd tighten the grinder slightly and run that through again. Then repeat over and over until I have everything going through the 12 mesh. This gave me the best target yield percentage.

[HighUintas]

Back to you guys discussing media erosion again, I can't remember what weight gain I had from media erosion in a batch of powder,but it was significant enough for me to look at not using lead because I don't want the lead impregnated powder floating around in the air.

I tested out milling ingredients separately with SS balls (I think it was a certain type of 304 due to not being magnetic) and then doing a very very short 3 ingredient milling with the lead to get the mixture well incorporated. I also tried a short 3 ingredient milling time with the SS balls with safety precautions, but only did that a couple times and will only use lead for the full mixture in the future. There wasn't any accident and the SS balls I had shouldn't spark, but you just NEVER know. Even with lead media, you could get a couple pieces of debris from the wood/charcoal in there make contact with each other and spark.

I milled the S and charcoal in a certain ratio mix that was not explosive and separately the KNO3 and S in a non-explosive ratio for a long mill time. Then Combined the two mixes and and did a very short mill time to integrate. This seemed to work just as well as a long 3 ingredient mill, but I felt it was safer (with lead media for final mixing) due to the shorter mill time and I had very little lead erosion into the powder.

[HighUintas]

I need to get some more powder made. I've been working on building a muzzleloader all year, so this has consumed all my free time I can hear it's belly growling for some homemade BP !

[KenH]

The way I had done it last year (need to get back to making some sometime soon!), I would collect what stayed on the screen above my target size, so in your case I'd collect the 12 mesh stuff, I'd tighten the grinder slightly and run that through again. Then repeat over and over until I have everything going through the 12 mesh. This gave me the best target yield percentage.

Thanks for the info - it sounds like I'm on track. Got it drying now, should be able to grind it tomorrow.

[Super Sneaky Steve]

Back to you guys discussing media erosion again, I can't remember what weight gain I had from media erosion in a batch of powder,but it was significant enough for me to look at not using lead because I don't want the lead impregnated powder floating around in the air.

I tested out milling ingredients separately with SS balls (I think it was a certain type of 304 due to not being magnetic) and then doing a very very short 3 ingredient milling with the lead to get the mixture well incorporated. I also tried a short 3 ingredient milling time with the SS balls with safety precautions, but only did that a couple times and will only use lead for the full mixture in the future. There wasn't any accident and the SS balls I had shouldn't spark, but you just NEVER know. Even with lead media, you could get a couple pieces of debris from the wood/charcoal in there make contact with each other and spark.

I milled the S and charcoal in a certain ratio mix that was not explosive and separately the KNO3 and S in a non-explosive ratio for a long mill time. Then Combined the two mixes and and did a very short mill time to integrate. This seemed to work just as well as a long 3 ingredient mill, but I felt it was safer (with lead media for final mixing) due to the shorter mill time and I had very little lead erosion into the powder.

My brass ball powder has been made but not shot yet. I don't care much about the lead in the air, we are shooting lead after all, but I am looking for cleaner burning powder.

It may be a shame to waste 45 cal cases but I do have some 40S&W cases that I've collected over the years. I thought about swaging them into 45cal projectiles but you guys gave me a better idea. This weekend I'm filling a bunch with lead to become my new milling media.

[dondiego]

OK, back to topic. I wish to confirm my thinking on grading BP size. If I stack up a 12 mesh on top of a 16 on top of a 20 mesh.

After breaking up the cakes of dried BP, and run thru pepper grinder. This ground BP I pour thru the screens. The 12 mesh will stop grains larger than Fg, and will have Fg laying between the 12 and 16 mesh. I'll have FFg laying between the 16 and 20 mesh? With FFFg and smaller going thru the 20 mesh?

Am I anywhere close to understanding?

"IF" this is correct, should I "rub" the large grains laying on top of 12 mesh to get them broken up to go thru? OR, would it be better to run thru pepper grinder again?

Thanks again to all for suggestions and guidence.

Ken H>

I have a 2 inch golf ball cannon that I have molded lead balls for and want to shoot real ammo in. I guess I need cannon grade powder but don't really know what size that is. Larger than 1F I am sure. I am considering making screened powder. Does any one have a recommendation as to screen size? .....powder size?