Brown or orange colored paint flecks in 2230-c powder?

[Tripplebeards]

I finally got around to loading up some 35 Whelen yesterday. When I poured the powder into my RCBS charge master lite I noticed on top there were some orangish brown colored little pieces of what look like paint. I Would assume the same as what they do with green dot and red dot and put little color codes in it? I can see that some of the chunks were a lot bigger than the others. Are these color coated paint chunks or could be corrosion from old powder? Weren’t that many of them and some really small and some were bigger. I took pictures. I can dump them out and take pictures and post if I have to but I would assume it’s probably color-coded?

[Tripplebeards]

I just called Alliant, and they told me to dump the powder. They said that it corroded and will literally blow up my gun from Excess pressure. I’ll have to pull them and start over. Before I get to excited I’ll open the other jugs that seem full and check to see if they look the same and post pics.

[Tripplebeards]

I dumped what what was left of the opened powder and found what caused the issue. The 2 other containers were sealed. I opened up one of the new, sealed, containers and dumped out about a third pound of powder to smell and I spect it for flakes like whst was in the opened container. The new , sealed, 8 pound jug powder looked clean, black, shiny....and imo it was fine.


Here's what the open powder looked like. I had more big unevenly shaped flakes in the top of the powder pile I poured out to use the other day...











And the culprit....

[TurnipEaterDown]

Looks like contamination to me, rather than powder degradation.
Better to be safe though.

[Tripplebeards]

My guess is those little pieces are pieces of copper jacket that got eaten off the bullet over time I already pulled them and started over with all new components and fresh powder from a sealed container. I would assume this powder needs to be dumped? I would say there's a pound of it at the most left in the container. Ill have to fertilize the garden with it or sprinkle it in the burn barrel.

I scraped it. Looks like it didn't eat the jacket off...




I circled a few random pieces laying on the table I fished out while pouring it back into the container. There were more but I just put a few out to show and tell here..



That long rod almost looks like a Cordite stick? I think I saw a couple mixed in with the powder. I didn’t inspect it but I don’t know if it wax metal or something else. I know where I got the powder the guy had countless 303 British rifles. Maybe dumped a pulled case into the mix along with the j word.

[kerplode]

Yeah, who knows, but you did the right thing in dumping it. Contaminated powder with rando mystery chunks is a recipe for a bad day.

Sure, powder is expensive, but it's still cheaper than fingers and eyes...You chose wisely.

[Alchemist]

You were wise to question the suitability of that powder. Propellants with identification granules will have much more consistent distribution of said granules than what appears in your picture.

One question- why did you call Alliant with a question about Accurate propellant?

[Tripplebeards]

You were wise to question the suitability of that powder. Propellants with identification granules will have much more consistent distribution of said granules than what appears in your picture.

One question- why did you call Alliant with a question about Accurate propellant?

Lol....I called them back to tell them I found a j word decomposing in it along with the stick powder after digging. The customer service representative told me that it wasn't their powder either on the second call back. He said he had to do some googlimg to find out who made it himself. My mistake. I dumped that powder a few days after my post. It's long gone now. Saved the 8 pound plastic jug through. Figure it might come in handy some day. None of my LGS carry Alliant or accurate powders around here so my mistake. Thought they were the same company.

[jdsingleshot]

I would have piled a spoonful of the opened powder and a spoonful of the new powder (far away from each other) and lit them to see if their burning seemed the same. Looked to me like the powder was not degraded at all. Just had some foreign bits in it.

Had you been using the old powder?

[Tripplebeards]

No. I bought it a couple years ago from an estate sale. The “opened jug” was the first time I opened it to inspect. I don’t even think it was a full pound. I never weighed it but I bet it was maybe closer to a half pound, so no big loss. The powder looked as healthy as the brand new powder and smelled the same. I just didn’t wanna take a chance cause I got it for almost nothing to begin with and I also had two 8 pound jugs that weren’t open yet and still sealed. It will take me a super long time to burn through 16 pounds. Looks like I can use it for a lot of stuff. I’ll probably load up some 243 bullets I traded for here to plink in my ARs some time soon. I bought both of them and did a ladder test until I found a combo that would shoot good and then I never pulled the trigger on neither of them again. lol. The reason I opened up the powder for the first time a few weeks ago as I loaded up some 180 grain Speer hot cores in 35 Whelen. Seems like that’s a pretty good powder versus the velocity it was giving with that bullet in the Whelen. Kind of weird though bunch of extremely low velocity tap in loads with that powder for 30-06 180 grain loads. Maxed out velocity was almost 2500 fps at max where the whelen was high 2800’s fps.