I had gotten 5 lbs of the new 1Fg grade Olde Eynsford powder at the Quigley to see how it would work with paper patch boolits. My first successes with paper patched all came with Swiss 1Fg, although, as mentioned in another thread, 1-1/2Fg is now showing some promise in the .45-70 cases. Similarly, OE 1-1/2Fg hasn't come up to speed with paper patch either, thus far.
My first trials of OE Fg in the .45-70 were complicated by difficulties in getting the scope adjustments right for the 300M range I started out on. I have some more rounds loaded up to begin again at shorter distances, but haven't tried them yet.
I also loaded up some of my .44-77s with the new powder, and tested them at 200 and 300M. Cases were Buffalo Arms modified .348 Winchester shells, fired and unsized, trimmed to 2.255" and necks annealed, Federal Gold Medal Match Large Pistol Primers with punched-out primer wads from old ASSRA targets (better paper than NRA targets), 1/8" cork wads, compression 0.200" from case mouth and the Red River Rick adjustable .44 mould set at 1.329" length. This gave a 0.431" slug of 457-458 gr weight, which I patched with Strathmore Tracing paper, 1.5 thousandths thick.
Powder charges were weighed out at 75.0, 80.0, 85.0 and 90.0 gr. In order to get an equivalent wad height below the case mouth before compression, I needed 3 wads for the 75-gr charge, 2 for the 80 gr, and 1 for the 85 and 90 gr, respectively, before compression.
The patched boolits slid easily into the unsized case mouths, and would have fallen out just as easily, so I gave the mouths a slight "squinch" in my home made shell mouth reducer die. The boolits can be turned and pulled out, but do not fall out by themselves.
The rifle and sights have been described elsewhere. The air for both days' testing was dead calm for starters, with a breeze coming up later on. At 200M, two shots with 75gr (all I had after getting on target) went into 2-3/8", five of 80.0gr were 3-3/8"V x 1-1/2"H (4 in 1-1/2"V x 3/4"H), 85.0gr went 1-1/2"V x 5-3/8"H (breeze started up) and 90.0gr gave 1-1/2"V x 4-1/2"H.
Moving out to 300M, I wasted some shots (as usual) getting on target, but 75gr gave 11-1/4"V x 7-3/4"H, with two minutes' elevation and 1/4 turn of windage changes in mid group, 80.0gr gave 4"V x 6-1/2"H, 85.0gr 6-1/2"V x 9-1/2"H with some holding problems, and 90.0gr gave 2-1/8"V x 4-1/2"H for 5 shots.
Allowing for my problems of getting on targets and holding problems afterwards, I can't say that any of these loads seemed to be bad ones. The OE is quite a bit coarser and less dense than Swiss, so 90.0gr is about all that fits in these thick modified cases after drop tubing. Haven't tried the Jamison cases yet, but did load up 50 more BAs with 90gr charges for longer range testing. Either because I finally settled in on the bench and got on with the sights, or because the loads actually get better as more powder goes in, I don't know. I did get photos of the 90-gr loading at 200 and 300M, respectively. For some reason, the 300M shot is 90 degrees counterclockwise.
The testing is still preliminary, and short range as these things go, but the 1Fg Olde Eynsford seems pretty promising in this bottleneck caliber.