*** THIS THREAD CONTAINS DISCUSSIONS OF USING POWDER OUTSIDE THE TYPICAL CARTRIDGE APPLICATION AND EVEN DUPLEX LOADS. THIS EXPERIMENTAL DATA IS OFFERED FOR YOUR INFORMATION ONLY. THESE LOADS WERE WORKED UP WITH MY DIES, MY ALLOY, MY SIZER, MY POWDER COAT, MY SCALE, AND TESTED IN A GUN WHICH IS RATED FOR CARTRIDGES THAT EXCEED MAXIMUM 357 MAGNUM PRESSURES. IF YOU BLOW UP YOUR J-FRAME OR 50 YEAR OLD LEVER ACTION PLAYING WITH THESE LOADS, THAT'S ON YOU.***
IF YOU DECIDE TO TRY THESE OUT REMEMBER:
1) Start low and work up just like anything else. I crammed as much rifle powder into a case as I could and verified that was safe before I started duplexing.
2) NEVER have more than one powder canister open on your bench at the same time. EVER. Do one, then the other.
3) There is a reason this data isn't in any loading manuals. While it has proven safe for me at the time of writing, there is no guarantee it will be safe for you.
"And thus ended the disclaimer. And the Lord saw that it was good, and covered the blessed behind of the original poster, and the warning was sent throughout the land that the People of the Lord might know the risk unto their necks. Amen."
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Original Post Text:
I was reading another thread somewhere this weekend and was surprised to learn that IMR-4895 has been used in little cartridges like the 22 Hornet. LoadData.com suggests a load of 12gr. with a 45gr bullet for a velocity of 1735fps. That got me thinking, I've got quite a bit of the stuff, could I use it in 357 magnum loads destined for my Henry Single Shot?
According to Nosler, the 22 Hornet holds 14.2gr of water with a 35gr bullet, while the 357 Magnum holds 17.6gr of water with a 158gr bullet.
That gives us a case capacity ratio of ~1.24. If we reduce that to 1.20 to account for the difference in bullet weight between the Nosler and LoadData.com numbers, that would give us 12gr * 1.2 = 14.4gr as a starting load for the 357. The difference in maximum pressures favors the 357, so we have a safety margin to start with. Perhaps starting with a 125gr boolit would be wise, although the bore volume is so much larger than the baby Hornet that maybe that isn't necessary.
Does that sound even vaguely plausible?
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For those who haven't read the entire thread, the responses initially fell into a few basic categories:
- This is a bad idea because it's dangerous.
- This is a bad idea because it won't work.
- This is a bad idea because it's wasteful of good rifle powder.
- Use rifle powder in rifle cartridges and go buy some H-110 or W296 or 2400.
- You'll shoot your eye out.
- I tried this and it sort of worked and sort of didn't.
However, our gurus did explain to me some of the forces at work and educated me a bit on ways to move forward without necessarily endorsing exploration outside the manual. This is probably a good thing, well done gurus.
With additional information and a combination of foolish optimism and caution borne of my awareness of ignorance, I forged onward in my pointless quest to burn the wrong powder in my favorite cartridge!
Testing ensued, and kind, supportive posts followed.
I had a bunch of copy-paste from subsequent posts, but that was getting really confusing. So here are my results a more readable format:
Gun: Henry H015 Single Shot, 357 Magnum
Brass: Hornady
Primer: CCI Small Magnum Rifle
Boolit (PC'd) Green Dot (gr) IMR-4895 (gr) FPS Accuracy Notes Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 0.0 20.0 1221 ???? Very light report hidden by sonic boom. Lots of unburned powder. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 0.5 19.5 1362 ???? Sharper report. Some unburned powder. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 1.0 19.0 1479 ???? Sharper report. Almost no unburned powder. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 1.5 18.5 1593 ???? Normal report. No unburned powder. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 2.0 18.0 1673 OK/Good Normal report. No unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 14.4 ???? Shot to point of aim at 10 yards Very mild "foof" report. Lots of unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 16.0 ???? Shot to point of aim at 10 yards Mild "foof" report. Lots of unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 17.0 ???? ???? Mild "foof" report. Some unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 18.0 ???? ???? Lighter than normal report. Some unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.5 17.5 ???? ???? Report sharpened from straight IMR-4895. Marked decrease in unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 1.0 17.0 ???? ???? Report further sharpened from 0.5gr load. Almost no unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 1.5 16.5 1473 ???? Report sounded normal. No unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 2.0 16.0 1521 Good Report sounded normal. No unburned powder. Accurate 35-245P 0.0 12.5 ???? Shot to point of aim at 20 yards Report sharper than 158gr boolit with IMR-4895. Lots of unburned powder. Accurate 35-245P 0.5 12.0 ???? ???? Report sharpened. Unburned powder barely reduced from straight IMR-4895. Accurate 35-245P 1.0 11.5 1040 ???? Single unburned kernel of powder. Lots of residue. Accurate 35-245P 1.5 11.0 1104 ???? No unburned powder. Lots of residue. Accurate 35-245P 2.0 10.5 1155 Good No unburned powder. Little residue. Accurate 35-245P 2.5 10.0 1197 ???? No unburned powder. Little residue. Might have mild pressure on primer, but easy extraction.
This data is for Benchmark powder, NOT IMR-4895:
Gun: Henry H015 Single Shot, 357 Magnum
Brass: Hornady
Primer: CCI Small Magnum Rifle
Boolit (PC'd) Green Dot (gr) Benchmark (gr) FPS Accuracy Notes Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 0.0 21.0 1400 ???? Compressed. Medium report. Some unburned powder. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 0.5 20.5 1515 ???? Compressed. Medium report. Almost no unburned powder. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 1.0 20.0 1617 ???? Compressed. Medium report. No unburned powder, some residue. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 1.5 19.5 1647 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder, clean. Possible out of character V/C. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 2.0 19.0 1722 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder, clean. Missouri 125gr Cowboy #2 2.5 18.5 1828 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder, clean. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 14.5 1020 ???? Very light report. Lots of unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 15.5 1100 ???? Light report. Some unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 16.5 1160 ???? Light report covered by sonic boom. Some unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 17.5 1178 ???? Lightly compressed. Medium report, some unburned powder. Possible out of character V/C ratio Lee 358-158RF 0.0 18.5 1258 ???? Compressed. Medium report, some unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.0 19.5 1343 ???? Compressed heavily enough for duplexing. Medium report, some unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 0.5 19.0 1466 ???? Compressed. Medium report. Little unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 1.0 18.5 1494 ???? Compressed. Medium report. Almost no unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 1.5 18.0 1578 ???? Compressed. Normal report. A single kernel of unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 2.0 17.5 1609 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder. Lee 358-158RF 2.5 17.0 1684 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder, clean. Accurate 35-245P 0.0 12.5 880 ???? Compressed. Medium report. Lots of unburned powder. Accurate 35-245P 0.5 12.0 1001 ???? Compressed. Medium report. Almost no unburned powder. Accurate 35-245P 1.0 11.5 1094 ???? Compressed. Medium report. Almost no unburned powder. Accurate 35-245P 1.5 11.0 1163 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder, some residue. Accurate 35-245P 2.0 10.5 1183 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder, clean. Accurate 35-245P 2.5 10.0 1218 ???? Compressed. Normal report. No unburned powder, clean.
That's more or less it for now since I've run out of powder/boolit combinations to test. While it's hardly comprehensive, and (as has been pointed out) lacks any but the most scanty data on accuracy, I feel like it's illustrative of some general principles of duplex loading, at least in the 357 magnum. I might add to this later if I get another powder or boolit, we shall see.
If you have a particular load you're interested in seeing accuracy data for, I can do that so please post in this thread and I'll try to pay attention. "But this comes with a couple of caveats," foremost among them being that I don't have a bench and therefore my accuracy rating scale really doesn't get more detailed than "Bad" (unusuable), "OK" (probably doesn't impact my ability to hit target gongs offhand inside 100 yards too much), and "Good" (this load is more accurate than I am).
Thanks for reading my experiments!