Comparing capacity of balloon head cases with modern brass

[fourfingersofdeath]

I don't think that had much to do with what Elmer got out of his 44 spec. Folks are a bunch more mamby pamby about pressure now than then.

If you blew up a gun in those days, well, we'd all say, 'shoot boy yer gotta expect that when ya'll go pedal to the metal all the time!' then we'd all have a bit of a laugh about it and put the gun on display so that our friends could give us a razzing about it. Nowadays, there is a huge panic, is the manafacturer/club/range/whatever liable, who's fault is it, etc, etc, etc.

My brother gave me a perfect example, he is an Industrial Arts teacher in a radical church owned training centre which prepares high schoolers and out of work youths for the workplace. The 'school' is set up like a factory and actually does contract machining work, etc, so the atmosphere is more realistic. They have an auto lathe and have had a contract making towballs for many years. They are made from long lenghts of round bar and as the machine was drawing towards the end of a bar, another was bought up and placed on the ground behind the machine. About 10 years ago one of the new students walked by and tripped on the bar, Tom remembers saying 'watch where yer going mate!' and everyone had a bit of a laugh about the dreamy hormone befuddled youth.

Ten years or so pass with no further problems and the same thing happens to another young dreamer floating by. This time it is different. The poor unfortunate is carted off to teh clinc for a check up. A safety meeting is held by the safety committe and a risk assessment is done. As a result it was seen that to conform to the laws of the land and avoid any further 'accidents' a clip together fence and signage is purchased and everyone has to go twenty metres out of their way because some dreamer wasn't paying attention. The ultimate decision was to re-design the shop and turn the machine around so that no one had to walk by it. My brother pointed out that it would take 37 years of the contracts profit to pay for these grand plans, but he was shouted own. The tail is wagging the dog it seems!

[Steel Horse Bailey]

4 Fingers - sadly it is true in soooo many places.

We (collective "we" not the we as in right here) try to legislate safety in every part of life.  It is bad or even tragic when your Grandson (or Son, Daughter - whatever) hurts himself.  NO parent or person with any feelings at all can ignore what happens.

However, there is a certain necessity of Life and Learning to Live that requires some form of failure.  As good parents, we try to keep our loved ones as safe as possible, but it just ain't possible to do fully.

This - to ME - is one of the biggest disservices we have done and IMHO is one of the primary reasons our kids (again, collectively, NOT OURS) are becoming real problems and even some becoming misfits.  We have become so afraid of failure (and of taking responsibility for actions that may not work) that we can't handle the occasional failure or pain.  We don't keep score at our little kid's sports league; our education system is geared toward "not hurting the children's psyche;" and so on.  Oh, no!  We must make sure they feel good about themselves!

BULL!

This is one of, IMHO the primary reasons that our society (and I dare say our beloved America) is "going down the tube$."  And yes, the dollar sign indicates another weakness our society has.  You'd better have plenty of ca$h or you won't amount to a hill of beans.  Don't worry if the kid can actually DO something worthwhile - just make sure he makes piles of ca$h.  And feels good about himself.

(stepping off my soapbox)

I'm not sure exactly how this gets into the capacity of balloon head vs. solid head cases, but it does perhaps show some perceived safety thoughts.  Would it be safe to say that the biggest reason for the change was for ease of manufacturing?


And Driftwood, thanks for posting that wonderful picture.  It shows the many new folks around here ... in no uncertain terms ... exactly what the difference is between styles of cartridge cases.

[Bryan Austin]

4 Fingers - sadly it is true in soooo many places.

We (collective "we" not the we as in right here) try to legislate safety in every part of life.  It is bad or even tragic when your Grandson (or Son, Daughter - whatever) hurts himself.  NO parent or person with any feelings at all can ignore what happens.

However, there is a certain necessity of Life and Learning to Live that requires some form of failure.  As good parents, we try to keep our loved ones as safe as possible, but it just ain't possible to do fully.

This - to ME - is one of the biggest disservices we have done and IMHO is one of the primary reasons our kids (again, collectively, NOT OURS) are becoming real problems and even some becoming misfits.  We have become so afraid of failure (and of taking responsibility for actions that may not work) that we can't handle the occasional failure or pain.  We don't keep score at our little kid's sports league; our education system is geared toward "not hurting the children's psyche;" and so on.  Oh, no!  We must make sure they feel good about themselves!

BULL!

This is one of, IMHO the primary reasons that our society (and I dare say our beloved America) is "going down the tube$."  And yes, the dollar sign indicates another weakness our society has.  You'd better have plenty of ca$h or you won't amount to a hill of beans.  Don't worry if the kid can actually DO something worthwhile - just make sure he makes piles of ca$h.  And feels good about himself.

(stepping off my soapbox)

I'm not sure exactly how this gets into the capacity of balloon head vs. solid head cases, but it does perhaps show some perceived safety thoughts.  Would it be safe to say that the biggest reason for the change was for ease of manufacturing?


And Driftwood, thanks for posting that wonderful picture.  It shows the many new folks around here ... in no uncertain terms ... exactly what the difference is between styles of cartridge cases.

You hit the nail on the head. I could care less if someone does not want to be "safe" with what they do....as long as if what they are doing does not hurt someone else if all hell breaks loose! Being safe and enjoying life they way "you" want to enjoy it is fine by me.  It would be safer for me not to have to drive 50 miles a day for work, or fly an airplane or ride a motorcycle or a horse. The word Safe is over rated.

[Mako]

I'm not sure how a modern Boxer primer would work correctly in the balloon head cases.  They might work some or even most of the time, but the anvil would not have a surface for the legs to engage.  It is very possible you would get misfires.  Look at the pictures of the balloon head case pocket above and compare them to the illustrations below.





John and those of you that have sectioned these cases with the primers, what do the legs on the anvils set against?

Regards,
Mako

[w44wcf]

Mako,
UMC was the only company that turned the bottom of the primer pocket back at a slight angle.  That was done so that reloaders could only use UMC brand primers for reloading.

Other case manuufacturers used a flat bottomed primer pocket like the cases today. Envision the UMC case with the bottom of the primer pocket flat. That's the way WInchester, Peters, US Cartridge Co and Rem-Umc balloon head cases were.

w44wcf

[Mako]

Mako,
UMC was the only company that turned the bottom of the primer pocket back at a slight angle.  That was done so that reloaders could only use UMC brand primers for reloading.

Other case manuufacturers used a flat bottomed primer pocket like the cases today. Envision the UMC case with the bottom of the primer pocket flat. That's the way WInchester, Peters, US Cartridge Co and Rem-Umc balloon head cases were.

w44wcf

w44wcf,
Well that makes more sense, I had never noticed the UMC pockets.  I have seen sectioned balloon head cases before but never that pocket shape.  It's obvious that a standard boxer won't work.

Thanks for the answer!

~Mako

[Bryan Austin]

w44wcf,
Well that makes more sense, I had never noticed the UMC pockets.  I have seen sectioned balloon head cases before but never that pocket shape.  It's obvious that a standard boxer won't work.

Thanks for the answer!

~Mako

Mako, can you draw up some brass of different brands like UMC, REM-UMC etc like you did with that primer? Thats some cool looking stuff!

[Mako]

Mako, can you draw up some brass of different brands like UMC, REM-UMC etc like you did with that primer? Thats some cool looking stuff!

Sure, someone get me the cross sections and I can make them.  w44wcf has been sending me some great stuff on .44 Henry and .44 Colt.  I can make a UMC .44WCF case now from that photo.  If John or someone has a section of a UMC primer or even a shot looking into it (preferably and unfired primer) I can illustrate a UMC case and primer. 

The case shown is a Starline .44Colt case and Winchester Primer.

Regards,
Mako

[Bryan Austin]

Not trying to get far from the BP topic but I dissected this this morning. Old/Unused Western Solid Base case, rounded head box primer, and a copper jacketed (looks melted formed) hollow base bullet with smokeless powder. At least 1960's or earlier if a reload.

[Mako]

Savvy,
Flip that primer over so we can see the anvil.

The bullet is plated.  Lead bullets like that have been barrel plated for years.  It died out on large caliber bullets for a while and you just saw it on .22 Rimfire ammo.  Winchester tended (and tends) to use the copper plate on rimfire bullets, Remington and some others did the brass or "gilding metal" plating.  Copper plating of large caliber lead bullets has made a comeback with air standards for indoor ranges getting more rigorous.

I used to have a sponsor that provided H&G truncated cone semi wadcutter style 200grain copper plated bullets which I really liked.  They were clean when loading (which I really liked in the volumes I was loading and shooting) and the pistols remained "cleaner" without the lube.  I just used a copper fouling remover every time I cleaned.  But that was "smokiless" powder, I've never tried a copper plated bullet with Black Powder because you need the lube to keep the fouling soft, not prevent "leading."

I'm not sure what you mean by

(looks melted formed)

The bullet is at least partially swaged (probably fully), see the ribbing on the bullet body?  Those older bullets were plated to prevent leading.  The copper acted as a lubricant.  You'll note it doesn't have grease grooves. Does the bullet have a waxy coating in the area that was still in the case?  Those ribbed areas are used to hold wax on the bullets.

Regards,
Mako

[Bryan Austin]

Yeah, the small crimp looking grooves had a tad bit of wax in them.

[w44wcf]

Jack,
Thank you for the pic.

Mako,
I found these two very nice pics of SHBP (Solid Head Button Pocket) cases on the internet......





w44wcf

[Bryan Austin]

Now I just gotta get some multi ball 45-70s!! 

[Steel Horse Bailey]

Now I just gotta get some multi ball 45-70s!! 

They look mean!  Didn't the Army have a "garrison" or "guard" round made like that back in the 1870s/80s/90s?  It's not a new concept, by any means.

Who is Paul Smith, anyway?  The maker? Photographer? Inventor?  All the beside? 

[Mako]

I'll add to w44wcf's thank you Savvy...

And w44wcf thank you for those sections.  You can see how they had to use a primer without that "flat" on the leg to let the primer pocket to hold it with the UMC case.  I'll sketch up what I think it looks like and you can tell me if it's correct.

Thanks guys,
Mako

[Dick Dastardly]

Most of the bad press as pertains to Black Powder being corrosive had to do with the primers.  Winchester was a real culprit in that they loaded their proprietary smokeless stuff with "Staynless" primers that they didn't offer to hand loaders.  The only powder available to hand loaders at that time was black powder.  Thus, the corrosive primers stayed with the black powder and the smokeless ammo got the non corrosive primers.  Wallah!  Black Powder was seen to be corrosive and smokeless was not.  But, by and large, it was the primers that were the problem.  Not the powder.

DD-MDA

[w44wcf]

Regarding primers.......
Early Winchester catalogs indicate that up until about 1916, for
black powder cartridges, they used No.'s 1, 1 1/2, 2 & 2 1/2 primers, depending on the cartridge.

Smokeless cartridges used No.'s 1W, 1 1/2W, 2W & 2 1/2W. The primer face had a "W" impressed to let the user know that the cartridges were loaded with smokeless powder.

Both types were mercuric, the W primers being 'hotter" to ignite smokeless powder. Mercuric primers were hard on brass, not so much on barrels.

After 1916, only the "W" primers remained and were used in both B.P. and Smokeless cartridges.

In the early 1920's, the mercury in primers was replaced by a "non-fulminate" compound containing potassium chlorate which was corrosive and if one did not properly clean barrels after ammunition fired with these primers, the barrels would be ruined in short order.

In 1925, Remington introduced their "Kleanbore" priming whch was non mercuric and non corrosive.  Winchester followed 4 years later with their "Staynless" primers.

w44wcf

[Deadeye Dick]

Balloon head case post deleted by DD

[Bunk Stagnerg]

Also a big difference in those old style .45 Colt cases from the 50's is they have a different tiny rim with out the extractor groove and will not fit in a modern shell holder. At least not on my Dillon 550. I still have some of those cases but I don't care to risk problems loading them.

[PJ Hardtack]

I have several factory boxes of Dominion 44-40 balloon headed cases, and a few boxes of loaded factory ammo in 44-40 and .455 Colt loaded ammo and brass.
I shoot the .455 sparingly, and they seem to be lasting well. I've yet to reload any of the 44-40 cases, but I have fired some of the factory 44-40 200 gr RNFP and it is accurate in my '66.

I've been present when a fellow CAS shooter was shooting some old Dominion balloon headed .45 Colt brass with BP and he suffered a case separation in his rifle. Net result - he got a face full of gas. This was pretty old and tired brass.