How many Grains in a CC ?

[Driftwood Johnson]

Howdy

16 drams to the ounce. 16 ounces to the pound. 7000 grains in a pound. A dram is 27.34 grains, rounded off. Two of them are 54.68 grains. Drams are a unit of weight. Does not matter whether Fg or FFFFg, a dram is still 27.34 grains.

[Dick Dastardly]

Ho the fire,

When loading my 44 ELR ammo I drop enough powder that the bullet compresses it well when I seat and crimp it.  By "compresses it well" I mean all that I can without deforming the bullet.  Then, that's my load in CCs.  So, it doesn't matter so much what it weighs, just how much it fills the case when it's well compressed.  Yes, I'm talkin' Genuine Powder here.  Black Powder, the One True Powder, Holy Black.  The mix of the three original ingredients, sulfur, charcoal and niter in what was always known as gun powder.  In other words, don't go tryin' my load with Bullseye. . . .

For those that don't know what 44 ELR is, it's 44 Extra Long Russian, also known as 44 Magnum.

I use the same procedure to fill my C45Spl, 32 S&W and 45 Colt cases with black powder when I'm loading them.  So, I don't pay no nevermind to the actual weight, it's the volume of powder that gives nice tight compressed charges when the boolit is seated and crimped.  I am a mite more fussy about my 45-70 and 38-55 long range ammo.

But, if you must know, I've always used the figure of 16 grains per CC to interpolate my loads.

DD-DLoS

[The Elderly Kid]

And people wonder why Americans are so averse to using the metric system.

[Sir Charles deMouton-Black]

And people wonder why Americans are so averse to using the metric system.

Drams & grains are soo much simpler!

[Wildcat Will]

Hello folks.  All is talk is very confusing for my very simple mind.  For goodness sake.  Take your case and place it under a 12" drop.  Using you FF of choice ( I use 2FF for my 45 LC) and drop enough powder to fill the case a hair under completely full and set you boolet of choice (I use a 250gn big lube boolet) and compress.  Heck the thing goes bang, make lots of smoke and if I aim properly hits the target without making spotter guess (unless they cannot see cause of the smoke.). 

That is a whole lot easier than what cc = what weight = what vol. 

[wildman1]

Careful you is gonna wreck everboby's fun.  WM

[Mako]

Hello folks.  All is talk is very confusing for my very simple mind.  For goodness sake.  Take your case and place it under a 12" drop.  Using you FF of choice ( I use 2FF for my 45 LC) and drop enough powder to fill the case a hair under completely full and set you boolet of choice (I use a 250gn big lube boolet) and compress.  Heck the thing goes bang, make lots of smoke and if I aim properly hits the target without making spotter guess (unless they cannot see cause of the smoke.).  

That is a whole lot easier than what cc = what weight = what vol.  

Will,
You have just described loading by volume which is what some of us have been saying all along.

Regards,
Mako

[Wildcat Will]

Careful you is gonna wreck everboby's fun.  WM

WM  would never want to wreck anyone's fun, just figure I'd boil it all down. 

Mako your right it basically is loading by volume.  I honestly not sure how many cc it is but it is somewhere around 36 or 37 of FF.  I actually measured it once.  Nice thing about real BP is close is usually good enough as long as there is compression.   

[WaddWatsonEllis]

This is a peripatetic question and is always good for at least ten pages of comments ....

Kinda reminds me of how monks would argue about how many angels would fit on the head of a pin ...

[Mako]

This is a peripatetic question and is always good for at least ten pages of comments ....

Kinda reminds me of how monks would argue about how many angels would fit on the head of a pin ...

So am I being likened to an itinerant monk wandering about just discussing the hermeneutics of BP?

You have actually inadvertently unmasked the problem that everyone seems to have with firearms in general and in this case the holy black in particular.  People treat it as a matter of opinion or faith instead studying and learning there is actually a reason for everything.  As I said much earlier that a grain volumetric is not some mystical whim, or some unsubstantiated theory. It is an established unit of measurement that has a universal and very repeatable system of reference.  Most people are just simply unaware of it so they just act as if it is some unfathomable mystery lost to time.

Regards,
Mako

[Pettifogger]

The only way to tell how many grains are in a CC is to dump a dipper full out on a clean piece of white paper and then get out your tweezers and count them.

[Pony Racer]

I load like Wildcat Will.

1.0 cc powder and 158 grain bullet for 38's.

1.0 cc powder and 205 grain bullet for my 44 ruskies.

4.3 cc powder for my 43 spanish rounds.

4.3 cc powder for my 12 guage loads (could put more in but with 4.3 cc of lead shot the square load does not fail me).

Going to start reaoding for my 45-60 soon - I am sure it is probably near the 43 spanish powder load.

PR

[Lucky R. K.]

The only way to tell how many grains are in a CC is to dump a dipper full out on a clean piece of white paper and then get out your tweezers and count them.

And, more than likely, if you repeat the process you will get a different count.

Lucky 

[Pettifogger]

And, more than likely, if you repeat the process you will get a different count.

Lucky 

That's why you have to average ten counts.  I'm still working on the first dipper.  Been at it over an hour.

[Paladin UK]

Roughly, generally, or most of the time, how many grains of black powder are there in one cubic centimeter?

Paladin (  ) UK

[Mako]

Roughly, generally, or most of the time, how many grains of black powder are there in one cubic centimeter?

Paladin (   ) UK

I'll try again because this is important.

If you are talking about weight then it primarily depends upon the powder size.  Fg is larger and has a certain amount of air space in a 1.0 cc measure dictated by the shape, FFFg will have less air space and therefore the same volume will weigh more.

This is the chart that Lee provides with their dippers:

http://i627.photobucket.com/albums/tt358/Mako_CAS/Odds%20and%20Ends/1cc.png

It is obviously a generalization for the weights because different manufacturer's powders will have different weights per Lee Dipper (more on that later).

Look at it this way, you have seen the same situation with other materials.  If you take a clear drinking glass, fill it with pebbles and weigh it the combined weight will be less than the same glass filled with smaller pebbles of the same type. To take it even further, think of how much fine sand you could add to the glass and shake it down even after it was "full" of coarse pebbles. That's because the pebbles always leave air spaces in the glass.  The same is true for coarser Black Powder.  

There are differences in the production and milling techniques between the different manufacturers.  Even though there is a mesh size standard which determines the grain size of the powder you can imagine that the shape of the grain will make a difference in how it will fill a volume.  From the above example you can imagine rough rock leaving more air space in a glass than smooth river stone or pebbles.  That is one of the reasons there are differences in the weight by volume of the same marked grain size between manufacturers.  The other reason is the final density of the powder which varies because of charcoal density, the "caking" operation (that's where they formed into cakes and the water is pressed out before it is dried and broken up in to granular form) and sometimes the milling of the sulfur and potassium nitrate before the mixing.

On the other hand if you are talking about the volumetric measure called a grain I can tell you exactly how many grains are in a cubic centimeter because there is a volumetric measure called a grain.  Everyone knows that there is a volumetric measure called an ounce as well as a unit of weight called an ounce. Water is used as the standard to determine volume and weight. This is actually true in the metric system as well.  One ounce of volume equals one ounce of weight.  Being British you may have heard the ditty, "The Pint's a Pound the world around" that used to be taught in school.  So just like the ounce, a grain uses water to determine the volume. A grain volume of water weighs exactly one grain by weight.

To answer your question in terms of volume, one cubic centimeter through conversion is equal to 15.43 grains of volume.  If you want to check the math then use the weight of water for your calculation.  In the metric system 1cc of water weighs exactly 1 gram.  1 gram is equal to 15.432358347 grains of weight (1/7000 of a lb.).  So a one CC volumetric measure holds 15.43 gr of water which is as we said 15.43 grains volume.

So Paladin, just for grins,  if you walked into your local pub and asked them to draw a pint for you and the guy behind the bar asked you how much that weighed you'd think he was daft.  You might also think he was trying to confuse or cheat you and not give you an Imperial Pint but an American pint.  You would demand your full 568ml (cc) of beer instead of the 473ml (cc) that would be accepted elsewhere.

Being the suspicious (and thirsty) man you are then you would want to check the glasses in that pub, so the next time you would visit you would bring your scale with you.  You would ask for a "pint" glass of water before you ordered your beer. you would then weigh the entire glass with water on your scale, record the weight and then proceed to water the plants with the contents of the glass.  You would then weigh the glass alone and if there wasn't at least a 568 gram difference in weight you would know you were being hoodwinked.

Your friend,
Mako

[john boy]

Roughly, generally, or most of the time, how many grains of black powder are there in one cubic centimeter?

Palidan ... It all depends!


Powder Density I made a cylindrical powder measure with a depth of 1.000 inch, a diameter of 1.128 inches, and a volume of one cubic inch. I measured and weighed all the powders I could get a hold of, and measured some power dippers.

Density of Black Powder
Powder Size Grains per cubic inch   

GOEX   Fg   235   
GOEX   FFg   231   
GOEX   Ctg   252   Surprisingly Dense
GOEX   FFFg   238   
GOEX   FFFFg   235   
Dupont
Superfine   FFFFg   232   70 years old and good as new
Dupont
Superfine   FFFg   243   
Kik   FFg   230   
   242   Antique powder dipper
   248   1970's T/C powder measure
Average   239   
Quite a variation. That is why you measure powder by weight and not by volume.
The average seems high to me; 235 is the value that I would likely use when making a powder measure.
http://www.tbullock.com/bpsg.html

[Sir Charles deMouton-Black]

Mako;  A pint is NOT a pound "The World around".  That old saw is true only where the American writ runs.  It is not true of "Imperial" measure, (Now obsolete) where a pint was 20 ounces, not 16. It is true that the ounce was the same in both measures.

[rickk]

A 20-ish ounce "imperial pint" glass will often have a line scribed on it at the 16 ounce point, usually with the Queen's mark next to it. This is so that, even with lots of foam, you know you are getting 16 ounces of beer.  They take beer seriously in England.

In the USA however, 90+ % of the time when you order a "pint", if you took the time to measure the beer in the "pint" glass, you would find that it is actually only capable of holding 14 ounces. It's a USA measurement system called "cheating".

This was discovered early one saturday afternoon at a local brewpub in Northampton, Massachusetts. They had a guest beer that came in 12 ounce bottles. The barmaid tried to pour the entire contents of the 12 ounce bottle into one of their "12 ounce" glasses and it didn't fit at all. There were only a few of us regulars there so, out came a measuring cup....

We found that their "12 ounce" bar glass, which was pretty much an industry standard "12 ounce" bar glass,  only held 10.5 ounces. Now being suspicious, we repeated the experiment with the "pint" glasses and found they only held 14 ounces.

Later that day, I checked my collection of about 20 different souvenir "pint" glasses from 20 different brew pubs and found that they all held 14 ounces before overfilling.

Sooo, a pint's a pound around the world, except for in the USA where the beer industry has decided that it isn't.

[Sir Charles deMouton-Black]

Mako;  Your chance comment on "pints" hasn't hijacked this thread, it has saved it!

Saved it from becoming too serious!

Despite the slagging of some brew pubs for short measure I trust them to serve real beer, not "substitute beer" like the international brewing firms bring 'round in tankers. I will drink local beer wherever it can be found in preference to what the brewing giants splash around.

maybe we can get a beer & whiskey thread going on the history board.