Black powder Measurement: by Weight or Volume

[Bryan Austin]

John Boy, I thank you for referring to my long on the box posting about this very subject. My reason for my posting is that I became upset over seeing a posting that said the dram on a shotshell box was referring to the speed of the shot. This person went on to say that BP was loaded by volume. If we allow this type of information to be printed by persons who have not done any research but are repeating what they have read or heard the future of our history is in trouble. The LOAD BY VOLUME was not ever in print until the advent of the sub powders. Even the buffalo hunters that loaded their rounds did so with a dipper that was calibrated with a scale. Look at any BP box of ammo and you will see a line that states loaded with 40 grains of powder, not black but just powder. 44-40 box would have that line,just as 45 Schofield might say loaded with 27 grains of powder. Show me a ammo box that said all ammo in this box was loaded by volume! As far as trying to make a statement that each can would be different that is true about many things and not just powder. The given about BP is that 39 grains will not act much different than 40 so there was some lee way. Our gun nomenclature has taken some hits over the years also. How many times have you heard a TV person or writer refer to a 45 ACP magazine as a clip or people go into a store and say I want to buy a box of bullets. If you were to give them a box of 250 grain lead bullets they would tell you that you don't know guns very well. You do know that they really wanted a box of ammo. If we don't care enough about our sport to say the correct way of doing things then how bad will the next shooters be. I am not trying to be picky or start the word police dept but how in the world can we teach the loading of BP if not do it by including the powder scale. It weighs both black and white. There are several BP shooting games that require a very precise loading. I shoot about three SASS matches a month and if you put enough powder in then you will for the most part hit the target. Although we have a 3ft x 3ft target at 7 yds that has been missed by shooters with revolvers and rifle. It seems impossible but I was a spotter and saw it. AS many posters have said this has been run until it's worn out but I bet a new member will ask with in a month, hey guys how much powder by volume do I load in my 45 Colts. As far as the Drams Equivalent goes it is almost gone just like the 2 3/4 is being replaced with 70mm

Yeap, this pretty much sound like me when I started. Go review all my topics. I ask questions and get plastered by those that have been reloading for 40 years but only by the way they were told, not by facts. Don't be a robot, ask WHY once in a while!

[Fairshake]

Savvy Jack, The reason that it is disturbing to those who know history and have been shooting and loading BP for a long time is the very fact that even people who know better say it wrong. Statements such as I know that it is weighed but for me just pouring some into the case is good enough. What does that pass on to our future shooters. Jack as far as your flask statement it is way off base. Flask of old would come with as many as 4 different spouts or at least one long one. The instructions said to keep weighing out your charges until you found one that was accurate and worked for you. They then said to cut off the extra metal from the spout. The Buffalo hunters would make a dipper with a old case and wire to use as a dipper. Once they had the correct weight they cut the case. This way they did not have to carry the scale into the field to become damaged. I have read about shooting and reloading since I was 9 years old. Not until the advent of Pyrodex was there such a term as load by volume. In Lyman's 41st edition there is a MZ section and each and every load is given in weighed charges of grains. Not one reference to volume is printed. Quit repeating what the arm chair reloaders have come up with and do some research of your own. If you are going to be a BP shooter then learn it's correct history. Pyrodex, 777, White Hots, Pinnacle and so on are not Black Powder. If you live by a road then you can buy the real thing if you care to. I'm also tired of the no stores sell BP so I shoot Pyrodex. You shoot Pyrodex because you want to. That is your decision and I wish you the best as this is a free world so that you may chose your own way. BP LOADS BY WEIGHT!! 

[Bryan Austin]

Savvy Jack, The reason that it is disturbing to those who know history and have been shooting and loading BP for a long time is the very fact that even people who know better say it wrong. Statements such as I know that it is weighed but for me just pouring some into the case is good enough. What does that pass on to our future shooters. Jack as far as your flask statement it is way off base. Flask of old would come with as many as 4 different spouts or at least one long one. The instructions said to keep weighing out your charges until you found one that was accurate and worked for you. They then said to cut off the extra metal from the spout. The Buffalo hunters would make a dipper with a old case and wire to use as a dipper. Once they had the correct weight they cut the case. This way they did not have to carry the scale into the field to become damaged. I have read about shooting and reloading since I was 9 years old. Not until the advent of Pyrodex was there such a term as load by volume. In Lyman's 41st edition there is a MZ section and each and every load is given in weighed charges of grains. Not one reference to volume is printed. Quit repeating what the arm chair reloaders have come up with and do some research of your own. If you are going to be a BP shooter then learn it's correct history. Pyrodex, 777, White Hots, Pinnacle and so on are not Black Powder. If you live by a road then you can buy the real thing if you care to. I'm also tired of the no stores sell BP so I shoot Pyrodex. You shoot Pyrodex because you want to. That is your decision and I wish you the best as this is a free world so that you may chose your own way. BP LOADS BY WEIGHT!!  

Fairshake. Thanks for that information. I do want to get one thing straight though. I agree with you and the weight topics. I am one of the ones to argue weight not volume when it applies to real BP. Many of my posts I use gr/w to show I measure gr by weight not volume or if I use volume I show it as gr/v. However, I am still wrong with certain info until I get the truth. Sometimes ya have to look stupid by posting certain faulty info just so someone will post the truth to keep you from blowing yourself up, so to speak! My ignorance is bliss. I have posted questions here on these forum until I am blue in the face about weight, compression etc for the 44-40 and real black powder. W44WCF finally shed the light on the facts that was dang near exactly what I gathered from me racking my brain on the 38gr charge compressed to .20 in as little as one year reloading experience with the 44-40!. I can post a link to that specific topic if you would like. That is why no more than a 1/16 that is so told on these forums as the gospel. I know that the 1/16 comes in to play with the advent of subs and knot real BP and some with no compression at all such as 777. I have countless posts on several forums that are dead ends because of all these 40+ year reloading vets swearing up and down you load by volume and not weight with little to no compression at all.  To top it all off, many times the firsat reply to my posts are something like, "you don't need that much for CAS". Makes my blood boil when they automatically assume everyone on these forums loads everything for CAS. I was even told that these are CAS forums...sure..looks like they are but I have yet to find a better forum than this one right here!

Some day I'd like to posts all the names of you guys that have taken the time to seriously answer my questions and you are certainly one of them.

Here are some topics I posted that are a year or so old back in Feb09, October-Dec 09 of last year that I lost a many hours of sleep trying to figure this mess out on my own!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRyIMqXA_o8&feature=related (just a joke)

http://www.theopenrange.net/forum/index.php?topic=7248.0

http://www.cascity.com/forumhall/index.php/topic,29189.20.html

This is the topic where w44wcf answered my question with an original cartridge dissection test of the 44WCF. I learned that by myself by going where I was told not to go as can be seen with my replies and posts. As a matter of fact, you were the first to reply to this one.
http://www.theopenrange.net/forum/index.php?topic=6267.0

There are plenty more topics like these that I posted or topics I posted in. I do not dare to post stuff like this on the God Almighty and Self Righteous SASS forums. I seldom even go there any more cept maybe to check out the classifieds.

I really enjoy CAS but I love facts about the loading/reloading of the original cartridges of the 1800's even more!

[Fox Creek Kid]

Remington stated in their catalogs of the 1870's to WEIGH and not use a volume "throw" for reloading rifle ctgs. as they stated that one gr. difference at 600 yds. equaled great disparity of which number I have forgotten. Reloading kits of the times did not have scales, they had dippers calculated for a certain company's powder. This is covered in the Seller's book on Sharps.

For CAS it is not important. I use Lee dippers. For BPCR, I weigh.

[Bryan Austin]

Remington stated in their catalogs of the 1870's to WEIGH and not use a volume "throw" for reloading rifle ctgs. as they stated that one gr. difference at 600 yds. equaled great disparity of which number I have forgotten. Reloading kits of the times did not have scales, they had dippers calculated for a certain company's powder. This is covered in the Seller's book on Sharps.

For CAS it is not important. I use Lee dippers. For BPCR, I weigh.

Thanks Fox! Aside from your quote,


It was info like this that got me to thinking about compression. If a dipper was made for a specific powder maker to throw a specific charge in weight, then that powder had to be consistent in weight. I do not see that now days as per John Boys posts up in one of these pages. I would read what I could but that added more questions and then when I would post those questions on the forums I got controversial  answers that did nothing but add more questions. To me it did not take a genius to understand that compression may be different between the 44-40 and the 38-40 when charging both with 40gr of powder. Using the 38-40 as a dipper gave me exactly 40gr/v of powder that weighed 38gr of my batch and brand of Goex. It was different when using the 44-40 case...of course!

I knew there had to be an answer there somewhere. I then started reading up on the BPCR forums. Other than long distant targets, their loading methods more added up to what I thought was original practice back in the days. Powder weight plus bullet weight equals power, power equals distance. Tweaking the two gives accuracy. When I started looking into compression I discovered the compression dies and thought to myself...why use a compression die if 1/16-1/8 inch compression is gospel. Doesn't take much to compress this without damaging the lead. Then I saw compression dies for other than large rifle cartridges namely the 44-40. I then made my own compression die for my 44-40. I compressed my powder and discovered that the 44-40 compressed nice with 38gr by volume with a little force. Although the weight was less due to powder manufacture, the actual grains was right on with the solid head cases. I then discovered that the balloon head case only holds 2 grains more for the 44-40 rather than 7 or so I kept reading about when actual cases were dissected. This was right on with my loading experience findings.

Now I then shot my reloads for the 44-40 and found that accuracy was affected by full loads rather than less compressed loads of which I suspected after reading other info. I then did all of this again with the 45 Colt and found much different results. 40gr/w compressed much easier but accuracy and trajectory was much better with the full loads. Certainly explained the questions I had about the front sight on the revolvers. With full loads on the 45, the top of the sight was used as I guessed it was designed. With the so called "cowboy" loads I had to adjust to midway down the front sight. It was actually the front sight experience I was having that started many questions. I never could figure out why the sight was so tall if it was useless. With full loads its now point of aim at 50yards not half way down the sight!

Ok, back to compression. I then got to thinking, does one have to use less powder for a larger bullet to be seated in the case? Is so would this now make the 44-40 with a 240gr bullet a 44-35? What about the 230gr 45 Colt, would a 250gr bullet now mean less powder? As per original 44wcf dissection...larger bullet simply meant more compression. Again answering my questions. I have no idea if this is true with all ammo loads from back then but I do know it was with the 45 colt and 44 wcf. From looking at the 45-70 information on the BPRC forums.....well now my interests have expanded to BPCR! I am just not ready for it yet although I do want an 1876 soo bad!

Then I got to wandering about the CUP, pressure stuff. The latest I read is that stuff ain't all its cracked up to be for these smaller cal cartridges. So now I don't know the truths there...but I am ready to learn!

[Wills Point Pete]

 SJack, the .45 Colt was loaded a lot of different ways, including a round ball weighing around 145grains, plus or minus a little. Same with most other of the well established cartridges. The somewhat bottlenecked cases had less variety although even they had some much reduced loads. The Army was really big on reduced loads due to the need to practice when the snow was deep, etc. They did a lot of work with wads of cork and other lightweight stuff. Or how about that .45-70 "carbine load" of only 55 grains powder behind that 405 grain bullet?

As for the comment about often illiterate buffalo hunters, many were well educated, say the Bat Masterson types, many were somewhat educated, say the Wyatt Earp types. And, yea, there were those who could not read.

As for Sharps rifles being expensive, those rifles were always in the minority. There were far more surplus .50-70s, Rolling Blocks, ect. Many hunters even started with muzzle loaders. It did not take too may hides to buy a used rifle. After all, the shooting was easy, the hard part came after the Buff was dead.  The big, really professional types with one or two shooters and a crew of skinners, wagon divers, etc, were the minority. Mainly it was two or three guys with one big rifle, a wagon and sone sharp knives. And a whole lot of would be buff hunters simply could not stand the smell of the carcasses and green hides. There is a reason the Earp brothers and the Masterson brothers got out of the Buff business and into law enforcement after only a couple of seasons, when, I might add, the Buff were still plentiful. They were not alone. And, of course, there is no record of Bat or Wyatt ever leaving a buffalo gun in their wills. Like most, they sold those rifles when they went into the pim, er gamb, er, law enforcement biz.

Handloading then was much like today. Many cared about fine accuracy, many only cared about "enough for CAS". For every guy who wanted an eight or ten inch six hundred yard group there were as many who thought five or six inch hundred yard grouple would do.

Sharps rifles expensive? Sure, new. I do believe enough of us here have tried to sell used rifles, though. Remember how expensive they were to buy and how cheap to sell?

I'll say it again, those cartridges were loaded all kinds of ways back then, just as they are now. The only difference is that it was gunpowder then and (mostly) smokeless now.

[Bryan Austin]

  As for the comment about often illiterate buffalo hunters, many were well educated, say the Bat Masterson types, many were somewhat educated, say the Wyatt Earp types. And, yea, there were those who could not read.

Tahnks Pete. I guess I did open a can of worms with that post huh?  Sure got some folks attention!

[Bryan Austin]

Density examples that I have determined:
Wt Vendor Grain
90.2 Goex Cartridge
91.2 DuPont FFg
91.9 KIK FFFg
94.1 Goex Cowboy
90.5 Goex FFg
94.4 Goex FFFg
92.5 Goex FFFg
91.6 Goex FFFg ... all the Goex FFFg's are different lots
94.4 Meteor FFg
97 Meteor FFFg
97.2 Goex Express FFg
97.8 Schuetzen FFFg
99.2 KIK FFg
102.3 Swiss FFFg
102.6 DuPont Fg
102.7 Skirmish Fg
104.4 Swiss 1.5
104.9 Swiss FFg
100 gr volume pan weighed

JohnBoy, have you chronographed and checked accuracy on these findings I placed in bold? Also you can do the same with the others if ya wan to.

[john boy]

JohnBoy, have you chronographed and checked accuracy on these findings I placed in bold? Also you can do the same with the others if ya wan to.

Jack, I load based on scale weight, not volume charges.  So with the lighter density powders, the column height in the case is higher than those powders with a higher density - more grains of powder.  If I charged by volume and chronographed the rounds, it would be meaningful.  But with scale weight - it's not.  Understand?
In addition, velocity is a factor of burn rate, not density.  Burn rate is measured by the closed bomb test and I have never done it because I don't have the equipment

Plus, you are not a BPCR shooter and I am.  For CAS, one is not loading large caliber reloads and shooting them at distances substantially longer than just banging away at 7 -12 yds.  Shooting BPCR reloads at long range, one wants to keep the bullet as close to sonic speed as possible and for CAS, many strive for 'lighter recoil',  aka gamers.  Further, the bullet weights that I shoot for BPCR are no where near the light weight bullets shot for CAS.  Meaning - the comparison is meaningless

But yes, I do chronograph the majority of my BPCR reloads for the many different powder charges by brand used by bullet weight, the majority weighing greater than 500grs

May I offer, a chronograph is a tool that you might want to treat yourself to.  Then you would have the answers instead of the questions for your CAS reloads.  If you are interested in velocities for CAS type reloads using black powder ... read the numbers here ... http://www.goexpowder.com/load-chart.html  But the powders used are not identified

[Ranch 13]

Jack, just running velocity comparisons wouldn't mean much.
The dirty little secret folks leave out when they're trying to expound on the "superior" benefits of swiss and the other URA peon powders, is they are finer grained. IE swiss 2f is the same sized powder kernel as goex 3 f, so that goes along way towards explaining the "volume" difference and the "higher velocity" of the Swiss powder, when someone is comparing swiss 2 f to goex 3f.

[Noz]

I have always been intrigued by the statement that the buffalo hunters destroyed the great herds.  I read recently that the numbers of buffalo killed by the hunters in the period called the "buffalo slaughter" would not make up for the natural birth rate of the herds, if the herds were indeed as large as they were reported to be. Instead, tick fever imported by the settlers domestic cattle is the probable culprit.  The buffalo had no resistance to the disease.

[Ranch 13]

Noz and most of the people that foist the "buffalo slaughter" thing don't have a clue the range could not of sustained the huge numbers they expect us to believe.
I think the end of the great buffalo herds were the result of a collison with man and mother nature all at the same time.

[Bryan Austin]

Jack, I load based on scale weight, not volume charges.  So with the lighter density powders, the column height in the case is higher than those powders with a higher density - more grains of powder.  If I charged by volume and chronographed the rounds, it would be meaningful.  But with scale weight - it's not.  Understand?
In addition, velocity is a factor of burn rate, not density.  Burn rate is measured by the closed bomb test and I have never done it because I don't have the equipment

Plus, you are not a BPCR shooter and I am.  For CAS, one is not loading large caliber reloads and shooting them at distances substantially longer than just banging away at 7 -12 yds.  Shooting BPCR reloads at long range, one wants to keep the bullet as close to sonic speed as possible and for CAS, many strive for 'lighter recoil',  aka gamers.  Further, the bullet weights that I shoot for BPCR are no where near the light weight bullets shot for CAS.  Meaning - the comparison is meaningless

But yes, I do chronograph the majority of my BPCR reloads for the many different powder charges by brand used by bullet weight, the majority weighing greater than 500grs

May I offer, a chronograph is a tool that you might want to treat yourself to.  Then you would have the answers instead of the questions for your CAS reloads.  If you are interested in velocities for CAS type reloads using black powder ... read the numbers here ... http://www.goexpowder.com/load-chart.html  But the powders used are not identified

No need to be condescending!!!

Again for those that don't quite get it. I have not shot CAS in over two years. I do still load some charges for plinking in my back yard but is not why I post here. I have what I have and I will use what I have until I can get a BPCR and join the....el..ah nevermind


Now with that said, yes I do understand and I wish you would have just answered what I asked or simply said no. Yes, I do have a chronograph and I do chronograph my loads. I guess I did miss something here and at some point I will learn from it. But until it slaps me in the face.....I will just move on.

Tucks tail between legs and eases on off into the think jungle! 

[Bryan Austin]

Jack, I load based on scale weight, not volume charges.  So with the lighter density powders, the column height in the case is higher than those powders with a higher density - more grains of powder.  If I charged by volume and chronographed the rounds, it would be meaningful.  But with scale weight - it's not.  Understand?
In addition, velocity is a factor of burn rate, not density.  Burn rate is measured by the closed bomb test and I have never done it because I don't have the equipment

Plus, you are not a BPCR shooter and I am.  For CAS, one is not loading large caliber reloads and shooting them at distances substantially longer than just banging away at 7 -12 yds.  Shooting BPCR reloads at long range, one wants to keep the bullet as close to sonic speed as possible and for CAS, many strive for 'lighter recoil',  aka gamers.  Further, the bullet weights that I shoot for BPCR are no where near the light weight bullets shot for CAS.  Meaning - the comparison is meaningless

But yes, I do chronograph the majority of my BPCR reloads for the many different powder charges by brand used by bullet weight, the majority weighing greater than 500grs

May I offer, a chronograph is a tool that you might want to treat yourself to.  Then you would have the answers instead of the questions for your CAS reloads.  If you are interested in velocities for CAS type reloads using black powder ... read the numbers here ... http://www.goexpowder.com/load-chart.html  But the powders used are not identified

Hey JohnBoy, remember this post...lol http://www.cascity.com/forumhall/index.php/topic,29189.20.html

[Noz]

I have been laughing at this thread since December.  Grapeshot answers a question that was not asked with universally agreed upon information and it has taken us 4 pages to get around to agreeing again.

[Grapeshot]

I have been laughing at this thread since December.  Grapeshot answers a question that was not asked with universally agreed upon information and it has taken us 4 pages to get around to agreeing again.

Yeah, I do stir the pot every now and then.

[Bryan Austin]

I have been laughing at this thread since December.  Grapeshot answers a question that was not asked with universally agreed upon information and it has taken us 4 pages to get around to agreeing again.

What was agreed too again...