[Doc Holliday, Trader]

Thanks for the replies pards. But I'm still having a hard time understanding if it's OK to seat my .451 ball down on top of the 3 grains of smokeless powder into the brass of what I'm calling Gallery Loads. Regular smokeless reloading sez you need free space between the load and the ball, unlike black powder, 777 & Pyrodex. My friend sez to seat the ball down on the smokeless 231, but I wanted more than one opinion from someone with experience.

Much obliged.

Doc Holliday
Doc@DocHollidayTrading.com
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[Dean Williams]

Regular smokeless reloading sez you need free space between the load and the ball

I wanted more than one opinion from someone with experience.

That is what the people who write the reloading manuals say. They do this for a living. I think you can assume that their "opinion" is one of experience. Follow the suggestions of the people who actually do the research and you will do well.

Lyman says seat the ball to 1.440". Speer says for W231 use 4.0 grs. Don't take my word for it.

Black powder and it's substitutes do not have the same characteristics as smokeless powders.

[Randy1911]

Blackpowder is an explosive. Smokeless powder is a extremly fast buring flamable. Any air gap in the shell with blackpowder will cause an explosion. I use to load these "Gallery Loads" by seating the ball so that the ball can be crimped lightly in the case mouth. About 1.440 sounds about right IIRC I always used .454 balls because that is what the book called for..

[Remo-99]

When I was loading .433 RB gallery rounds for my .44mag,
I found I got best results by loading the RB about halfway down in the case length, to reduce case capacity, as I was only using around 2gr of RedDot or Clays.
They shot supprising well to 25yds, but dropped too much for 50yd targets.

[rcmodel]

Follow the data.

http://www.thehighroad.org/showpost.php?p=5461967&postcount=4

Still don't understand?

Don't seat the ball down on the powder!

rc