[fishblade2]

What all guns can fire black powder in their cartridge? If I remember right does any gun that can fire modern powder fire black powder as well? Does it harm modern guns easily doing this especially if you do it a lot? So I guess the better question would be what guns can't fire modern powder or can fire both? Last question is: do reloading manuals let you know if the gun can fire black powder as well as modern powder and does it tell you how much black powder to use? IF they don't can anyone tell me a conversion to use for changing modern powder to black powder?

Thanks for everything!

[Old Fuff]

Currently popular revolver cartridges, such as the .32 S&W Long, .38 Special, .44 Special and .45 Colt all began life as black powder rounds. You can add to that the .32-20, .38-40 and .44-40, all introduced by Winchester as black powder loads. More modern variants such as the .32 H&R Magnum, .327 Magnum, .357 Magnum, .41 Magnum, and .44 Magnum could be easily loaded with black powder. That covers just about everything in a center fire revolver you might encounter.

It is important that no air space be left between the powder and bullet (or bullet and wad if you use one) so the cartridge's capacity determines what the load will be. There is no revolver cartridge that has enough room to hold enough black powder to endanger a quality-made modern revolver.

There are no serious reasons not to shoot black powder, except the cleaning chore you face when you're done. :uhoh:

Pistol cartridges were designed to use smokeless powder in the first place. Consequently they don’t hold enough black powder to be effective. But if you want a very light load and something different that will quickly get attention at any shooting range… :evil:

[BCRider]

A guy that shoots Cowboy Action with me loaded up his 1911 .45acp round with black powder (BP). The amount of BP that fits is more than safe. In fact it was a much lighter load than even lower power smokeless loadings. So he had to use a lighter recoil spring to allow the gun to cycle correctly. I think he ended up using a 12 lb spring more suitable to 9mm versions of the 1911.

For semi autos there's really not much point in doing this other than perhaps with the .45acp. The rest simply do not have enough case volume to allow a decent amount of BP to be used. For example a 9mm casing by the time you seat even a light 115gn bullet would only hold around 7 to 9gns of BP which would be a VERY weak load.

Revolver cartridges fair much better. Here's an online primer on loading and shooting BP cartridges as used in cowboy action shooting;

http://www.jspublications.net/tips/BPLoading.pdf

Basically with any of the revolver casings you can't overfill them and create an unsafe condition. The most powerful of the BP loadings is with .45Colt which uses the heaviest bullet of the lot in front of the biggest case volume. Yet the .45 Colt comes from the day when the case was stuffed full with around 40 gns of BP.

The big issue is going to be the bullet lube. The lube used on many cast bullets isn't BP friendly. It tends to combine and react with the BP fouling to produce hard tar like deposits which do not clean easily. You'll want to boil the bullets to remove the modern waxy lube and replace it with a BP friendly lube made from some specific ingredients. A common bullet lube for BP is beeswax and Crisco shortening with maybe a dollop of olive oil. Note that this is all vegtable or animal based. None of it comes from dead dinosaur guts that come out of the ground.

Simiarly the petroleum based gun oils will combine with the BP fouling to create a sticky tar like mess. So those of us who like our BP guns tend to lube them for corrosion protection with Ballistol which works well with BP.

You'll also need to clean the guns at the end of the day. The fouling from BP has some water loving salts in it and rust can become an issue. But cleanup is pretty easy with warm slightly soapy water and a soft bristle bore brush and brushes for the outside.

With all the extra fuss does this still seem like a good idea? :D

[joecil]

I don't shoot pure black powder but do shot Pyrodex, a good substitute and meters as well as loads the same way. Now with pistol or rifle I load the same as black powder and Pyrodex are based on volume not weight. I measure a bullet from the base to the crimp grove. I simply add enough powder to be from 1/16" to 1/8" higher than the distance from the mouth of the case. Fill it with your powder and when the bullet is seated will compress it the 1/16" or 1/8". Pretty much how it was done in the days of black powder.

As for cleaning soap and water work fine, just avoid petroleum based cleaning product till you wash with soap and water followed by drying. At that point I clean like any other guns using Hoppes #9, Break Free CLP and Tetra Grease. I don't recommend using black powder or substitute with modern semi auto weapons at all. BP tends to foul more than smokeless and one might find his gun stops functioning quickly.

[StrawHat]

I have loaded a lot of black powder cartridges and some modern cartridges with black powder. The 45 long Colt, 50-70, 40-72 and such are the easy ones. Harder to find data for are things like the 458 Magnum, 450 Marlin and other straight cased cartridges. I loaded black into the 458 (when I had one) and found it to be the modern equivalent to the 45-90. Loading black powder into bottlenecked cartridges is not usually recommended, although the 303 Enfield was originally black powder. It has been found the bottlenecked cartridges do not do well with black powder.

A good black powder lube is necessary to keep the fouling soft. Either applied to the bullet or as a grease cookie under the bullet. As for bullets, with modern firearms, lead or jacketed work well. My 458 shot some good groups with the 405 grain JSP from Remington.

Cleaning is usually no big deal. Water is a good solvent for black powder residue. The cases need to go into a soap and water solution after firing and then tumbled.

Oil the firearm after the cleaning and all is good.

Did you have a particular cartridge in mind?

[fishblade2]

I'm interested in 38 special, 357 mag, 44 mag, and 500 smith and Wesson. I appreciate all the help so far. I am definitely looking for other advice out there over this for instance the extra info such as cleaning the cases and how to clean the black powder off is great stuff! I need that. I have always been iffy about cleaning my gun at all with water and it wasn't until recently I cleaned my black powder rifle (modern inline one) with water. I was so surprised at how easy and quick it was to clean!!! And I didn't find rust after cleaning it with oil and cleaner. I am just extremely unsure about cleaning my revolvers with water. How should this be done because I don't think it would be good to get water too much around the gun's parts because I see water getting down into the springs and small grooves and resulting in rust. So should the cylinder be taken off if possible (still don't know with my revolvers if that can be done without a lot of work)? So mostly how should I go about cleaning it. Would it be better to run hot water down the barrel or take wet patches of water and run them down the barrel? Now when it comes to the reloading part should I just fill the casing as much as I can as long as the overall length is below what it should? How close can the overall length be and still be safe? Does anyone have good loads of black powder already for these calibers mentioned above? And is there any problems, extra cleaning (including cleaning in between so many rounds) that should be done? Any extra advice would be great!! Thanks for all the help guys! Oh and I'm interested in doing this for 12 gauge shotgun. Can anyone tell me the volume of black powder for this and if I should load wads or not in with this and any extra cleaning that should be done?

[TonyT]

I decided that I did not want to take my guns into the shower and have stayed away from using black powder.

[BCRider]

The best way with a revolver is to take the cylinder off. For a modern DA revolver I know this means removing that front screw that holds the crane in place or doing whatever the particular brand requires. But if you do that then you can soak/clean the barrel by simply sitting it muzzle down in a bucket which only washes the gun up to just over the forcing cone. No wash water need enter the action at all.

The cylinder will be easy to clean of course. But it DOES mean taking all the ejector and other bits out and cleaning and oiling those as well.

If you're going to do all this fairly frequently be sure you don't do more than just pinch tighten the screws so it's easy to remove them for cleaning without slot damage.

If shooting these rounds from a single action obviously a lot of this detail stuff goes away.

I looked at the idea of BP for my own TC Encore in .500S&W. But by the time I put in the bullet the case only held about 45 to 50 gns of powder. And that would have been a very mild plinking load. Lots of smoke and belching flame mind you. So I may still have a go at it. But it'll be very mild in the recoil department and won't push the bullets to all that high a velocity.

.38Spl is in the same boat. With the bullet seated you don't have room for more than around 15 gns of BP. So if your guns are chambered in .357Mag I'd use those cases and then you should be able to squeak in close to 20 gns with some compression and via the use of a drop tube for your reloading.

Wait.... I found this on another forum from a google search.

38 special 158 gr Baloon head case Solid head case speed
21 gr FFg 19 gr FFg 850 fps

38 long colt 150 gr 18 gr FFg 16 gr FFg 760 fps


Lyman's black powder only lists 38 special

158 gr bullet

goex ffg 17 gr 561 fps

goex fffg 17.5 gr 642

pyrodex RS 17 gr 638

pyrodex P 18 gr 635


The old balloon head casings would hold a more respectable amount of powder. The 17'ish grain loads from the Lyman manual are due to the heavy case head found today taking up the volume that was there with the balloon head cases. It'll be fun for sure but it won't bang up your wrist at all. Going to .357Mag casings would provide the volume with modern casings to properly replicate the 20 gn loads originally available.

[deadin]

The biggest problem I've seen with BP loads in modern firearms is that due to the closer tolerances that modern guns are made with, they tend to crud up and stop functioning faster than guns designed for BP. (Especially semi-autos:D)

[fishblade2]

okay well for my major concern still that I have over black powder in the modern revolver is if I don't take the cylinder out and just pour water through the cylinders and the barrel and take some extra time cleaning it, will this be enough or will I still have problems with rust and possible malfunctions in my gun unless I take it apart and clean it? Thanks for the help as always!

[sirsloop]

Given the alternatives I dont know why anyone would want to shoot BP out of their modern smokeless powder gun. Just seems like a cleaning headache! Wanna shoot BP get a muzzleloader. I guess if you dont care about the clean up....

just DO NOT put smokeless powder in your dang BP gun!

[TonyT]

Shooting BP in a modern DA revolver does not make snese due to the additionbal cleanup required. With the old Colt SAA whenb you removed the cylinder you did not have to contend with the rachet.
Personally use Trail Boss it is almost as bulky as the old BP and is smokeless.

[BCRider]

If you don't take the cylinder and crane off the gun for cleaning I'd say you'll want to remove the grips and flush it following the water cleanup with something like Ed's Red to flush away any water that gets into the action. I like the idea of the Ed's Red because it's mostly solvent with only a little oil. So after you shake it out and blow it with a bit of compressed air (ideal but not TOTALLY necessary) there would be no water and only a little oil left behind. Just right for avoiding corrosion issues and yet still pretty quick to do. A 4 oz plastic squeeze bottle would do the job. Simply suck some ER mix up in the bottle then squirt it inside through the action and through the ejector rod assembly and the barrel as well. Work the ejector rod a few times, shake out the excess, wipe/patch/blow dry then replace the grips.

All in all I don't think this would take any longer to do once you get a little practice at it than it does to clean a C&B revolver. The ease of the double ended chambers would be countered by the time to flush the action and ejector rod systems to ensure there's no water in it compared to the fussing to clean the blind ended chambers and cap nipples in the C&B revolver. So in the end I suspect the time to clean either would end up about the same.

[Cosmoline]

I'd say this:

--Use a stainless revolver to ease cleanup
--Clean with boiling water poured down from the receiver through the barrel and using a funnel through each cylinder. Promptly oil and finish from there
--Load with a drop tube and get the proper ramming die
--Read up from a good BP Cartridge Loading manual.
--Use 2F or 1 1/2 F, why go with a substitute?
--Use BP friendly lube on your cast bullets
--Use magnum primers

That about covers the basics. No reason it can't be done with the rounds you mention. The .500 S&W will effectively become a .50-70, which is a very fun round.

[BCRider]

The .500 S&W will effectively become a .50-70, which is a very fun round.....

Sorry, there's simply not enough case volume. It'll be more like a .50-45 or at best a .50-50. I know because the idea of BP occured to me quite a few months back and I checked it out.

[fishblade2]

Bc Rider: you spoke on using a product called Ed's red flush because it contained a small amount of oil in it. Could I use ballistol here for the same purpose or would it contain too much extra oil? Lastly I don't have an air compressor beside a small one for my bike tires. Would this work? If not then what exactly should I do as an alternative? Thanks for the help!

[Old Fuff]

In 1889 Colt introduced it's first double-action/hand ejector revolver. By 1896 Smith & Wesson started with a little .32, and in 1899 they cataloged the first Military & Police models (Now called the model 10).

These revolvers were more often then not loaded with black powder ammunition, and suffered no serious consequences because of it. Usually the shooter would clean the bore and chambers, and them wipe off exterior surfaces that showed signs of being coated with fouling. Occasionally they might remove the cylinder assembly by removing one screw, pull the crane forward, and wipe the tube (called a barrel or arbor) on which the cylinder revolved.

Frankly, I think the cleaning issue is being overstated, unless you plan to just experiment and then quit.

[BCRider]

Bc Rider: you spoke on using a product called Ed's red flush because it contained a small amount of oil in it. Could I use ballistol here for the same purpose or would it contain too much extra oil? Lastly I don't have an air compressor beside a small one for my bike tires. Would this work? If not then what exactly should I do as an alternative? Thanks for the help!

The recipe for the Ed's mix is a simple google away. And I can make up a gallon of Ed's for what a single spray can of Ballistol costs. So I tend to reserve my Ballistol for the final barrel and cylinder wipedowns on my BP guns since the Ballistol is truly BP friendly when you shoot it next time.

But if you really must use Ballistol for the internals you could use it by mixing in some Ballistol with some mineral spirits. The spirits would evaporate and leave a thin film of Ballistol same as with the Ed's mix. Mineral spirits is also found as "low odor paint thinner" which is used for oil base varnishes and house paint thinning. I'd suggest a mix of about 4 or 5 parts thinner to one part Ballistol. Using a small plastic bottle that has a small hole in the end suck up some of this mix and use it to squirt and flush out any water that is in the action through the spring opening where the grips normally are and through the bolt and down the hammer opening and such.

Since you don't have any compressed air simply prop it up and allow to drain dry for a hour or so. During that time the mineral spirits will mostly or fully evaporate away as well. Wipe off the outer frame of any excess and replace the grips.

An even lower "low odor" option with Ballistol is to mix some with water to make up "Moose Milk". Ballistol in water forms an emulsion which is milky white. The mix is about 6 to7 parts water to one part Ballistol. Shake well, then squirt the milky mixture in through the action. Collect the drain out to use again and again. Now the only thing with this method is that it'll take somewhat longer for the "solvent" (the water) to fully dry. Prop up the gun with grips still off to drain into a shallow dish to collect the oil and stick a table top halogen lamp close by to warm the gun and encourage the water to dry away and leave the Ballistol behind. Or even better is to set a hair dryer on low heat and airflow blowing into the mainspring opening again to encourage the Moose Milk to give up its water content. I'd suggest you leave it running for about a hour if you do it this way. Or in the case of the halogen table lamp leave it drying for a good two hours.

If you're an apartment sort or simply don't want to play with the smell and toxicity of the mineral spirits this Ballistol Moose Milk option has a lot to recomend it. It will be just as effective as the Ed's Red mix at both flushing out any washing water while leaving behind a film of oil for both protection and lubrication. The only downside is that it takes longer to ensure it is fully dry as the water doesn't want to evaporate as fast as the solvent option. But if the pivots still have a little moisture in them you don't need to panic. The oil being emulsified in with the water will both lubricate and protect the metal until the last traces of any moisture are fully gone.

[MCgunner]

If I remember right does any gun that can fire modern powder fire black powder as well?

Sure, at least once. BP requires large case capacity. This is why it seems a bit weird to load 2.7 grains Bullseye in a .38 case. I love my cap and ball guns for BP, leave my smokeless guns, even my .45 Colt, to smokeless. Just me, though. Lots of folks shoot BP in cartridges, especially classic BP cartridges. Clean up must be thorough and an auto may gum up pretty fast even if it is set up to function.

[Cosmoline]

Sorry, there's simply not enough case volume.

There isn't enough case volume in a .50-70 for 70 grains, either. You have compress it quite a bit to get a slug to fit. I'm not sure how much you could reasonably get into a .500 S&W case, but it could be upwards of 60 grains of 2F I expect. With a long drop tube and a compression die.

[MCgunner]

If you just want smoke in an autoloader, 777 has significantly more power, especially compressed, than does black or other subs. It's also easier to clean up, less gum, but it is quite corrosive, too.

[PRM]

I vote for the real thing. Been shooting black powder cartridges for over 20 years not. Clean up is not that bad. Hot water pretty well does the trick. Just make sure you dry and lubricate afterwards. Its pretty corrosive, BP is not something you fail to clean up after shooting. But, then I always clean my guns after I go to the range.

So far I have reloaded and shot .44 Russian, .45LC, .38 S&W and .38 Special.

Better than the 4th of July.

[BCRider]

I'm not sure how much you could reasonably get into a .500 S&W case, but it could be upwards of 60 grains of 2F I expect. With a long drop tube and a compression die.


Once again, the .500 isn't as rosy as some might think. The amount of black it held from my testing was 45 to 47 gns when I tapped it against the counter to settle it to where it would then take a bullet. With some compression this may go as high as 55gns but I doubt it. More likely a reasonable moderate compression load with a 350gn bullet sitting on top of it would be more like 50 to 53 gns. And I'd bet at more like 50 if I were a betting man.

At that load the performance would be somewhat underwhelming I'm afraid.

Once I get some more bullets I'm going to load up a few and try it just for giggles.

[fishblade2]

Another question that just crossed my mind is if I'm shooting black powder out of these casings and the power is weaker than smokeless, should I get lighter bullets? Also when it was mentioned that bullets have lube on them that is not liked by BP, does that go for full metal jacketed bullets or just lead bullets? If so how do you lube the full metal jacketed bullets? I know that most cast bullets have grooves that will allow pan lube to work by filling these grooves but I don't ever remember seeing a full metal jacket bullet having these.

[BCRider]

Well... lighter bullets are also often a little shorter as well. So they would allow a little more powder in the casings.

Jacketed bullets use the copper jacket as a self lubricating layer so they don't really need anything else. How they'll work with the fouling left by BP I don't know.

If you go with cast bullets I'd suggest boil out the existing lube and go with one of the various recipes for BP lube such as used in black powder cartridge rifle rounds. Google for "black powder bullet lube for a variety of recipes.

Since you're obviously doing this for fun and the shock value of the big clouds of smoke I wouldn't really worry too much about the bullet weight. But it would be worth sticking with one of the lighter options for the chosen caliber.

Ya know... this would all be a lot easier if you simply went and bought a cap and ball revolver... :D