Is there a powder......

Greetings
I have shot Unique in every rifle and pistol I own to include AR's.
That is possibly why it is called Unique... Any gun any time.
Mike in ILL

Unique comes a close as anything else.

It will give plinking to near magnum performance in most handgun calibers.

And usable performance with cast lead bullets in most rifle calibers.
It cannot begin to match full power rifle powder loads however.

No one powder can do all that.

rc

As other posts have said..Unique..and some of the faster pistol powders if we are talking cast-bullets...and of course the forerunner of all...and worked fine in just about any firearm..good o'l Holy Black!

Unique, or Universal Clays, will work in most any handgun and many shotguns. Don't know about rifles though. In many rifles you can get away with a reduced load (look for "The Load" on the web) with some shotgun powders, but not sure how useful that would be.

You answered your own question, Universal. Does the same thing Unique does while being cleaner and easier to meter. Don't expect optimal performance in most cartridges. But it will give passable performance.


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Not and get anywhere close to standard ballistics.

Of course if you like .44-40 and .45-70 or similar, FFg works real well in both.

There are some pretty versatile powders, like those mentioned above. But my experience is like Walkalong's. So I've settled on some powders that are reasonably good across my main rifle calibers (.308, .223), and some powders that work in my main pistol calibers (.45, 9mm). I have only 12 gauge shotguns, but ended up using Clays in them. It also worked in my .45 ACP reasonably well.

I mostly do shot/medium range, informal target shooting now. So my needs are not geared toward maximum loads. The kind of shooting you do will probably determine your loads and limit the usefulness of some powder, primer, bullet combinations.

Take a peek at some online data sheets for companies like Alliant or Hogdon, and examine the data in a good reloading manual. Experimentation can be a lot of fun.

That's the concept at work in the design of cars like the Honda Accord or Toyota Camry: adequate for nearly anything, optimal for nothing.

I've got no beef against these cars and have owned several Accords over the years. I can't afford a different car for every sort of trip I take, but in the case of a smokeless powder, at roughly $20/lb, I'll keep using powders that are optimal for the cartridge they're going into.

Just as there is no one gun that gives optimum performance for every scenario, neither is there a powder capable of doing the same

With both pistols and rifles you can usually get away with one powder for each, not both, as long as you stay away from the magnums. With pistol you can still do it but not at peak performance. Unique, Universal and AA#5 for pistol, IMR 4895 for rifle.

I bet there are other shotgun/handgun powders that would work as well or better than Unique in rifle cartridges but are unknown. Unique is a very old powder and was used with lead bullets in cartridges like the 30-30 way back when. By the time newer powders came along there were also dedicated rifle powders which gave much better performance so there was no reason for reloaders to try the newer pistol powders in rifle loads.

It the same thing when asking about powders for the 45 Colt. Many reloaders will swear Unique is the best powder for the job but I feel they think so because back when the 45 Colt went smokeless powder Unique was the only choice you had. While Unique does do a very good job in the 45 Colt I have found a hand full of powders I feel deliver better performance. (HS-6 is one of them)

I would love to hear the AR unique load... I don't have that one yet


HS-6 is one of those hidden wonders for 44 mag as well, for those who haven't given it a try- I suggest it !

Its another one of those twofers for me- 12 ga autoloaders or power slugs, and 44 mag across the board. Very handy, that hs-6.

HS-6 is one of those hidden wonders for 44 mag as well, for those who haven't given it a try- I suggest it !

Click to expand...

How does HS-6 meter? Looks like low charge weights for the performance.

7075-T7 said:

How does HS-6 meter? Looks like low charge weights for the performance.

Click to expand...

HS-6 is a Ball Powder so it meters like water...

Yep.

I just started loading 300AAC Blackout over the past few weeks and discovered H110!! This looks like a canidate for the position but is a very new powder to me - good for AR, Blackout/Whisper and pistol loads.

I would be skeptical of loading h110 to 30 cal high power requirements.

That case fill/ sensitivity problem could be immense.

I don't think I'd like a 30-06 or 308 case filled to 90-95% capacity with h110 and a magnum rifle primer...... Specifically, I don't want little pieces of rifle.

Trailboss supposedly works in just about any handgun or rifle cartridge.

I just looked at the reloading data for H110 for the Blackout. It looks like Hodgdon didn't finish the testing. I guess the blackout case is comparable to a 357 case in size. I don't want to do the math right now. I don't think I'd attempt to use it as there are known issues with it.


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H110 is NOT suitable for .308 or 30.06 but is one of the most widley used powders for Whisper/Blackout. It is also not suitable for .223 as I earlier stated but interestingly Accurated lists some .223 loads with Clays.