about smokless....and c@b's

[1858rem]

does it really seem that way? i have been told that so many times its not even funny anymore. i truly amaze most anybody i meet with what i know and do.

 

[scrat]

you know whats crazy is most of us are the same way thats what make us who we are. Get a bunch of black powder relics together they are all very good with their toys and have all sorts of ideas and have tried just about anything you can think of. Thats what makes bp shooters different. Bp shooters and reloader have a lot in common. Its really easy to get someone who reloads ammo and turn them onto black powder. For people that have never reloaded and are cautious about it. You would never see them shooting black powder.

 

[4v50 Gary]

1858rem - I'm with pohill on your course of study. I hope you're in engineering and take some metallurgy. You'll learn the tensile strength of them and if you can combine that with industrial applications, it can take you places. Some chemistry would also be useful to you. No one wants to see another enthusiast hurt. It also hurts the hobby when legislators call for more legislations to curb our activities.

There's a lot of very knowledgeable guys on this board and you would do well to heed their advice. It was paid for by experience and I stand in awe of their wisdom.

 

[arcticap]

btw whats a OP?

"original post"

 

[mausgun]

Now ideally by theory if you have two round balls coming out of the same chamber same barrel at the same time from the same charge. They should go through the same hole. However that was not the case. It was inconsistant. To the point that differenty chambers in the cylinders would give different results. Same time every throw of the hammer would put the balls 1/4 of an inch apart or even more.

I believe Recoil is at work here. The second ball exits after the first but the barrel is in recoil and slightly above the position for the exit of the first ball. Depending on the shooter's grip, some horizontal displacement can be seen as well as vertical displacement of the POI. Change in POI between chambers is probably normal group dispersion.

However... YMMV

 

[scrat]

makes sense but it all depends on the gun and the load. When you pull the trigger. the bullet should have left the barrel theoredically before you heard it or before you even felt the recoil

 

[mausgun]

Recoil begins at shotstart. While the bullet is still in the barrel, apparent recoil before bullet crowning is the effect of the force on the gun caused by mass centroid remaining constant (inertia) while mass distribution (bullet position) changes. After crowning, recoil is mainly reaction mass force (rocket effect): same principal, but now outside the barrel.

Upshot: Recoil starts when the ball starts to move. The sense of "felt" recoil happens well after shot crowning because of sensory delay. Actual effect of recoil on POI happens in the few milliseconds of barrel travel resulting in a small but significant motion of the muzzle. Felt recoil is more from external effects of reaction mass (jet). No matter how the gun is loaded or held by hand, all shot sequentially exiting the muzzle will see different impact points.

Clamp the gun in a heavy vice and the balls may well hit the same hole. 'Course, one could always stick the muzzle right on the target...

 

[Zedo]

The fundamental problem with "catastrophic failures" in firearms -- besides the fact that they're catastrophic -- is that they typically occur without warning.

"Black Powder Only" is clearly marked on the gun. There's a reason for that, and it has to do with complex parameters like pressure spikes and ignition profiles in black powder / smokeless, metalurgy, SAAMI specs, engineering, and SAFETY.

Catastrophic failure in a firearm is usually preceded by absolutely no warning whatever that the steel is going to fail.

"BLACK POWER ONLY" -- It means what it says.

 

[1858rem]

out of 12 loads of 2 rb in the same cylinder they consistently hit about 3/8-1/2 in apart....one on top of the other. i had heard that recoil actually starts after the bullet leaves the barrel, maybe thats just felt recoil cause of sensory delay like mausgun said.

 

[4v50 Gary]

Recoil begins as soon as the bullet begins moving. Remember Newton?

 

[1858rem]

ya, i don't think he would ever get along with the westerns and people flying backwards from getting hit by pistol bullets lol

 

[1858rem]

what about a duplex load of smokeless and bp.... and this time in a cartridge gun lol, bp to fill the case with a reduced smokeless load for cleaner burn maybe, or is this still a bad idea. i was not sure if you loaded the smokeless in first then the bp on top, would the smokeless powder burn up the bp residue as it follows behind the bp gases?

 

[Smokin_Gun]

you're on my prayer list! For real!!!

SG

 

[1858rem]

oh! i totally forgot it is very clearly stated NOT to do this lol

 

[Smokin_Gun]

A duplex load is used by long rifle shooters, ffffg BP in a small amount and then ffg BP charge atop it...you do have a computer so I'd suggest you do some Google research.
Glad to hear from you,will be worried when I don't.

Shoot smart and safe you can go blind from doing other things too you know.

SG

 

[WARDER]

smokin gun's right ,get of that track before it comes to a DEAD end

 

[mgregg85]

Don't use smokeless powder in a C&B revolver, period.

 

[J.T. Gerrity]

To repeat, in case you missed it: NEVER USE SMOKELESS POWDER IN A BP GUN, PERIOD!

 

[Tomahawk674]

Impressive pic. I wonder if the shooter was hurt...

 

[1858rem]

look at the pitting and rust on that cylinder and around the nipples, maybe was an old original or badly taken care of? do you know if it was smokeless or bp that blew the walls out? crazy look at reality anyhow

 

[Smokin_Gun]

1858Rem you can pack the chamber tight with a ball in each if you could set them all off and once it would hurt the cylinder a bit.
10-20 grains of Bullseye will blow a cylinder on ya. The porosities you see in that pic are what the metal is made of you trust that metal to shoot say 9 gr of unique...It's your face and hands or the person next to you.

SG

 

[Jamie C.]

There's something else you need to be aware of, 1858Rem... stress is cumulative in steel and other metals.

What this means is that you can fire an over-charge in a pistol's chambers a given number of times and not see any damage, but later on have the gun blow up with a much lesser charge.

In other words, a person could fire off several shots of smokeless powder in a BP gun, and not see any evidence of damage, but then turn around and fire a normal BP charge and have the cylinder end up looking like the pic J.T. Gerrity posted. That person might be inclined to blame the black powder, since obviously the gun survived the smokeless powder without any harm.

But the fact is, the BP only finished what the smokeless started. The problem being, it would've taken magnafluxing or something else of the like to detect those microscopic cracks and fissures that were building up in the chamber walls.

Do a Google search on "magnafluxing" and "Metal fatigue" for more information on this stuff. It might be a real eye-opener for you, on what you can really expect out of a piece of steel.

It might also tell you why some of us expect you to blow yourself up someday soon.


J.C.

 

[J.T. Gerrity]

look at the pitting and rust on that cylinder and around the nipples, maybe was an old original or badly taken care of?

This happened many years ago, and the remains of this cylinder has been through many hands since then; thus the pitted and rusted condition (amazingly enough, no one bothered to keep it properly oiled...). This is the result of using smokeless powder in a BP cylinder (and a possible chain-fire). Fortunately no one was hurt when it let go. Never use smokeless in a BP gun of any type.

 

[1858rem]

i was wondering about the way it looked like it might have chain fired, but smokeless would be even harder than smokeless to ignite, especially a chain fire, maybe it was like Jamie C. said about the bp finishing what the smokeless started? maybe a chain fire with bp did the trick after being used with smokeless? but the force of the smokeless probably just blew the whole side off i guess would be more likely. i understand the stresses are cumulative, i did this before i got a pair of spare cylinders, the one that originally came with the gun had one nipple sized from the start, i broke several nipple wrenches trying to undo it before i first fired the gun but nothing worked. also when i first got the gun, i somehow scarred the metal all the way around the cylinder between the lock stud groves, so i decided to start over with a fresh cylinder. now i still have the same gun but two brand new cylinders to use with it, i have the third put up and loaded with #4 shot and about 17g and a wad on top and bottom, just in case of a possum or something after the chickens at night lol now i have wondered about proofing guns for a long time..... wouldn't putting such a heavy load damage the gun some? i don't know exactly how it is tested but i thought it was like a 125-150% load for bp guns anyhow. and i had also read of ruger proofing with full loads of red dot.... they might be strong but wouldn't that still really be bad? and im done shooting anny smokeless in capand ball revolvers too, way bad idea on my part an i guess im pretty lucky, still cant spare a dollar for a lottery ticket though lol

 

[J.T. Gerrity]

This occured while using smokeless. The blast came so fast and was so loud that no one was really sure exactly what happened, but the general consensus was that a chain-fire did cause the extent of the damage. You've been given precautions about this; that's all we can do. One of the purposes of this (and any) forum is for education. It's up to you whether to take the advice offered or not. If you want to shoot smokeless, get a conversion cylinder, or a SAA proofed for smokeless powder. Trying to use SP in a BP gun is a sure-fired (pun intended) road to catastrophy.