Can one powder be used for both rifle and handgun?

[akodo]

You don't have to worry about me going off and blowing my hands off trying this. This is theory only.

Is there any powder that is multi-use enough that you could make it work in a centerfire rifle and a handgun?

I suppose if you back up all the way to blackpowder era, you could have a 45 LC revolver, and all sorts of black powder rifles. My understanding is the 303 Brit was originally a blackpowder cartridge. So I suppose in a pinch if you had enough black powder or black powder substitute you could use it for either the 45 LC or the 303. While 38 special wasn't designed as a blackpowder cartridge, a lot of it's direct predecessors were and I expect it would work fine too.

I know the 44-40 was first a rifle cartridge, blackpowder era, and then a revolver cartridge second (not really many period lever guns actually available in 45 LC, if you wanted matching handgun and carbine, you went 44-40 or 38-40) but that later 44-40 was loaded with some of the more potent smokeless powder for rifle use only and no surprise it greatly improved the performance of the round. Would the reverse be true? While the 30-30 was designed to be a smokeless powder cartridge, could you load it with black powder instead and expect performance in the 32 Long neighborhood?

Aside from black powder, could you make that 30-30 case work with any powder that might be more common in a 38 special, 9mm or something (most likely at reduced effectiveness)? And are there any rifle powders that in a pinch, you could concoct an amount that would work in a handgun? For now let's say revolver so you don't have to worry about the timing of the action. Could you take a small amount of any powder used for 30-30 or 30-06 and put it in a 38 special case, maybe add some sawdust as you'd probably not come anywhere close to filling the case, seat the bullet, then be able to fire it in a strong revolver without blowing your fingers off?

 

[Panzerschwein]

while 38 special wasn't designed as a blackpowder cartridge

Wrong.

 

[Tommygunn]

From what I understand, back in the years immediatly after the .30-30 was developed, people often reloaded it with blackpowder since it was often what they had available. It worked but it was not as satisfactory as the smokeless propellent that it was supposed to use.

Cooldill is right about .38Sp; if I remember correctly it was originally introduced with a 22½ grain load of black powder.

 

[buck460XVR]

Is there any powder that is multi-use enough that you could make it work in a centerfire rifle and a handgun?

TrailBoss

 

[Arizona_Mike]

The .30-30's fast (for the time) twist rate of 1:12" fouled badly with black powder. Early jacketed bullets were also noticeably less accurate due to core-jacked concentrically variability. The .32 Winchester Special was a necked up .30-30 with 1:16" twist intended to be sold to Westerners as a jacketed smokeless round but reloadable as a lead black powder round. The .32-40 Ballard was the most accurate black powder round of the day and the .32 bullets had a reputation for accuracy. It also offered a bit more punch for heavy game. It should have been a commercial success but smokeless powder took over much faster that thought.

Mike

 

[suemarkp]

Unique and trail Boss are the two most common I know of for reduced loads in rifle cases. Unique seems to have a load that works in everything.

 

[627PCFan]

IMR-4227 I think but I wouldn't bet my fingers on it.

 

[buck460XVR]

IMR-4227 I think but I wouldn't bet my fingers on it.

While IMR4227 does work for both rifle and handgun loads, I don't know how appropriate it would be for small capacity auto rounds like .380, 9mm or even .45ACP. According to IMR, virtually any cartridge can be safely loaded with Trailboss.

 

[Jackal]

Doomsday scenario reloading is kinda bogus anyway. If circumstances are that bad, you likely wont have time/right situation to spend reloading ammo. If circumstances arent that dire, factories will continue to produce ammo. Seems easier to stock up on common rounds, its not like its going to go bad in our lifetime.

I youre looking at a non violent long term survival scenario, black powder properly stored and a couple hundred pounds of lead/molds/pot would work. BP revolver and rifles are cheap.

 

[Haxby]

30-30 and 38 Special. Unique, Universal, Blue Dot, 2400, 4227.

 

[akodo]

thanks for the info guys

 

[MachIVshooter]

Nothing I can think of that would be flexible enough to cover everything from .380 or 9mm up to magnum rifle rounds.

One would be much better off selecting a very flexible medium-fast burn rate handgun powder (unless you don't shoot anything less powerful than .357 magnum) and a medium burn rate rifle powder. I'd probably go with Unique for pistols and IMR 4895 for rifles. 4895 can be made to work well in a huge range of rifle rounds. A little slow for .223 & the like, and a tad fast for big boomers with 80+ gr. capacities, so will not give optimal performance on the extreme ends of the spectrum, but is the most flexible rifle powder I can think of.

 

[X-Rap]

Better to keep at least a half dozen powders laid in in decent quantities to fill voids in supply.
I'd also take the time upfront to do your load development so you aren't making noise and burning up a rare commodity in lean times.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

 

[PapaG]

Unique. 30-30 was not intended to be reloaded with bp. 32 Special was factory loaded with smokeless and intended for bp reloading. In the beginning, most manufacturers discouraged reloading with smokeless.

 

[ArchAngelCD]

Unique and trail Boss are the two most common I know of for reduced loads in rifle cases. Unique seems to have a load that works in everything.

Just a note, there are and were other very popular and common powders.

2400 was used a lot for rifle cases when lead bullets were the only bullets available. As a matter of fact when 2400 was first introduced it was labels 2400 Rifle Powder.

The recently discontinued IMR4759 is extremely popular for reduced rifle loads, lead bullet rifle loads and I used it a lot in the 45-70.

IMO there is no one powder that you can use for all handgun and rifle applications and do either acceptable well. If you are only loading the 45-70 and the .357 Magnum or hot 45 Colt ammo you can use 2400. Other than that it would be really tough to do one powder. One powder for rifles and one for handguns is totally different and doable.

 

[Bama Drifter]

Someone else beat me to Trail Boss. Even it is more for softball rifle loads and isn't economical for bulk production. Just my $0.02

Sent from my HUAWEI G620-A2 using Tapatalk

 

[Grumulkin]

Blue Dot can be used in a variety of pistol, shotgun and rifle loads.

 

[Steve C]

Handgun/shotgun powders are commonly used with cast bullets in most center fire rifles as cast bullets are not driven to the velocities that jacketed bullets are capable of. You can find data for such loads in Lymans manuals for cast bullets.

Cast bullets are usually used for target and small game shooting but are capable of killing larger game too.

 

[Skinnedknuckles]

A lot of good information can be found here http://www.gmdr.com/lever/lowveldata.htm and here http://www.gmdr.com/lever/lowveldata.htm on the subject of handgun powders in rifle cartridges.

Good luck.

 

[Barrelgal]

To answer your question, it would depend on the cartridge and powder chosen. But there's still a lot more to it that would need to be taken into consideration. For example, if someone tried to push a 165 gr. jacketed bullet from a 30-06 at 2800 fps. with a super slow burning magnum wheel gun powder such as H110, I think the rifle would get reduced to pieces. I'm sure there's someone here who can provide you with a more professional depiction in this area than I can, that's an extreme example I tossed out there.

First of all, if we were looking at using a powder for say 38 spcl that would function in say 30-06, from a practical approach we would want to use a powder that is fast enough burning for 38 spcl, with charges and bullets that would function safely in the 30-06. This would maybe be best accomplished by using super reduced handgun powder charges for the 30-06 with non jacketed lead projectiles. Folks use these type of reduced plinking loads quite often in high power rifles, there is existing published data available. I've used these type loads for fire lapping high powered rifle barrels on occasion. The down side is that you likely will not get typical velocities or accuracy potential on the bottle neck application, but the handgun cartridge could produce very typical / average pressures and velocities in the handgun cartridge.

OTOH and IMO a rifle powder that will function in a handgun, that's a tough one. Rifle powders are designed for bottle neck cartridges, so if loaded in a straight wall case they would behave very differently, probably unpredictably, they may not even ignite, and if they do the might not develop enough pressure to push the bullet out of the barrel.

My recommendation would be to research reduced loads for the bottle neck cartridge you're interested in doing this with. Cross reference the handgun powder with powders for the reduced rifle loads. I have a bunch of those loads in my library, so if you need some data let me know and I'll see what I can do. I do however warn that it's never a good or safe practice to use data from someone on the internet without verifying it with a published source. I'm not implying that someone here would deliberately try to blow your guns up, but typo's are always a concern.

BG

 

[Grumulkin]

I've used these type loads for fire lapping high powered rifle barrels on occasion. The down side is that you likely will not get typical velocities or accuracy potential on the bottle neck application, but the handgun cartridge could produce very typical / average pressures and velocities in the handgun cartridge.

OTOH and IMO a rifle powder that will function in a handgun, that's a tough one. Rifle powders are designed for bottle neck cartridges, so if loaded in a straight wall case they would behave very differently, probably unpredictably, they may not even ignite, and if they do the might not develop enough pressure to push the bullet out of the barrel.

In reference to Blue Dot:

In a bottle necked cartridge you will not get the velocity you'd get with a rifle powder but accuracy can be pretty good even with a jacketed bullet.

Regarding rifle powders in pistol cases:

The big problem is getting enough powder in the case to develop enough pressure for complete powder burning. At least in the cartridge I tried it in, accuracy wasn't bad though.

 

[jmorris]

Trailboss is good for reduced loads in rifles.

If you pick a rifle round like 458 socom, 300 blk and others that use magnum pistol powders, well you can also use magnum pistol powders.


Even if you go with BP like making your own you will still grade it differently for pistol or rifle for ideal results.

 

[lpsharp88]

Hodgdon has data for TiteGroup for 223 rifle. 3.1gr max load for MV around 1k

 

[dragon813gt]

Red Dot works for reduced rifle loads. But 2400 is a better option for rifle loads. But it's a magnum handgun powder so it's not suitable for all. W231/HP-38 can be used in rifles as well. Don't expect to find published loads for it. But they call it load development for a reason.

You aren't going to get full performance w/ this type of loading. But of you're shooting cast in rifles than 2400 will get you the velocity you need. Just don't expect jacketed velocity.

 

[Blue68f100]

All depends on the calibers. W296/H110 is the preferred powder for 357Mag and 44mag, full house loads. It's also one of the best powders for the 458 SOCOM.