Powder identification help please....

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WaywardSon

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Need a bit of help here, probably from the old timers:)

Powder is 700X

I have a 1 lb. can that I bought in 1991...it is a known quantity. Sticker is still on it & I have used it a bit over the years. If you pour it out and look at it, there are a few yellow granules scattered about, similar to the "dot" powders...as in Red, Blue & Green. I bought it new.

Bought another 1 lb. can today. The store I bought it from got it with a truck load of stuff from another gun shop that went out of business...they bought their inventory. Opened it and there was no seal...can seemed very full but only weighs about 14.4 oz. including the can. I suspect it is older than my "control" can above. The granules in this powder are slightly darker and have no yellow granules mixed in. Did 700X change in this respect over the years?

I am using the term granules to describe this powder...both are actually more like flakes, but appear identical other than a bit of difference in the overall color and the presence of the yellow particles in one batch.

So...what to do? Keep it and load it...pitch it? Who is familiar with 700X over the years? Have the yellow granules been eliminated?
 
Smell the one with the yellow granules. If it really stinks like caustic chemicals then it has spoiled. Also, it will look very dusty.
 
700X usually light grey spherical disks

There is usually no yellow in any I've seen. I have worked with very old 700X and it seems pretty much the same. It can be different grades of grey color. Some of it has bends in the wafers, and some old 700X I have has aggregates of the wafers, or little chunks once in awhile. It is light and doesn't fill things up much for the weight of the charge. After Bullseye it is fastest powder or close to it.
 
If it was me.

I would try just a few rounds with a starting load. I would not jump in with that yellow dot can with the same mid-range or hotter load you have been using with the 1991 source of 700X. The strength of these powders can change lot # to lot # especially over decades.

The powder 800X is darker and has much larger discs, does not flow well.

I cannot think of any yellow dot powders.
 
Well, this is strange. The powder with the yellow dots mixed in (about the same proportion as the colored flakes in Red Dot, Blue Dot or Green Dot) is the powder that I am confident in. I bought it new in 1991...and while I obviously have not used it much, I have loaded it using published data for 700X with good results.

I think I'll contact the manufacturer and see if they can shed any light on the yellow flakes. I am not going to load any powder unless I am confident as to what it is.

Thanks for the input.
 
Any powder I received with no factory seal would be fertilizer unless it came from an utmost trusted friend with an explanation.
 
I also have 5 of the large square metal 700-X containers with the metal snap on cap with yellow and black labels and the two I have opened so far have had the yellow flakes in them. This is NOT a sign of bad propellant. They both have tracked with the published data exactly as best I can determine. They are from the late 70's and were factory sealed when I got them. You should ALWAYS use starting data when changing lots or developing loads whether the propellant is old or just manufactured for safety's sake. FWIW I have not needed to purchase any new 700-X for a long time so do not know what it looks like these days either.

ETA the "dot" propellants are bulkier than the extruded and ball so the containers are not a full pound and are labeled as such--My large can of Blue Dot is not 5 LBS, only 4 LBS. Same thing with the International Clays can I have.
 
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WaywardSon,
As a side note, I would probably try to return the can of 700X you bought that had no seal and was not full. Since that can came from another store and was not under the control of your shop dealer it might have been opened already. (and probably was if there's no seal)
 
@FROG0207....Thanks for confirming the presence of the yellow flakes. Both of these are in the yellow & black metal can..and appear to be the same except that the one I picked up yesterday does not have the yellow flakes. I became suspicious of this powder mainly because it had no seal and appeared to be more full than normal. That said, can and all it weighs less than 15 oz.

@ArchAngelCD...Returning the powder is not an issue & I may do that yet.

FWIW the only thing I have ever used 700X for is reduced loads in rifle calibers...mostly .243 with cast bullets. If memory serves it was about 14 gr. under a 75 gr. bullet. Very mild and extremely accurate. But at the end of the day, just something fun to play with.

Still curious if the manufacturer dropped the yellow flakes as an indicator at a later date. Both of my samples are pretty old.
 
Gunpowder is normally a yellow-white color, the silvery-grey-black color is because of graphite powder that is applied as a flash retarder and to make it flow better. I've seen the occaisional off color speck but if there is any quanitity of it I would be suspect.
 
700-X has always had less weight in a can than other powders. Back in the days of metal cans, 700-X cans only had 1/2 pound not one pound. At the time Dupont did not want a special sized can for just one powder.

The current plastic containers are larger than the old IMR metal cans and they could fit a bit more powder in them, 14 oz of 700-X instead of 8 oz.

I've used 700-X since the early eighties and still think of a container as a "pound" of powder.
 
I just loaded some cartridges this evening with 700-X circa 2009 and it had yellow flakes in it.

While some powders have what seems like identifiers in it, I never paid attention to them. If the powder gets away from its original container, I consider it fertilizer.
 
My metal 5 Lb can of 700X has yellow flakes. Bought in the late 80s. The first 700X I bought was in a paper bag, and I do not remember if it had yellow flakes or not.
 
Well at one time they talked about putting sometime in all gun powder so that the GOVERNMENT could tell what powder and where it came from after it was fired! I do not know if it was ever done. This was in the 70.
 
Just got an 8# black plastic jug of 700x. well about 4 months ago, and it has the yellow flakes in it. I use it for .45acp. At the time it was the only powder available for loading .45acp. couldn't tell you how old it is, smells good, shoots real good.

be safe
 
Ive got some 800x (recently), it has the little yellow granules. Dont know if that helps at all, I didnt read the posts above yet.
 
From what I have seen both of the "Hi-Skor" powders (700-X and 800-X) have little yellowish /beige flakes. The overall size of 800-X kernels is larger.

In win243xb's photo above, the yellow flakes are noticeable in the 800-X sample, not so much with 700-X. Not sure if it is just the photo.
 
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