Hey all. I pulled a bunch of herters 7.62x39 bullets to reload in brass. I kept the powder and I was wondering if it would be a good idea to reload it or dump it. I have no idea what kind of powder it is or how many grains were used. Whats the general feeling about using unknown powder?
Anything you choose to do is strictly at your own risk. That being said, I have pulled down some old ammunition of like year of production, bullet weight and manufacturer. I then used my experience, the average charge weight of the loaded ammunition, and known loads in the same caliber and bullet weight to work up gradually to a safe and effective load. You do you. If you don't know the original charge weight, you may be S.O.L.
I have refused powder but you missed the critical information. I measure every round and just make sure their all exactly the same using an average of what came out using the exact same components. If you change anything use a new known powder. Some factories have low quality controls so I fix the variance with higher precision.
If you weighed the charges as they were dumped from the cases you have a starting point. I did this with some ComBloc 7.62X54R ammo I pulled down. I weighed 5 cases worth of powder as I pulled the bullets. I noticed gross disparity. I then added all my weights and divided by 5 to get average. The powder is similar in appearance to 4895 of some sort. I used the average of the 5 cases and reduced it by a grain or 2 and loaded the bullets in brass cases with non corrosive primers.
Only if I was the one who loaded the ammo in the first place. Mystery ammo/bullets get dumped in the yard.
The safe thing to do is dispose of it. I started typing other ideas, but then reread my first sentence. I guess my first thought was my best thought.
Did you by chance weigh a few charges to get the average weight. That, the bullet weight, and the caliber would give you a good start on figuring out what it may be useful for. With that info, and a solid background in reloading, it could be used. It could also get you in trouble.
I would have no issue using the powder for 7.62x39 loads using the same bullet weight and averaging out a charge from 10 you pulled. However if you didn’t keep track of what the factory charges weighed at, it is no longer relevant. Dump it in the roses. Smells like cat urine anyway most likely.
I have done the same, with the same cartridge, except 10 rounds instead of 5. I had very good results.
I have 5 reloading manuals. Just for grins, I checked them all and none of them have a recipe for unknown powder. Just saying.
In the past I have weighed the propellant in a good sample of ammo that I have dissasembled and reloaded the same weight bullet back again with good results. That is a risk I am willing to take. One time I was doing this and taking the average of every ten'th one. Then I noticed two different types of propellant in the pile. Now I dump every one into a dish and inspect first. That bunch got spread on the roses. I buy and use pull down propellant from various vendors when available to save cost of reloads.
The man said he had no idea what kind of powder it was or how many grains. How you going to work up a load with that information?
Why don't you know that? Did you really forget to measure? It's not uncommon to pull and reuse some components, replacing whichever (bullet, case, powder) caused your problem. Without knowing the original charge. . . where do you start? I would work up a charge starting at 50% case fill, but then again I would know what the factory charge was and start -10% from there.
You use an unknown powder ever time you use factory ammo. If you pull and reload an unknown powder to the same (or slightly lower) charge, with the same (or lighter) bullet, you're taking no remarkable risk. You do in fact know everything you need to know about the powder. . . just call it George.
This. I don't know why this is so hard for many people to understand. I've mostly stopped posting about doing this style of handloading, because most of the responses are some variation of "OMG ! You are going to DIE or be MAIMED in a CATASTROPHIC EXPLOSION!!!!" To each his own I suppose. And it is a fairly advanced technique. If one is not comfortable doing this, by all means please don't.
