Looking at a 200yd BP IS target from the 2013 Ia. BP state shoot. This was only five shots, but the group is .823; made with a CPA 32/40.
Bob

All of us have shot or seen others shoot some very small groups now and then, BP and/or nitro, at hundreds of meters/yards. There is likely a good bit of low probability statistics at play in those much smaller than usual groups, as well as "random" variations in shooting conditions and shooter's performance. --- Nothing at all new in that sentence.

I concur with anyone that thinks that getting consistent,long term data on group sizes for BP vs nitro powders is going to be a demanding undertaking. Maybe better labeled as Fool's Work.

Steve Garbe has written articles of his own personal success using BP in the 32-40 breech seated. The articles we're published in past Black Powder News magazines and when time allows I will dig through my stack and look for anything that might be of interest and if so I will share it.

I'm not sure I'd call testing done to prove for the individual's use of BP or smokeless, "Fool's work". I think if the shooter is really interested in trying to achieve his absolute best with any gun, powder, bullets, etc.; any efforts to obtain the results he wants aren't foolish at all.
I've spent many days at the range working on charges, bullets, etc. just to figure out what one particular gun liked best. Then stretched the shooting out to longer distances only to find that load no longer worked as well at longer distance. I never felt it was a waste of time. I just went back to load work up, and spent more time finding out what I needed to change to get results at the longer distances.

I think at some point the shooter has to decide if he has tested every component, and determined he's got either powder shooting in his gun as well as it can shoot. Then he can say for sure whether it's good enough to continue shooting BP or smokeless, and whether it was worth the effort to get to that decision.
Some may decide at some point it's not worth it. While others might never change to one or the other regardless of resulting feedback from testing.

JLouis wrote on Nov 7^th, 2018 at 2:37pm:

Yes, in those days we had hotly contested, BP matches, here in Grants Pass and Springfield Oregon.

Those were the days

Frank

marlinguy wrote on Nov 7^th, 2018 at 1:48pm:


My "Fools Work" comment has NOT to do with individual shooters efforts to attain their person best results. "Fools Work" is directed at the rather absurd, to me at least, idea of ever demonstrating whether BP or nitro powder gives smallest groups at realistic distances (100-1000M). Schutzen may be the only venue where rifles and shooting conditions have enough in common between BP and Nitro matches that a direct, statistically valid comparison seems maybe possible. Trying to draw valid comparisons using data from HiPower and BPR matches, for example, seems doomed before it even starts. Trying to get either group to use the other type of gunpowder in the interest of a simplistic, direct comparison seems a real Fool's Errand".

JLouis wrote on Nov 7^th, 2018 at 2:59pm:

My opinion as to why they died out, is that shooting BP takes a bit more work than smokeless and that people, in general, didn't want to shoot smokeless and do the extra work to be competitive with BP.

You have to prepare to shoot two different matches and only the bullets, w/o lube(some didn't even use the same bullets), being the common denominator.

Frank

Proving one is better than another is the reason we have rifle matches instead of just the internet.   My experiences mirror RSW's.   Not that I haven't had some excellent results with BP.   This morning I was shooting at 300 with my .45-90 and did a 9 shot group ( miscounted and thought it was 10 ).  I made a sight adjustment after the first shot and after that the rest went into less than a minute of angle.  A better than average group for sure, but it's a good reliable gun

My .32-40's have always been inconsistent with BP.  One day shooting excellent groups and the next they blow up to much larger groups.   I'm not much of a smokeless shooter, but I have found it much, much, more simple to get good targets from my CPA & Ruger #1.

I asked Steve Garbe on the WSU forum once regarding his thoughts on BP benchrest accuracy and he said something to the effect that reliable 24 ring accuracy is possible, but he has not seen reliable 25 ring accuracy.  This pretty much mirrors what I see. 

This fall I will spend a little more time working on BP benchrest on the 25 ring target.

Chris.