What was the maximum amount of space Mr. Creed tested?

MartiniBelgian wrote on Dec 27^th, 2019 at 1:52am:


MartiniBelgian:

Original specifications for the .577/450 drawn brass case ammunition called for a cotton wool wad on top of 85 grains of powder to fill the airspace.

A beeswax wad was between the cotton and the bullet.

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I have loaded cartridges to this specification, but I normally use a short section of 1/2" diameter backer rod in place of the cotton ball.  Either works fine.

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Curl

OK Westerner, wisecrack somewhat unfounded but i am puzzled, and obviously stupid.   Please explain how Italian muzzleloading  Hawken rifle craze led to apparently mistaken credo about no air gap in CARTRIDGE bp loads. Seems like a non sequitur. Thanks  If u cant or wont i would appreciate someone else filling in the "gap" in my knowledge base., because i am anxious to try out less than 100% loafing density w/o ruining a good rifle.

I will weigh in here as I have been listed by Joe as using reduced black powder loadings.   Yes I have been shooting a 28gr. black load in a 32-40 for years and is by far the most accurate black load used in the rifle.
The governmant did extensive testing on the trapdoor springfield before adopting the design.  the one I am most interested in was the testing of space between the powder level and the bullet base.  The test gun had a 6 foot barrel as I remember, and was loaded and fired in 1/2 inch space increments.  the conclusion was the space, when it became excessive , reduced the efficiency of the loading but was not detrimental to the firearm.
what did cause a catastrofic failure was a plugged barrel ahead of a cartridge being fired .    
I believe someone at some point, miss-interpreted the airspace as being the same as a plugged bore, hence the belief of the airspace in the cartidge being dangerous.  I have not found any problems with reduced loadings in any of my black powder guns.   I do make sure the wad if any is at the bullet base and not on the powder face. whether it would act as a projectile and cause a problem  or not, I do not have any data for that, it is simply how I load fixed ammunition.
Dave Casey

Even a foot down. Don't ask.

I  never develop a load with compression in mind - compression is a given, resulting from adding more powder in the case.  IOW, I don't care how much compression I have, as it is not a variable I'm changing on purpose.  And it is pretty hard to tweak compression only.  Usually, you change compression through adding powder or more / thicker wads - but those are other variables.  And yes, zero compression loads can shoot well.

I have a Swiss Federale Stutzen muzzle loader, model of 1851. The original ramrod had an ajustable stop on it to avoid compressing the powder. The Swiss maintained that keeping the combustion chamber volume constant was the important thing.
These were, and are, the most accurate military muzzle loaders ever made.
Fred

Regarding the .22-15-60 Stevens C.F. cartridge, Stevens noted the following...
"Reduced Loads
By reference to the cuts of bullets for this cartridge, it will be seen that it can be loaded , .22-3-32, .22-5-40, .22-7-46, .22-10-46, .22-13-46. Use a soft lead bullet, seated in  usual manner in mouth of shell with a thin wad over powder. Grain of powder will vary with the rifle, but the smaller loads will require a FFFFg or FFFg, while the two larger will probably do best work with the FFg size."
Stevens provided various similar notes for other cartridges that were chambered in their rifles.

So it looks like for reduced black powder loads, Stevens kept the bullet seated in the normal position at the case mouth, with the reduced powder charge held back against the flash hole, perhaps by a thin wax paper wad, with air space to the base of the bullet.
It also looks like Stevens played around with the faster burning finer granulations of black powder for some of their reduced black powder loads... sorta along the lines some do these days when using smaller/reduced powder charges of the faster burning smokeless shotgun/handgun powders for cast bullet CBA style shooting.

Stevens also noted "Remember that no two rifles perform exactly alike. A change of temper of bullet or a few grains of powder, more or less, may sometimes be necessary to obtain the best results."

So you got to get up off your lazy butt, and experiment. 

There was an article a long time back in either Rifle or Handloader magazine regarding loading the 40-90 Sharps Straight... seem to recall that the author could not achieve accuracy with his various loadings... until he eliminated the powder compression he had previously been applying to the black powder charges he had worked with in that nice long cartridge case.