45 ACP Powder Selection

[Unclenick]

I was just looking this thread over and notice a pattern that's appeared on this subject before, which is you find some people saying a certain powder, 231, say, is very clean and other saying some other powder is much cleaner. How clean or dirty can one be? Some lubes certainly create a lot more smoke than others and some seem to spread lube vapor around that makes the soot in the gun sort of waxy, exaggerating the apparent dirt. Whose lube you use is certainly part of cause of the discrepancy.

Another factor is graphite. Most of the older and many of the modern formulations use it to dissipate static and improve metering flow. Bullseye and Unique have quite a bit, and it blows around in the gun and winds up coating the insides of it. Newer compressed sphere flakes, like Clays and Universal Clays don't have it, apparently relying on more modern treatments to handle lubrication and static.

However, the main thing that affects clean burning is still pressure and temperature. The higher the pressure with a given powder, the hotter and more quickly and completely it burns. The completely aspect accounts for a good deal of how little residue is left in the barrel. I remember in the 80's playing with very low pressure loads of Unique and, for reasons I don't recall, 2400. Both left lots of unburned and partially burned particles. The Unique often left whole unburned flakes, possibly those the bullet lube contaminated, and the 2400 left a lot of gritty and yellow waxy looking particles behind.

I think a lot of us, when we in our early reloading days, wishing to be responsible with respect to safety, will load too low. It is worth remembering that all those different powder burning rates exist for a reason. You want a quick one with low velocity loads so the pressure is high enough to burn well. If you select the powder that produces the velocity you want at close to normal peak pressures, it will likely be your best choice. The normal pressure for the cartridge not only burns powder more completely, but it burns it more consistently. That's why it helps accuracy.

One other clean, fast powder that should be mentioned for light loads if Vihtavuori N310. Loads with it are light in weight, like Clays, because it is extremely fast and burns up before the bullet moves far enough down the tube to create much volume behind it for the powder to burn in. Some measures meter it better. Vihtavuori powders burn relatively cleanly in general because the high grade nitrocellulose in them is made from cotton, while that made from wood or other waste cellulose fiber sources tends to be less pure and leave more unconsumed matter behind. The Vihtavuori grains are black, so I assume there is graphite in it, but the cleanliness of the nitrocellulose burn makes up at least partly for that. It is very consistent in its performance.

[Don P]

TITEGROUP!!!!!!!!! Works great, I am loading 230gr cast and use 4gr of powder. This works out to 14,000 rounds out of a 8lb keg. I was using Unique but man does it ever burn DIRTY. Titegroup burns almost as clean as factory ammo

[D. Manley]

One other clean, fast powder that should be mentioned for light loads if Vihtavuori N310. Loads with it are light in weight, like Clays, because it is extremely fast and burns up before the bullet moves far enough down the tube to create much volume behind it for the powder to burn in. Some measures meter it better. Vihtavuori powders burn relatively cleanly in general because the high grade nitrocellulose in them is made from cotton, while that made from wood or other waste cellulose fiber sources tends to be less pure and leave more unconsumed matter behind. The Vihtavuori grains are black, so I assume there is graphite in it, but the cleanliness of the nitrocellulose burn makes up at least partly for that. It is very consistent in its performance.

Good post U.N. and spot-on about N-310...fantastic powder and my favorite in .45 under 185's. My votes on the cleanest stuff out there for pistol (in no particular order) are:

N-310/N-320 (IME, all the VV powders are very clean)
Clays
Solo1000
American Select

[Unclenick]

Ahh! Solo 1000. I forgot to mention that one. It's another virgin cotton nitrocellulose based powder. So were the Scot Brigadier powders, before their stick powder plant burned down. A bummer. In .308 and .30-06 their Brigadier 3032 and 4065 were great. Good case fill and excellent burn consistency. I still have a little of the latter and miss those powders. They'd become my mainstay in service rifle match shooting.

I have yet to try American Select. On the to-do list.

And you mentioned N320. I have found it to be a nearly perfect grain-for-grain substitute for SR7970 in the .45 ACP, 5 grains of which populate the military hardball load. 5 grains of Bullseye is another traditional substitute, the military having used it at one time, but not nearly as clean or consistent metering.

[D. Manley]

Ahh! Solo 1000. I forgot to mention that one. It's another virgin cotton nitrocellulose based powder. So were the Scot Brigadier powders, before their stick powder plant burned down. A bummer. In .308 and .30-06 their Brigadier 3032 and 4065 were great. Good case fill and excellent burn consistency. I still have a little of the latter and miss those powders. They'd become my mainstay in service rifle match shooting.

I have yet to try American Select. On the to-do list.

And you mentioned N320. I have found it to be a nearly perfect grain-for-grain substitute for SR7970 in the .45 ACP, 5 grains of which populate the military hardball load. 5 grains of Bullseye is another traditional substitute, the military having used it at one time, but not nearly as clean or consistent metering.

Yep, if I had to live with any of the powders on that list, I could do just fine. American Select is very similar to S-1000 but a larger, even fluffier flake. I think it's Alliant's only single-base powder and it has a very similar feel shooting to Solo. It does take a bit longer getting fully settled to get the measure tweaked for consistency. I use 10-throw averages for adjusting and find it takes twice as many throws to finally "get there"...oddly, charges tend to get lighter as it compacts. I used some of it today under 147 grainers in 9MM.

[salvadore]

Titegroup and Bullseye work for me.

[sserdlihc]

I use unique. However, it is not clean burning.