Powder life

[tstr]

Will an open container of smokeless powder loose potency over time? Can smokeless powder be ruined from absorbing mositure from the air?

tstr

[TexasRusty]

I think by open you mean a container that has been opened but has the cap put back on.

The answer is no. Smokeless powder has pretty much an indefintie shelf life as long as it is kept in a weel controled climate. In other words if you keep it inside your house wher it won't be subject to temperature and humidty extremes it will last a long time.

For example I am currently loading from an 8lb. keg of Win231 that I purchased in 1993. The powder is fine. I also recently finished off an 8lb. keg of Win296 that I have had since 1991. I loaded it in 44 magnum that has all shot fine.

As far as absorbing moisture, I am not sure. It hasn't seemed to affect any of my powders.

To determine if older powder is still usable. Open the container and smell it. If the powder as an acrid smell then is it bad and it needs to be destroyed.

[Mike Irwin]

Excessive changes in heat and humidity can be death to powder.

Being cold isn't a problem, but being hot (such as in an uninsulated or non-airconditioned attic or garage, can cause powder to decay fairly rapidly.

A much better way to determine if powder is decaying is to pour some on a sheet of white paper.

All you want to see are powder granules. If you see any reddish-colored dust or notice anything other than the ether/acetone smell that powder has, chances are the powder is going bad and should be disposed of.

Be careful not to touch or inhale any of the red dust that often accompanies decaying smokeless powder, it is toxic.



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Smith & Wesson is dead to me.

If you want a Smith & Wesson, buy USED!

[HandloaderJohn]

I loaded up a lb of IMR 4227 that was 25 years old, it has been kept in storage building, subject to Texas Summers, the powder worked fine in the 357 mag loads, I have talked to reloaders who have used powder that was 30 years old, worked fine.

[Big Bunny]

We have had reports of large quantities(2KG) of shotgun powder igniting spontaneously in a steel container due to build-up of heat from old powder "going off".
There was a report in the SSAA magazine abt 5 years ago of such an incident in Queensland.
The powder was stored in a ground floor garage in very hot tropical Queensland and not checked for smell/deterioration at any stage for an extended period.

It blew out the brick wall.No-one was hurt but the insurance company refused to pay as it was considered 'not normal storage quantities' for private home insurance.

Maybe a little check every year or if so over 5 years old may be prudent?
Hell...I better go check my 700x now .....

BB


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If we shooting sportspersons don't hang together... we will all hang separately !
Never knock another's different shooting interest or discipline...REMEMBER we are all but leaves on the same tree of freedom.

[Southla1]

Back in 1963 when I started reloading I did not know squat about it nor did I have the money to go into it in a hurry. Not too many 19 year olds attending college then did. I purchased a Lee Loader for 30-06 and some primers. There was a gunshop in the adjourning city that was owned by one fine man. One of my mentors told me "use a full case of H4831 and a 190 grain Sierra MatchKing in that old 03A3 and you will be fine. Well I bought about 5 or 6 pounds of the old original WWII Surplus H4831 for about a buck a pound. About 3 years later while home on leave from the service I visited his shop and he had bought a 100# keg of the old original H4831 and was selling it by the pound for $1 a pound still, but this powder he was putting in paper bags and weighing it on his meat scale. (he also ahd a butcher shop in the same building as the gun shop). Well he had one keg with 40 pounds left in it and seeing as how I had won $60 the night before in a poker game bought the rest of the keg. It stayed in an unheated, uncooled building during the hot South Louisiana summers as the quantity declined as it was used up. In 1993 I finally built an Air Conditioned/ heated reloading shop. I still have about 3 pounds of this powder left. I put in in some cans that originally had the same H4831 Surplus powder in it. The can says(the big keg did too) "caution WWII surplus powder, storage life not guarenteed". Well friends its still in fine shape. Smells the ether and is not deterioated at all! In 3 years it will be 60 years old, if I haven't burned it up by then.

Carlyle Hebert

[This message has been edited by Southla1 (edited October 31, 2000).]

[Chipperman]

"In 3 years it will be 60 years old"

That's cool!

[tstr]

Thanks for the info guys.

Southla1, are you going to throw a birthday party for your powder? I'd be happy to come so long as you promise not to let the powder blow out the candles.

Tstr

[Mike Irwin]

Carlyle,

Quite frankly, I'm amazed.

During WW II many, many corners were cut on powder production (such as final acid neutralization) that, while it didn't affect the short term life of the powder, could and did affect its long-term life, especially under adverse storage conditions.

If it's not all gone by the time it's 60, be sure that it is registered for Social Security. It's had a long and active working life.

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Smith & Wesson is dead to me.

If you want a Smith & Wesson, buy USED!

[Southla1]

Guys if I can ever get all these honeydo projects finished around here I am hoping that that stuff is long burned by the flash of a good CCI or Federal primer before it hits 60. Mike is right about the final acid neutralization, that is what kills powder...any acid left in it after manufacture. Nontes book "Modern Reloading" has a great chapter on powder manufacturing. One other thing about H4831. The government specified and ordered it for use in the 20MM Cannon shell. It was made to specs but the specs were wrong and it was too fast burning, so it was stored in some rail boxcars and parked somewhere. After the war Bruce Hodgdon found out about it and bought it for a song as surplus, packaged it and sold it. That was the start of Hodgdon Powder Company, and the 4831 was the powder that brought cartridges such as the 25-06 into general use with its slow burning rate.

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Carlyle Hebert

[Rezdog]

Once upon a time I found a cloth machine-gun belt of 100 .30-06 cartridges which had laid outside in the Alaskan rain, mud, and snow for over thirty years. The cases and bullets were heavily tarnished but not corroded. I pulled all the bullets and cleaned them up. Then checked out the powder -- looked and smelled okay so I averaged out the weights on ten loads. Then reloaded the powder and bullets into new cases with new primers and everything went Bang! Beware of old black powder, however, as the grains break down over time and become smaller; the finer black powder is, the faster it will burn/explode. I've seen Spanish American War and WWI vintage military ammo (.30-40 Krag and .30-06) still fire okay.

[rugercollector]

I shot a deer with surplus bulk 4831 from WWII and it worked perfectly. I have also chronographed bullets loaded with new and surplus 4831 and mine is still right near the new stuff in potency. I also shoot Alcan AL-7 from the 1960s that still is a great pistol powder.

[Mike Irwin]

Rezdog,

Old blackpowder cartridges have to have been handled pretty harshly over the years to really affect the powder. BP loads are compressed loads, meaning that the powder won't move around much.

Back in the 1980s I fired some civil war era .56-56 Spencer cartridges through a friend's Spencer Military Musket. Loads of fun, and about 70% ignition.

Over the years I've also fired a lot of other old ammo.

The biggest sticking point is normally the primer. I was shooting some 11.15 Spanish Remington rounds (Spanish military surplus) that had headstamps from the late 1880s.

About 20% of them went bang the way they should, another 40% of them were hangfires, anywhere from 1 to 10 or so seconds, and the rest of them were simply dead.

We pulled some of the dead ones apart, and the powder was basically compressed into a solid lump, but didn't show any signs of having broken down into smaller and smaller grains.

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Smith & Wesson is dead to me.

If you want a Smith & Wesson, buy USED!

[Southla1]

Back in the late 60's my grandfather gave me his revolver and asked me to "check it out" it was an S&W .38 Spl M&P Model from the early 20th Century with the 6" barrel. His brother had "borrowed" it from him in the 30's and after he died 38 years later it was returned to him ! Well along with the revolver he gave me a handful of cartridges (about 20 or so). I took the weapon home cleaned and checked it, and a few days later went out to "test" it. I brought a box of my 148 grain wadcutter handloads over 2.7 grains of Bullseye along with the cartridges he had given me. I fired a few of my wadcutters and all was fine, I then loaded with 6 of his and squeezed the trigger on the first one BOOM! Along with this BIGGGGG cloud of white smoke! Yes, you guessed it they were old black powder 38's. I tried all 6 that were in the cylinder and each one fired just fine. Of course I had to wait for the smoke to clear before being able to see the target again . I saved the rest of the cartridges and if I can find them I will let ya'll know what the headstamp was I don't remember offhand, but I do know that they had to be close to 60 years old then and the ingition on 6 of them was 100%.
I also had the same experience with some .38 S&W black powder rounds in my greatgrand mothers old Oliver Johnson Arms and Cycle works break top revolver. These were about 95% reliable and they were OLD! That particular revolver has quite a history to it

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Carlyle Hebert

[This message has been edited by Southla1 (edited November 02, 2000).]

[This message has been edited by Southla1 (edited November 02, 2000).]

[This message has been edited by Southla1 (edited November 02, 2000).]

[Southla1]

OK, guys as promised the headstamp on the old .38 Spl's is U.M.C. NOT Rem-UMC. These were no doubt from before Remington bought out UMC. Or was it the other way around?)

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Carlyle Hebert

[Southla1]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Rezdog:
I've seen Spanish American War and WWI vintage military ammo (.30-40 Krag and .30-06) still fire okay.[/quote]


I read somewhere long ago that some MilSup ammo from around the turn of the century that had the silver colored bullets loaded in it may cause a poblem if fired today. I forget (old age again ) what the silver color was but seem to think it was tin. Anyway, the reasoning was that over the years the tin in the jacket and the brass in the cartridge case would actually solder themselves together, without the application of heat, just close contact and time was all that was needed. IIRC, there was a rifle that came apart on firing, and that was the only explanation that anyone could come up with. I think that they found some other rounds in the lot that was being fired soldered together. I know that my father has an 1891 Argentine Mauser, and a quantity of surplus ball ammo with the silver colored bullets. I told him not to fire it until he checks with me. All I plan to do is run it through a seating die and seat the bullets a hair (yes that kind of hair ) deeper to make sure they are not stuck to the cases. Some of those older rifles can't take an overpressure like a modern one can.


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Carlyle Hebert

[Cheapo]

Amercan doughboys fought WWI using .30-06 ammo loaded with cupro-nickel jackets. Silver colored, just like our coins.

They're okay and don't solder themselves to the brass. They just foul your barrel a LOT faster that gilding metal jacketed bullets do.

[Kenneth L. Walters]

Years ago I talked to one of the fellows at the plant making Unique. He said that they still had some of the original (first) lot and that periodically they would test it. After more than 100 years (of proper storage) it hadn't changed any noticeable amount.

[Southla1]

Cheapo, the problem was not back when they were made during WWI but years later after sitting in storage for ages. If I remember correctly it was an action of time and pressure (tight necks) that caused the bonding.

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Carlyle Hebert

[Mike Irwin]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Southla1:
OK, guys as promised the headstamp on the old .38 Spl's is U.M.C. NOT Rem-UMC. These were no doubt from before Remington bought out UMC. Or was it the other way around?)

[/quote]

Carlyle,

My guess is that these cartridges were at some point reloaded, and were NOT factory ammo.

To the best of my knowledge, .38 Special was never loaded with blackpowder by the commercial makers.

I may well be wrong about that, but I don't think that I am.



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Smith & Wesson is dead to me.

If you want a Smith & Wesson, buy USED!

[Mike Irwin]

Carlyle & Cheapo,

IIRC, the deal with the bullets soldering themselves to the cases happened with cupro-nickle bullets and the tinned cases that were produced for sea service.

I've got several examples of tinned case military ammo made around the turn of the century.

Julian Hatcher, in his book, said that it was not uncommon at Camp Perry, where the old ammo that had been in storage for years, to see the entire shoulder area torn off a tinned case and taken downrange with the bullet.

I'll see if I can find my Hatcher's Notebook and provide a section ref.

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Smith & Wesson is dead to me.

If you want a Smith & Wesson, buy USED!

[Mike Irwin]

Ken,

I've read about the powder samples they store.

Apparently it is stored in vats of distilled buffered water, which is about as neutral an environment as you can get.

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Smith & Wesson is dead to me.

If you want a Smith & Wesson, buy USED!

[Southla1]

Mike I am not trying to argue but these are not reloaded cartridges. They are factory with what looks like a 158 grain pure lead round nosed bullets. I am going to re-look at them but I will bet the ranch that they were not re-loaded, one reason being that my grandfather got one box when he bought the pistol in 1910 (I think I remember him saying). It was bought from his uncle who was a police officer in New Orleans and at that time weapons used in crimes were sold to citizens that wanted to buy them (wish that were still so) for the astounding price of $5. He used it for protection but never fired it. In the 30's he "loaned" it to his brother and it migrated back to him when his brother died in 1968. The box that the original bullets came in had dry rotted away and he had the remaining cartridges in a paper bag . At the time that he bought the revolver he had his uncle buy the shells for it. In all the intervening years he never fired the box that he bought with it! His grandson (me) makes up for all the rounds that he did not fire .

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Carlyle Hebert

[Southla1]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mike Irwin:
Apparently it is stored in vats of distilled buffered water, which is about as neutral an environment as you can get.[/quote]


Thats guarenteed to be neutral! Do they just dump it in that distilled water and take it out and dry it if they want to test some of it?


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Carlyle Hebert

[Mike Irwin]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Southla1:

Thats guarenteed to be neutral! Do they just dump it in that distilled water and take it out and dry it if they want to test some of it?


[/quote]

That's my understanding.

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Smith & Wesson is dead to me.

If you want a Smith & Wesson, buy USED!