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I believe the most recent LongHunter Pronghorn Record was shot with APP.
T/C Omega
 
I use the pistol version in my cap and ball revolver. I prefer it over Pyrodex P. I think it cleans up easier than Pyrodex. It goes bang when I need it too.

A buddy used to shoot the pellets in his .50 cal rifle. He had lots of issues with them not combusting completely. He would put two "50" grain pellets in his rifle and have one of them follow the bullet out the barrel still burning. He eventually switched over to Pyrodex.

Your mileage my vary.
 
I used to use it in FFFG in my Omega and it shot very well for me. I found the FFFG American Pioneer Powder was about the same size as other powders FFG. I have since switched to 777 or Pyrodex RS.
 
4stringdude said:
I use the pistol version in my cap and ball revolver. I prefer it over Pyrodex P. I think it cleans up easier than Pyrodex. It goes bang when I need it too.

A buddy used to shoot the pellets in his .50 cal rifle. He had lots of issues with them not combusting completely. He would put two "50" grain pellets in his rifle and have one of them follow the bullet out the barrel still burning. He eventually switched over to Pyrodex.

Your mileage my vary.
Click to expand...
You know, I guess that’s probably how I should have replied. I was just going off of my experience with it. Snapbang, by all means, give it a try. It may even be different powder than that which I am thinking of. The APP I bought and tried, did clean up easily, did go off when I pulled the trigger, but the grains were HUGE and not uniform at all. Reminded me of fish tank gravel. It may work well for you.
I’ve never been able to get Black MZ to shoot good in my rifles I’ve tried it in, but I know some guys love it.
 
I started out muzzleloading with APP loose rifle powder. I never had any problem getting it to ignite with standard 209 primers. It cleaned up very easily with just hot water and sometimes a little bit of dish soap. It was cheap, and gave me a lot of range time as a ML newcomer to ingrain safe loading & handling habits into myself. I went through 7 bottles over a summer firing combinations of about 6 different projectiles, 4 different sabots, and 5 different primers. I had a great time doing a lot of shooting, although the fun was mostly from randomness - like trying to toss playing cards into a bowl from across a room. Bear in mind this was in 2006, and their formula/production methods may have changed since the dates on the bottles I used.

I never could get it to group out of the 3 rifles in which I tried it, though it's worth noting that they weren't great rifles to start with (CVA Apollo with #11 nipple, CVA Elkhorn, and H&R Sidekick with their infamously abysmal OEM primer carrier system). I recall a lot of smoking granules leaving the muzzle behind the bullet, spiraling off in all directions. Once, it started a small grass fire, and I was firing from an elevated bench! I had a hard time keeping shot groups inside 6" circles at 100 yards regardless of choice of projectile, charge weight, or primer/cap selection. I was a disciplined, experienced, reasonably well-trained (Army DM course grad) rifle shot at the time I was trying APP, and I used well-mounted Leupold and Zeiss scopes that had (and since have) proven utterly reliable on other rifles. Same rifles did MUCH better with plain Pyrodex FFg and pellets, so I'm confident the APP was the culprit.

I must admit for fairness' sake that I never got up the nerve to risk my chronograph in front of those rifles while I was still using APP, so I have no idea what the velocity SD/ES values were from shot to shot with a given load. Sometimes I could easily see the projectile in flight around 50-75 yards from the muzzle, and that shouldn't be so easy through a cloud of bluish white smoke from a 100 grain load that's supposed to give a MV of 1,800+ fps.

I gave away the Apollo to someone who promised to keep game shots under 50 yards. The Elkhorn belonged to a friend who had asked me to scope it, work up a decent load, and zero it for him while he was deployed so he could go hunting as soon as he got back. (That wound up being 2x 50 grain Pyrodex pellets on a Hornady Speed Sabot holding a 250 grain SST-ML for simplicity's sake, since he lost some dexterity and fine motor skills from injuries). I eventually got new breech plugs for the Sidekick and haven't used anything but Blackhorn 209 in it since.

In short, I had fun with it on the range, but I have never used it for hunting. That's my experience with it to the best of my fading memory, and I hope at least some of it seems relevant. Good luck!
 
Last edited:
NatureNick said:
I started out muzzleloading with APP loose rifle powder. I never had any problem getting it to ignite with standard 209 primers. It cleaned up very easily with just hot water and sometimes a little bit of dish soap. It was cheap, and gave me a lot of range time as a ML newcomer to ingrain safe loading & handling habits into myself. I went through 7 bottles over a summer firing combinations of about 6 different projectiles, 4 different sabots, and 5 different primers. I had a great time doing a lot of shooting, although the fun was mostly from randomness - like trying to toss playing cards into a bowl from across a room. Bear in mind this was in 2006, and their formula/production methods may have changed since the dates on the bottles I used.

I never could get it to group out of the 3 rifles in which I tried it, though it's worth noting that they weren't great rifles to start with (CVA Apollo with #11 nipple, CVA Elkhorn, and H&R Sidekick with their infamously abysmal OEM primer carrier system). I recall a lot of smoking granules leaving the muzzle behind the bullet, spiraling off in all directions. Once, it started a small grass fire, and I was firing from an elevated bench! I had a hard time keeping shot groups inside 6" circles at 100 yards regardless of choice of projectile, charge weight, or primer/cap selection. I was a disciplined, experienced, reasonably well-trained (Army DM course grad) rifle shot at the time I was trying APP, and I used well-mounted Leupold and Zeiss scopes that had (and since have) proven utterly reliable on other rifles. Same rifles did MUCH better with plain Pyrodex FFg and pellets, so I'm confident the APP was the culprit.

I must admit for fairness' sake that I never got up the nerve to risk my chronograph in front of those rifles while I was still using APP, so I have no idea what the velocity SD/ES values were from shot to shot with a given load. Sometimes I could easily see the projectile in flight around 50-75 yards from the muzzle, and that shouldn't be so easy through a cloud of bluish white smoke from a 100 grain load that's supposed to give a MV of 1,800+ fps.

I gave away the Apollo to someone who promised to keep game shots under 50 yards. The Elkhorn belonged to a friend who had asked me to scope it, work up a decent load, and zero it for him while he was deployed so he could go hunting as soon as he got back. (That wound up being 2x 50 grain Pyrodex pellets on a Hornady Speed Sabot holding a 250 grain SST-ML for simplicity's sake, since he lost some dexterity and fine motor skills from injuries). I eventually got new breech plugs for the Sidekick and haven't used anything but Blackhorn 209 in it since.

In short, I had fun with it on the range, but I have never used it for hunting. That's my experience with it to the best of my fading memory, and I hope at least some of it seems relevant. Good luck!
Click to expand...
In a nutshell, my experience as well..
 
Me thinks I will just dispose of it. I kinda like the thought of adding 10 grains on top of my regular powder to get a bit of fireworks for dramatic affects.
 
One thing I did as a kid was to make some pretty wicked bottle rockets. I used to have an Estes model rocket. I would take the spent engines (cardboard tubes) and knock the clay nozzles out of them. I would then take an un-used engine, dig the clay plug out of the back to expose the black powder parachute ejection charge, glue the empty engine to the full engine, fill the rest of it up with black powder except about 1/4”. Stuff toilet paper in the end and pack it tight. Put elmers glue over it and let it dry. I would then tape it to an arrow, (started using dry wild sunflower stalks after I lost all the arrows) put some cannon fuse in the end and let ‘er rip. Pretty awesome bangs up about 400’ in the air. Really cool at night, You’d see the flash and then a bit later hear the bang. I’ve always wanted to add some ground bloom flowers or fountains to the charge and try it again to see if I got colored sparks. Don’t dare now, I’d probably end up in jail...
 
Please, no more talk of the "other uses". Im sure many of us have done similar things but here is not a good place to discuss it.

As far as APP, Shockeys and BlackMZ.....They are all very similar composition. BlackMZ probably being the best of the bunch but overall still pretty lack luster compared to some subs. Main complaints are its very chunky and produces pretty poor fps. Fouling however is fairly light and its less corrosive. MUCH less than Pyrodex. It ignites easily with caps. Guys with a cap and ball revolver might enjoy it because the low amount of fouling.
 
GM54-120 said:
Please, no more talk of the "other uses". Im sure many of us have done similar things but here is not a good place to discuss it.

As far as APP, Shockeys and BlackMZ.....They are all very similar composition. BlackMZ probably being the best of the bunch but overall still pretty lack luster compared to some subs. Main complaints are its very chunky and produces pretty poor fps. Fouling however is fairly light and its less corrosive. MUCH less than Pyrodex. It ignites easily with caps. Guys with a cap and ball revolver might enjoy it because the low amount of fouling.
Click to expand...
Point taken
 
Youll love this. I went shooting today and at the end of the session I thought I should at least shoot this APP Powder before I throw it away. 2# I have. First it will hardly transfer from the flask to the powder measure. So I just poured it from the can into the measure. Loaded the gun per normal with 305 grain GT bullets and a sabot. Took a shot. Not as much recoil I think but Ill test it later. Reload took another shot. About 1 1/2 inches off the first. Not bad. So I did it again and have 3 shot 1 1/2 inch group. I show pics tomorrow. Im going to keep the 2 lbs.
 

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