Some education please.

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LHR

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I am completely new to smokeless muzzleloading and I have been trying to wrap my head around this concept of how you go about determining a starting point with smokeless powder.
In the rifle reloading arena, you have a given case capacity to work with. You have your bullet weight, and manuals that get you a starting point with any given powder suitable for the caliber.

In a muzzleloader, your case capacity can vary depending on seating of the bullet and bore diameter. How did someone learn that 60 something grains of H4198 was a good load?
Is this done by trial and error? Start at 10 grains and work your way up slowly till you find a sweet spot? For the record I would never try this !

I am waiting for my Woodman Patriot, which I will mostly be using BH209 with, but would like to try light smokeless loads as well at some point?
Just looking for information right now, and I will likely just go with what Woodman Arms recommends when that time comes.

So, if someone has a good explanation of how this is done, I would love to hear it !


Pic for attention:


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Make damn sure that muzzleloader you ordered is capable of shooting smokeless powder first. I know that by the time I started using smokeless powder there was already a vast amount of load information out there. And since I have a Savage ML II, Savage did all the initial testing so people could shoot safely (some still push the absolute limits).
 
Thank you for posting this because I am similar to you in this respect - being accustomed to working up centerfires.
I do know that a lot of people go with pressure-time data plots like you can find on Smokeless forum in Dougs Message Boards. (https://dougsmessageboards.proboards.com). And I am aware there are test equipment like “Pressure Trace II” to make those data plots. But I sadly don’t know enough to tell how reliable those traces might be.
So my plan is to trust Mark Woodman more than anyone else.
 
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Check out the Woodman Arms website at Woodman Arms' Load Data Also, the manual has some limited information such as maximum charge of BH209. Hope that helps.
Thanks Greg,
Already done that, I'm more looking for general info on how someone would work up a new load, using a powder that hasn't already been tried. Or how did they do it the first time with powders that we know work well in muzzleloaders?
 
The first thing is knowing how much pressure a barrel and breech can handle. I've done the analysis on that to have an idea.

I have a .45 cal barrel with a piezo sensor in a port in the chamber. If I'm unsure, I start with a light load and work my way up with real data.

We will be adding all this data to our website soon.
 
The first thing is knowing how much pressure a barrel and breech can handle. I've done the analysis on that to have an idea.

I have a .45 cal barrel with a piezo sensor in a port in the chamber. If I'm unsure, I start with a light load and work my way up with real data.

We will be adding all this data to our website soon.
That’s fantastic news, keep up the good work Mark!
 
What makes any barrel capable of using smokeless powder?How is it different than one that shoots 120 grains of blackhorn powder?Does that make it strong enough to shoot smokeless?And if so,what determines the amount of smokeless a person can use in that barrel?Where does one learn to stop at a specific amount?
I know barrels are proof tested so they are “proven” at the tested pressures to be safe. On the Woodman rifles the .50’s are not safe but the .45’s are within reason and in the limits of their barrels. I believe due to the thicker walls, since the two calibers share the same outside dimensions, the .45 would naturally be stronger than the thinner walled .50 cal.

Having the test barrel Mark mentions, allows him to test loads to see what gets you to those proofed limits and what is deemed safe. I am assuming there has to be some margin of error calculated in for the event of anomalies like an overly tight bullet?
 
What makes any barrel capable of using smokeless powder?How is it different than one that shoots 120 grains of blackhorn powder?Does that make it strong enough to shoot smokeless?And if so,what determines the amount of smokeless a person can use in that barrel?Where does one learn to stop at a specific amount?

BH209 is a hybrid powder made up of Nitrocellulose with enough Guanidine Nitrate added to it to make it work more like a Blackpowder substitute.

The thickness of the wall of the barrel and the type of steel would be the two keys to determine the pressure a barrel will handle safely.

Traditions has said their normal 50 caliber muzzleloader barrels are rated for 25,000 psi.
The Savage 10ML barrels have a higher rating, but I do not know exactly what it is. (Maybe another member can help us with that number.)

You need a computer program like "Quick Load" to help predict the pressure produced by a given type and amount of smokeless propellant. This program has been well tested over many years and yields excellent results.

Using a pressure gauge to confirm the Quick Load predictions would be the best option, if resources and technical expertise are not limited.
 
Gordon's Reloading Tool (GRT) is free and Patreon Funded. The gentleman that created it is deceased, unfortunately, but it still gets user based updates from time to time. It has a large selection of powders and bullets already in it, you can find one similar to the ones you are using. Choose a cartridge with the bore size you have, select a bullet similar to yours, select your powder and charge. Adjust the seating depth to 0.0000 (because it isn't in a case), and adjust the case volume until the load ratio (density) is between 98% (using wading and/or looser bullets) and 100% (no wadding and/or tighter bullets). Calculate your powder chamber volume and do not drop the "case" volume below that (I use some light, .22LR-type loads that I use in .30 that use very light charges of shotgun powder). It's not exact for SML's, but it gives you an idea of where your load is sitting. Ideally, we would all have a pressure testing set-up, but most don't.

Some people will just tell you to use cartridge data for your SML... don't do that and expect the pressures to be remotely the same.

On proofing barrels in the US- Barrel Makers almost never proof them, and proofing is not legally compulsory in the US. SAAMI is a voluntary association of MFG's, and really only deals in metallic cartridges. Many MFG's and importers in the US of Muzzleloaders do not proof every barrel, most don't proof any of them (other than a test barrel during the designing phase). So take load recommendations with a grain of salt, most are done to be on the "safe side", some are actually tested, and some are just wild guesses. If a barrel of "X" profile is chambered or recommended to be chambered in "Y" cartridge by a barrel maker or MFG, it is most likely safe to use up to the max pressure for that chambering. The only way to know for sure is to ask the maker if/how they proofed it, and if not, develop a proof load (at least 1.5x the max pressure, which is standard practice with most SAAMI and CIP chamberings) and proof it yourself (remotely). I quickly found this out when I got into building guns about 10 years ago, outside of CIP countries and government procurement, it's kinda like the wild west, especially when it comes to "primitive firearms". Several barrel makers even flat out say that they can't guarantee what pressures their barrels can take (unchambered blanks), and they accept no responsibility if you chamber/load them up too much, they just try to steer you to a profile that will hold up.
 
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Gordon's Reloading Tool (GRT) is free and Patreon Funded. The gentleman that created it is deceased, unfortunately, but it still gets user based updates from time to time. It has a large selection of powders and bullets already in it, you can find one similar to the ones you are using. Choose a cartridge with the bore size you have, select a bullet similar to yours, select your powder and charge. Adjust the seating depth to 0.0000 (because it isn't in a case), and adjust the case volume until the load ratio (density) is between 98% (using wading and/or looser bullets) and 100% (no wadding and/or tighter bullets). Calculate your powder chamber volume and do not drop the "case" volume below that (I use some light, .22LR-type loads that do that I use in .30 that use very light charges of shotgun powder). It's not exact for SML's, but it gives you an idea of where your load is sitting. Ideally, we would all have a pressure testing set-up, but most don't.
Thanks. I have GRT and was trying to figure out how to manipulate it for sml loads. Thats very helpful.
 
Gordon's Reloading Tool (GRT) is free and Patreon Funded. The gentleman that created it is deceased, unfortunately, but it still gets user based updates from time to time. It has a large selection of powders and bullets already in it, you can find one similar to the ones you are using. Choose a cartridge with the bore size you have, select a bullet similar to yours, select your powder and charge. Adjust the seating depth to 0.0000 (because it isn't in a case), and adjust the case volume until the load ratio (density) is between 98% (using wading and/or looser bullets) and 100% (no wadding and/or tighter bullets). Calculate your powder chamber volume and do not drop the "case" volume below that (I use some light, .22LR-type loads that I use in .30 that use very light charges of shotgun powder). It's not exact for SML's, but it gives you an idea of where your load is sitting. Ideally, we would all have a pressure testing set-up, but most don't.

Some people will just tell you to use cartridge data for your SML... don't do that and expect the pressures to be remotely the same.

On proofing barrels in the US- Barrel Makers almost never proof them, and proofing is not legally compulsory in the US. SAAMI is a voluntary association of MFG's, and really only deals in metallic cartridges. Many MFG's and importers in the US of Muzzleloaders do not proof every barrel, most don't proof any of them (other than a test barrel during the designing phase). So take load recommendations with a grain of salt, most are done to be on the "safe side", some are actually tested, and some are just wild guesses. If a barrel of "X" profile is chambered or recommended to be chambered in "Y" cartridge by a barrel maker or MFG, it is most likely safe to use up to the max pressure for that chambering. The only way to know for sure is to ask the maker if/how they proofed it, and if not, develop a proof load (at least 1.5x the max pressure, which is standard practice with most SAAMI and CIP chamberings) and proof it yourself (remotely). I quickly found this out when I got into building guns about 10 years ago, outside of CIP countries and government procurement, it's kinda like the wild west, especially when it comes to "primitive firearms". Several barrel makers even flat out say that they can't guarantee what pressures their barrels can take (unchambered blanks), and they accept no responsibility if you chamber/load them up too much, they just try to steer you to a profile that will hold up.

That’s some good info, thanks for sharing.
 
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