Lightest powder by volume or most bulky?

Of the available fast burning powders, which one take up the most space in a case, given the same charge weight?

The lightest powder based (bulky) on volume I know of is Clays. Any lighter?

A resized .45 ACP case will contain the following by weight, when filled to neck . Based on my scales and WW brass my findings so are:

12.3 gr Clays
13.7 gr WST
15.3 gr VV N310
15.9 gr BE

Anyone have or know of a powder which said volume would weigh less?

MJ

Clays is (primarily) a shotgun powder. So other shotgun powders that exhibit bulkiness are 700X and Red Dot. There maybe others. James Chapman can guide some as he’s been a longtime shotgun shooter.

Wobbley wrote:Clays is (primarily) a shotgun powder.  So other shotgun powders that exhibit bulkiness are 700X and Red Dot.  There maybe others.  James Chapman can guide some as he’s been a longtime shotgun shooter.

edited to read "fast" powders. Bulkiness is rather useless term without a measurement. Do you have any 700X or Red Dot? If so could you fill a resized .45 ACP case, then weigh the volume, and post result, or PM me the findings? Thanks. MJ

Trail Boss is the least dense of all the typical target pistol powders by a significant margin. Titegroup, PP and HP38 are the most dense.

Based on my powder measure records here are the powders I've measured from least to most dense with my value of Grains per Rotation of my powder measure.

Powder - Relative Density
Trail Boss - 0.38
Clays - 0.57
Solo 1000 - 0.62
N310 - 0.68
N320 - 0.69
WST - 0.69
N330 - 0.77
Bullseye -  0.78
HP38 - 0.90
Power Pistol - 0.93
Titegroup - 0.98

Excellent. But Clays among most dense? Wouldn't that be among least dense?  Other than that comment, your info supports my findings with Clays, BE, WST and VV N310.  Trail boss, makes sense, light cowboy loads. Any knowledge on how consistent Trail Boss meters? Thank you.

When I was looking through my notes I found this .pdf of volumetric density for lots of powders.

https://leeprecision.com/cgi-data/instruct/VMD.pdf

SteveT wrote:When I was looking through my notes I found this .pdf of volumetric density for lots of powders.

https://leeprecision.com/cgi-data/instruct/VMD.pdf

Thanks!

Allgoodhits wrote:Any knowledge on how consistent Trail Boss meters? Thank you.

It meters and shoots great. If I ever get time I want to work up and test 50 yd loads using it. For now 4grs is my 25yd lead load and the little bit of 50 yd testing I did looked really good. FWIW 4 grains nearly fills the case.

Allgoodhits wrote:Excellent. But Clays among most dense?

Sorry, my mistake. Should have been Titegroup. I fixed it in the post above.

Trailboss, don't sneeze while loading!
Stuff could use a lot more research!

SteveT wrote:

Allgoodhits wrote:Any knowledge on how consistent Trail Boss meters? Thank you.

It meters and shoots great. If I ever get time I want to work up and test 50 yd loads using it. For now 4grs is my 25yd lead load and the little bit of 50 yd testing I did looked really good. FWIW 4 grains nearly fills the case.

I don't have any Trail Boss, but I reached out to a friend and he claims it takes about 8.2 gr of Trail Boss to fill a .45 ACP case. You indicate 4 gr nearly fills a case. By nearly do you mean half full?

This is a chart Lee puts out to give a re-loader a good starting spot for each load. It also tells you which powders weigh the most (or the least) for a given volume of space. Pick any size collet and see what powder (by weight) you can get into it. This chart has most of the powders BE shooters use.

VV Tin Star is a bulky, case filling powder with a burn rate between N320 and N340. Designed for cowboy action cartridges. Have not tried it yet in a semi auto.

kashaV wrote:VV Tin Star is a bulky, case filling powder with a burn rate between N320 and N340.  Designed for cowboy action cartridges.  Have not tried it yet in a semi auto.

Thanks. The problem with burn rate charts is that they are not quantified. Only indicates that one is faster than another. A density list that someone provide is quantified.

MJ

Lee chart as Len provided

Anyone tried Alliant E3 .45 acp target loads?

YRMV, but I found Aliiant e3 an excellent powder in .45 ACP with 185 or 200 gr lead, cast or swaged bullets. I like Bayou Bullets best in that line.

For me 3.6 gr Alliant e3 is about the same powder measure setting (volume) as is about 3.7 gr of Clays. Clean burning and accuracy at 50 yds quite good at 1.75" or so. I have not yet found a great recipe with 185 JHP and Alliant e3, but around 3.9 - 4.1gr should be it. More testing.....

When I started reloading 45acp I used Clays with great success but when it became impossible to find I switched to WST.  I remember really liking the felt recoil of the Clays and I shot a 1 1/4" 10 shot group with it off a rest where 7 shots completely fit under a quarter.  It's been available again for a while now so it may be time to give it another try.
- Dave

dronning wrote:When I started reloading 45acp I used Clays with great success but when it became impossible to find I switched to WST.  I remember really liking the felt recoil of the Clays and I shot a 1 1/4" 10 shot group with it off a rest where 7 shots completely fit under a quarter.  It's been available again for a while now so it may be time to give it another try.
- Dave

Like wise had good success with Clays, and have used a lot of WST too. Due to some of the resent past shortages, I have started branching out to the uncommon powders, or more accurately, the unchosen. Clays has a density of .1462 and Alliant E3 is .1489. FYI, WST is .1205 . What this means is that by equal volume, not weight, E3, Clays and WST will weigh light to heavier respectively. If you cannot get Clays, simply use the same powder measure setting and drop E3. It will probably weigh about 1 - 1.5/10ths  less by volume, but is an excellent choice for 185 -200 grain lead or coated bullets.

~ Martin