2F or 3F What did the Old Timers actually use?

[HardBall]

I've read where some claim that what we call "3F" today was considered "2F" back-in-the-day.

Is our 3F today truly what would have been considered 2F in the 1700s and 1800s?

Why the discrepancy between 2F/3F then and now?

When did this change happen and why?

 

From what I have read "rifle powder" in the 18th cent was more like a mix of fg and ffg today--say ffg. Even 20th century writings describe ffg as rifle powder, fffg as pistol powder and ffffg as priming powder. Ffg works fine as rifle powder and only recently has fffg become the darling for rifles, even over .50 calibers--many folks use it in .62s! It may be noted that muskets used this coarser powder for both prime and load. In the humid climate heah in Lousyanna I find fffg more reliable than ffffg in priming, and I use ffg alot in my over .50 rifles and guns.

 

[CWC]

Are you using the FFg for priming also? I wouldn't mind trying FFg in my .54, but I want to get good results priming with the same powder.

 

[HardBall]

Are the designations of 1,2,3 and 4F relatively new? Was powder classified as simply "rifle", "pistol", etc. before the Civil War?

 

I usually use fffg for priming, but I know folks that use ffg with no problems.

 

Are the designations of 1,2,3 and 4F relatively new? Was powder classified as simply "rifle", "pistol", etc. before the Civil War?

I think the "f" designations are older than the Civil War, but offhand I cannot tell you how old. I'll look it up.

 

[Stony]

From what I remember reading, prior to smokeless powder, black powder was classified as simply blasting, cannon, rifle and pistol if at all. There was no uniform standard as to how it was considered rifle or pistol. There were hundreds of small companies making BP just in America alone. One company's rifle grade powder was probably another's pistol grade and so on. It was only after 1900 that the standard f system was adopted for grading BP. Goex a few years ago added again to the mix by introducing their cartridge grade BP which appears to be about a 1.5f, why they couldn't just call it 1.5f is beyond me, just appears to be an attempt to get more of the cowboy action shooter's market.

And to answer your question, prior to the Civil War, what we now call 2f was the most popular grade, after the Civil War is really anyone's guess as cartridges became popular and I don't recall reading if people took them apart to see what kind or grade of powder was being used.

 

From what I have read, even the formula for BP wasn't standardized until 1781 (England), when the present ratio of charcoal, sulfur and saltpeter was arrived at. I have read that when Du Pont set up their BP plant in the US ca. 180something, they started sieving the powder and packaging it in "F" sizes: fg for muskets, ffg for rifles and fffg/ffffg for pistols. No mention of separate "priming powder". Prior to that time I believe that 'fg' and 'ffg' equivalents were pretty much the norm....

 

[Maverick3855]

I read in article in Godey's Ladies Book from 1861 discussing gunpowder (Why they were discussing it in a ladies magazine I'm not sure) but the designation of "Fine Grain" powder in "One fine grain, Two fine grain and three fine grain" were already being used.
There was also an even faster powder referred to only as "Sporting Powder" as well as another designation we no longer use called "LG" or "Large Grain".
That is the earliest reference to "Fine Grain" black powder I have uncovered.
That terminology has been used since at least 1861 however.
Maverick

 

[Mad Monk]

The grain sizes we use now, in the American grain sizing system, were introduced in 1836 as a means of standardizing grain sizes within the industry. They were not used as such until much later in that century.

Capt. Alfred Mordecai, in 1844-45 describes the grain sizing of various powders he tested as "even" or "uneven".

The type of powder, i.e., sporting, rifle or musket denoted differences in ingredient purity standards and differences in basic chemical burn rates.
With black powder they tailored the chemical reaction rates to best suit the type of arm the powder was to be used in.
In cannons you wanted the propelling force to be a large volume of gases at relatively low temperatures. In small-caliber sporting arms the best propelling force was a small volume of gas at a far higher temperature. This being controlled by the proportions of the ingredients and how finely the ingredients were ground during powder processing.

Back about 20 years ago I collected old powder samples and ran screen analysis on them. Comparing that to modern powders. All I did was to confirm and further explain what Mordecai had written.

I should point out that here in the U.S. the production of musket type powders ceased near the end of the Civil War. This left sporting and rifle powders in production. By the opening decade of the 20th century the production of sporting powder ceased, leaving only rifle type black powder in production.
With the Swiss in the U.S. market we now may choose between a rifle type (burn rate) powder (GOEX and Schuetzen)and a true sporting burn rate powder in the form of the Swiss powder.

Generally, a rifle powder was about 10% "stronger" than a musket powder and a sporting powder was at least 10% "stronger" than a rifle type powder.
In Europe, the "best sporting" powders were up to 20% stronger than a rifle burn rate powder.

The terms musket, rifle and sporting pre-date the introduction of uniform grain sizes. When powder was ordered for the Lewis & Clark expedition you see orders for "rifle powder" and "best rifle powder".

 

[HardBall]

So I guess it's safe to assume that the granulation size we call FFg today would have been considered "rifle powder" back-in-the-day? And what we call FFFg today might have been called "sporting powder" back then?

 

[paulvallandigham]

Or pistol powder. ( FFFg)