Elephant black powder

[ole berthey]

I had a friend give me a pound can of elephant powder. I never heard of it,or saw it for sale anywhere. The can reads that it is made in Brazil and has a date on it that it was made in 08/1998. My question is the powder to old? or was it any good to start with. I always use Goex FF in my 54 RB. Do you think I could still plink around with it? :hmm:

 

[rabjr]

Yuk! dump it out! dump it out!

 

[Rebel]

Lawn fertilizer. Save yourself a lot of grief and dump it.

 

[RC]

the can will make a dandy target! gees, probably won't even have to empty it first! PLINK AWAY! RC :thumbsup:

 

[Tumblernotch]

It's not too old. Black Powder if stored correctly will last over a century. And despite the fact that the powder conniseurs on here say that it is trash, it is plenty good enough for plinking. In fact, I've seen some very good targets shot with it. Mind you, it's not as good as GOEX or Swiss and it may foul a little more, but I wouldn't throw it away if I had it. Just make sure it's not been damaged by moisture and hasn't had anything mixed with it. For a while several years ago, it was the only powder our club could get and we learned to deal with a little extra fouling. Like I said, shoot it and have some fun. Free powder is a good thing. A guy gave me some of that nasty Pyrodex and I didn't throw it away. Might even shoot it someday!
:thumbsup:

 

[Rebel]

I'd shoot Pyrodex a lot sooner than Elepant. The stuff fouls terribly, and is HARD to ignite.

 

save it for the spring time, your tomatos will love it in small doses.

 

[Gemoke]

I have a few pounds of the stuff. I use it in my cap locks but never in my flinters.I do`nt think you can even buy the stuff anymore.

 

[Birddog6]

You are about to learn 3 new things in BP by shooting that Elephant. 1: What fouling really is. 2: What a delayed ignition is. 3: When they sah "Shoot Elephant" they mean just exactly that. Sit the can up in a field & shoot the damn stuff ! :rotf:

I bought a whole case of it in 1998-99 or somewhere there. Took me 4 years to get rid of that manure. If I had to shoot Elephant like that all the time I would not even shoot BP. It was very accurate but it had the worst fouling I have ever seen in anything in 35 years of ML'ing......

I will say it was accurate & very accurate. But the fouling was Lots of it, big flakes & dry & hard to get out. I could change to Goex or Scheutzen & it was like the difference of night & day.

 

I second all said--terrible stuff. For a while all I could get locally was Elephant [and it works Ok in cartridges], but I had awful times with it in my flintlocks. Had to pull some loads and had many misfires. It is very fouling. I gave away all but one can of ffg--a batch I had not yet tried, but I have been afraid to try it! I may donate it to my cannon crew and blow it out the big bore! Oh, by the way, I was thrown off another site for saying this about the owners pet Elephant powder! He loved it (shot only percussions).

 

[Norskie]

I used a case of it back in the 80s and it worked fine. Don't know what changed, but the stuff you get now is real prone to fouling. I shoot GOEX these days.

 

[Chiefs50]

I am presently using a can of Elephant in my .50 cal. percussion rifle. It was the only thing I could get locally when I last needed powder. The only complaint I have is that it does create an awful lot of fouling. Other than that it performs beautifully.

 

[Mike Brooks]

I've got about a half a case left of elephant in 2ff and 3fff. It sucks in rifles as it fouls up so bad. I have had great sucess with the 3fff in flint shot guns. I use the 2ff in black powder breech loading shoot guns. Works great in both example. Mine was probably a batch from the mid nineties. I was buying it for about $4 a pound back then.

 

[hawkeye1755]

When i start ML, i got 6 pounds of Elephant BP fffg for the half price.
It was the worst fouling stuff that i ever had.I was so :cursing: :cursing: :cursing: ,that i take the rest of that stuff in an old wooden barrel and blow it up like in the old Pirate Movies. :grin:
5.5 pounds of BP makes a Big Bang. :shocked2:
I was a little surprised.But only a little.
Since that time a take only Swiss BP or Goex.
But Goex is hard to get in Germany.
:hatsoff:

 

[woodmaster62]

Hey Rowdy, :hatsoff:

My bro-in-law and I started out with Elephant 2f and 3f. My shooting has been with a 50 cal Great Plains caplock, and his has been with an assortment of caplocks and flintlocks. Other than some fouling it shot fine. We've used Dragon?(chinese brand) powder - we were glad when that was gone, it was worse than Elephant. Since then we have both went to Goex. Burns a little cleaner, and doesn't smell as bad as the Dragon.
As far as the age, give it a shot. If it was kept dry it should be good.

Have fun!! :thumbsup:
grumpy bear

 

[roundball]

For my Flintlock debut, I bought 5 cans of Elephant 3F with a date code of 1999, and 1 can of 4F with a different date...all based upon the pro-Elephant stuff I read on another forum from the same guy Mike was talking about.

Had mis fires, hang fires, terrible fouling, chunks of charcoal/wood left in the fouling, etc...could not continue the range session...was thoroughly disgusted to learn that "this is what shooting Flintlocks is all about"

Being economically minded, I tried it in a caplock the next Saturday...viola, same thing...so then I knew it had to be junk powder.
Bought some Goex and have never looked back...a 100% reliable, surperb price/performance powder and made right here in the good old USA.

I tried unsuccessfully to even give the Elephant away to local reenacters but couldn't find any takers...finally a couple years ago I poured out 4+3/4 cans of Elephant 3F in five 10' lines on the ground and set fire to them one at a time...it took many, many seconds for the flame to fizzle it's way along to the other end of a mere 10' line. (saved the cans just because)

Serious quality control problems...some lots were apparently manufactured OK, other lots were junk...my personal advice would be not to risk wasting your time, patches, balls, and gasoline to drive somewhere and plan to shoot ANY Elephant...get some Goex and you'll never regret it.

Moot point now, Elephant went out of business...

 

[SnakeRiverMatt]

Properly stored it will be fine. I have shot several pounds of elephant over the years with none of the mentioned problems.

 

everyone is saying bad things about elephant powder....to their credit they have a neat looking can.

 

[silverfox]

Rowdy. Enough said about Elephant. Send it back to Elephant Land. I was working with Boy Scouts about 2 or 3 weeks ago and they gave us Elephant to shoot. Had to pull more balls than I have had to pull in 50 years of shooting and all in one day. It does seem to work so so in shotguns and big bores if you clean every shot.
Get good name brand Black it's worth it. (GOEX)
Fox :thumbsup:

 

[patch knife]

Your friend GAVE you the powder . That should give you a clue . :haha: