Elephant black powder

[Mad Monk]

Almost forgot.
Tomorrow bright and early I'll be loading the bicycles for a 35 to 40 mile ride. May not get back until late in the evening. Any questions will have to wait.

 

[rabjr]

Thank you Mad Monk, I learned a lot about BP I did not know today. :hatsoff:

 

[Va.Manuf.06]

Paul, it is a great name, I figured it was just a slip in the memory. And thanks Mad Monk, excellent post with all kinds of GOD information, I really enjoyed the read! As far as the current cost of powder, I really do wonder why it isn't higher. As I said about the DuPont in 1960, it was somewhat less than two hours of minimum wage then - 65 cents/hour. If you make the same correlation today, the price is about the same, maybe a little less depending where you are and what is available. Oh, my "Meteor” can says "Made in Scotland", wish I had kept some of it, it was good powder. The C&H cans are all gone but I still have one empty DuPont can. Ah, nostalgia. Again, thanks for the posts on this subject, I know we all appreciate it. :bow:

 

[faw3]

Wish you had given us the long answer, and it's a great read. I wish youd been around when I was asking why they couldnt make powder like Curtis + Harveys #6 , ya the wood. Saw a guy shooting a twin 451 (org rifle) and nothing would get the barrels to print the same hole out to 80 or so yds but that, I still wonder why, why one powder would print bulls and all the rest throw lead all over. That C+H 6 was something else. :bow: Fred :hatsoff:

 

[ole berthey]

Man; I did'nt know that so much had happened to the BP business. I don't think I will complain about the price next time I buy BP. I also love to hear from people like MadMonk :bow: that knows what he is talking about. It's not hard to tell the differance between someone who knows and one who does'nt.
This is why I love this forum. Now who would have guessed that just a simple question like asking about Elephant powder would have gotten such a response. Just great, I Love it. :hatsoff:

 

[Mad Monk]

Ah Yes! The magical mysterious C&H #6.

For starters. The #6.
Around 1890 C&H switched to grain sizes similar to those we now use. Prior to that they had about 9 sizes that covered the size range of our 4.
In our grain size system the average grain size of 2F is half the average grain size of 1F. The average size of 3F is half the size of 2F.

A neat orderly system of regulating the amount of surface area in a specific weight of powder.

I would describe the C&H system as three quartering rather than halving.

When I looked at the raw materials and the production methods used by C&H and then looked at the same for the Swiss plant you see little difference. In the Swiss powder the 1&1/2Fg is very close in size to the C&H #6.

I had laid this on one of the well known BP cartridge shooters. He had the means to look at it with a chronograph and a pressure barrel. He had some original C&H #6. When he tested it against the Swiss powder he saw little difference in the gun.

By about 1880 to 1890 bp had reached its peak of perfection in the form of the very fast burning sportiong type powder. Some producers had a handle on the desired "moist-burning" while others did not.
C&H did as does the Swiss.

 

[renovato]

I never cease to be amazed at the ammount of knowledge offered freely on this site! Thanks Monk.

 

[Hunter300sav]

I had all of the problems everyone has mentioned and I also felt it produced less power charge for charge than Goex! While we're on the subject of crappy powders, I tried some Goex Pinnical this week end and it was just horrible :cursing: It didn't meter out of the powder measure It was inconsistant in muzzle report( I don't have a chronograph to measure velocity) And it was as dirty as cannon grade black powder to clean afterwards :shocked2: If any of you have thought about buying this expensive under performing substitute I advise against doing so! Take care Wes

 

[wulf]

gee,,nobody have anything to say that is good about Elephant powder??? I got some for my lady
to shoot...no problem..Some of the guys at the range complained about accurcy and sold all theirs
so I took some elephant from them and shot a five
shot group in the ten X ...I used my zoo and fired
from the bench at 25 yards. If it is hard to clean
that hasn't showed up because of my cleaning method. Murpphy's etc etc and we spray the loading
patches with that also which cleans the bore before the shot each time...final clean up is
minimal.Could be the climate...

 

[coehornboy]

A group of us here buys it in large quantities for our annual cannon shoot (cannon to ffff) 'cuz we get it for 8 bucks or so per can. No problems when used with a fuse or other ignition system. However, I can't talk about how it acts in a small arm... :v

 

[nuttbush]

Elephant works good for us War Between The States reenactors, we just pour about 50 grains down the barrel and set her off. Lots of smoke and noise, but it still fouls like heck. Quit using it with balls and shot.

 

[faw3]

Just got around to reading yours, dont know if its still on but I was looking at the Goex page (factory sheet ) on here last year and if you went thru all the hoops ect Express was the end product of what C+H had "the right tree" :winking: Fred :hatsoff: