Smokey in Oz said:
Guys,
some advice please?
I've noticed most around here tend to use 2F or 3F. Whats' 4F like? I can get a few tins but the bloke cant tell me whether it's safe to use.
Can I use it in my 50cal Hawken PRB with reduced loads. I currently run 60 grains of Swiss for 100 yards at paper targets. I'm not sure whether it will be too fast burning for what I'm shooting. :hmm:
Your knowledge would be appreciated.
Smokey.
I use Goex 4F as my priming powder, suspect I always will...extremely fast, consistent, and not loading from a horn I don't mind carrying a small pan primer in my shirt pocket.
NOTE:
I personally ran tests with a can of Elephant 4F, using it as main charges in .45/.50/.54/.58cals and posted the results here within the past few months...it works just as well as any other granulation like 3F or 2F with two notable observations:
1) It is so fine that when seating a ball firmly and quickly with one big power stroke like I normally do, the compressed air blew a lot of the fine 4F out of the vent, and for the first few shots until I discovered this, I thought using 4F as a main charge was erratic....but that was not the case at all...when I plugged the vent with a pipe cleaner and seated the ball more slowly, the 4F charges were extremey accurate for all three weekends of tests, very consistent, and very, very little fouling.
2) I experimented with 30, 40, and 50 grains just for 25 and 50yd targets...the 30grn charge was pretty much of a powder puff load that you hardly knew you were shooting;
The 40grn charge was a good 50yd target load and it began to feel like something actually going off;
The 50grn charge showed signs of a good 'report' and recoil like my normal 50grn target loads of Goex 3F;
Since I was mainly burning up a can of Elephant 4F to get rid of it, and to experiment with 4F main charges to be able to speak from actual first hand knowledge, I used up all the powder over different weekends using different caliber rifles and did not do any detailed testing with 60grns or larger...based upon the tests that I did run, I'd suspect recoil/pressure spiking would start to become an issue.
In summary, if somebody gave me a free can of 4F to play with at the range, I'd go shoot it without hesitation using the 40-50grn charges I mentioned...I would not intentionally buy it for that purpose due to the issue of the fine 4F blowing out of the vent unless you plug while loading...and I would never use it for hunting as 4F attracts moisture so rapidly...but it was great for targets at the range.
