Swiss Null B Powder

[stewart.leach]

At a time when all I had on hand was 2F I made up some priming powder by placing a teaspoon at a time between two sheets of typing paper and gently rolling a glass mayonnaise jar over the top fifteen or twenty times, from different angles. The resulting powder flowed through a brass priming flask valve with no problems.

 

[GREENSWLDE]

Hi Stewart, Don't know if you have ever watched the Sharp's Movie on TV but at one point Rifleman Hagman can be seen rolling powder down to give him faster ignition in his Baker.I think this was common practice in the Penincual as powder supplies were sparse. OLD DOG..

 

[TreeMan]

I’d try some FFFFFFFFFFx10,000 powder if it would help me with my flinch!

 

[dpasek]

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Powder Grade	Mesh Size	Average Size in mm.
Whaling	4 mesh	4.750 mm. (0.187 in.)
Cannon	6 mesh	3.35 mm. (0.132 in.)
Saluting (A-1)	10 mesh	2.0 mm. (0.079 in.)
Fg	12 mesh	1.7 mm. (0.0661 in.)
FFg	16 mesh	1.18 mm. (0.0469 in.)
FFFg	20 mesh	0.85 mm. (0.0331 in.)
FFFFg	40 mesh	0.47 mm.
FFFFFg	75 mesh	0.149 mm.

Note that the first 3 grades are intended for use with cannon. The A-1 grade is generally used for artillery blanks used for firing gun salutes. Fg is made for using in large bore rifles and shotguns (8-gauge and larger). FFg powder is used for historical small arms such as muskets, fusils, rifles and large pistols. FFFg powder is for smaller caliber rifles (below .45 caliber), pistols, cap-and-ball revolvers, derringers etc. FFFFg and FFFFFg are mostly used as priming powder for flintlocks. In the image above, the two grades of powder were intended to be used in a historical re-enactment and the FFg powder was meant for the main powder charge of a flintlock rifle, while the FFFFg powder was intended to be used in the pan of the flintlock as a priming powder.

This chart has some info that I had not seen before. TY for posting. I have one comment though: The column headed as "Average Size" is actually the *maximum" size that will pass the specified mesh screen shown in the column to the left. The average size will be smaller. But the 'average' size is not really very helpful. Particle sizes are usually given as what will pass a specified screen mesh and be retained on another smaller screen mesh. For example, I have seen FFg designated as '16-30' or '-16 +30'

 

[dpasek]

I’d try some FFFFFFFFFFx10,000 powder if it would help me with my flinch!

Just grind up some of your 2F with a mortar and pestle. Watch your eyebrows! Pyros use what is called meal D, and sometimes use literal airfloat dust for making burst charges by coating the dust onto rice hulls.

 

[M. De Land]

I'm not a flintlock shooter but have watched a lot of videos on shooting muzzleloaders to try to pick up tips. A couple of flintlock shooters have mentioned using Swiss Null B in the primer pan, claim it ignites faster than 4F. I don't personally have any experience with it as I'm strictly a cap lock shooter, just curious.

Well what seems like instantaneous to the senses can actually have a large difference in millisecond count. I know the focus cap ignition of percussion guns is faster but still I can't say for sure that I can tell the difference in speed of ignition in a properly operating flint gun.
I'm sure it shows up on target though as I shoot higher scores with the cap guns and as far as I can tell I'm not flinching with either. The added milliseconds of time before the ball leaves the muzzle translates to more movement off target .