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I read this today from an extinguished member of a major gun forum:

«I contacted Hodgdon and they told me you don't need published data to load any caliber with Trail Boss. They told me to make a line where the bottom of the bullet will seat, then fill the case to the line. Weigh the powder and that's your Max charge and reduce the charge by 10% to get your starting charge. Like said above do not break up the powder or compress it. Pressures will spike quite quickly if you do. »

Seems like strange advice from Hodgdon. I'll stick with published loads, though.

Man, I don't want to be next to that guy at the range

Rodentman wrote:I read this today from an extinguished member of a major gun forum:

Link? (I want to read the commentary)

"extinguished" .... ?

GregM wrote:"extinguished" .... ?

With his load info, that word is very fitting.

Its trail boss. Have you seen the stuff? its doughnut shaped. You might actually be able to follow that advise.

http://www.gunblast.com/IMR_TrailBoss.htm

People load that stuff in .308 to do subsonic loads.

Jon

JFettig wrote:Its trail boss. Have you seen the stuff? its doughnut shaped. You might actually be able to follow that advise.

http://www.gunblast.com/IMR_TrailBoss.htm

People load that stuff in .308 to do subsonic loads.

Jon

The problem is there are id10ts out there that if they hear this advice, will use the same method of calculating the max loads for other powders. I can think of a few that could be problematic, like Bullseye, 700X Win231.
Fill a 38special case with any of these and the only way I would touch it off is in your gun with a string tied to the trigger from the insade of a bunker. We're talking hand grenade here!

Nearly word for word from the pdf on the Hodgdon website, although the posted instructions recommend using 70% as the starting load.

Trail Boss reduced loads for rifle and pistol

People are going to blow their **** heads off.

Once again, I just don't really have the urge to go "UHHHHHHUUUUUUUUNNNNNNHHHHHH!!! and produce a full grown cow on the spot. SASS is as far as I know is shooting ALL original black powder cartridges, WITH loads that replicate the power that you got with black powder. The point here is that ALL those old black powder cases WERE designed to be filled up with black powder to begin with. So coming out with a smokeless powder thast mimics the volume of Black powder is probably a pretty good idea from a product standpoint, and smokeless powder is a hell of a lot less dangerous than black powder to work with.

About the only quibble I would have, and Hodgdon has probably covered this base, is what happens if you DO compress a load slightly or a lot. Black powder is VERY different from smokeless, because it has a fixed burning rate of about 1,000 FPS and that's it. Smokeless powder has a burning rate that is dependent on pressure, so a load can go critical and blow the gun. With black powder you could overload 45-70 loads a bit, but all that would do is make the rifle kick more, and the powder didn't burn any faster as a result of the overload.

So, apart from that, it looks like an interesting product. As far as the yahoo and noob factor is concerned, the home base for this powder is the SASS group, who can probably recite the velocities of their reloads to you from memory, and newcomers there are already hardened black powder gun enthusiasts or they wouldn't be shelling out all that money for the replica clothing. And if you get a REAL noob (like one who CAN make me have a cow on the spot), how much more likely is it that they will load up a 45LC case with Bullseye rather than Trail Boss, as compared to loading up a 45LC case with Bullseye rather than black powder?? Don't have an answer for that, but I doubt there's much of a difference. Blind ignorance tends to be pretty generic.

And finally, SASS loads are ALL low pressure, so it's not like we're talking about 500 Smith factory loads, and as far as I know, the guns are all modern replicas that are quite strong. You could shoot SASS with an original Colt post-Civil War revolver, but who is going to want to risk or put more wear on a $25,000 museum piece?? At this point, all of the originals are just too freaking expensive to be used for weekend shooting.

So: Strong guns, weak loads, veteran shooters and reloaders who like the old cartridges. Compared to some of the lethal junk floating around on the internet, Trail Boss and its instructions seem relatively mild.

The thread was on THR. I can't post a link now since I cannot access that forum from work. Somehow, I CAN get on THIS forum!

I use Trail Boss powder for light loads with lead in .44 spl and .38 spl. I follow published loads, however. I like that powder for this purpose, and have good loads which don't lead the barrel.

Here is the link:

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=526209

There are a few SASS shooters useing originals, Some even shooting open tops and conversions.
In all they are some pretty low pressure rounds, But with a maximum pistol MV of 1000fps(SASS rules) I would think a 250gr bullet in 45 Colt pushed to 1000fps would be a healthy load useing other smokless powders.
The most common calibers would be 38/357 and 45Colt with a few 38/40, 44/40, 44Russian, 44spl and 44mags and
45 Schofield.