Skip to main content
Help Center Community Shop

Black Powder Substitute

wfk
Been using Pyrodex for a number of years and came across American Pioneer Powder which claims to eliminate sulfur corrosion, fouling, the rotten egg smell and cleans up tap water. Sounds to good to be true. Anybody had any experience with this BP replacement good or bad. Thanks in advance

Walt
0

Comments

5 comments

Date Votes
  • He Dog
    No. 777 is great though.
    0
  • Raoul
    I'll go along with He Dog. I've used Goex, Swiss, Pyrodex, Clean Shot, Clear Shot, and 777. Of the black powder substitutes, I think 777 is the best. Triple 7 is a lot hotter than the others, however, so start with loads 25% to 30% by volume lower, and work up from there. If you have questions about 777, go to their web site or call on the phone. They are very helpful, and can guide you to a good equivalent load for your gun.
    0
  • mazo kid
    American Pioneer is the same as Clear Shot (or is it Clean Shot?) Same powder, new name. It is a bit hotter than black so adjust accordingly. I just bought a pound of it but haven't used it yet. It will be interesting to do a comparison of AP and black. Emery

    "Well done is better than well said"
    Ben Franklin
    0
  • Raoul
    I thought that American Pioneer was the name the new distributor of either Clean Shot or Clear Shot was using, but I wasn't sure which one it was. I generally liked Clear Shot pretty well. It seems to be small spheres, dosen't clump together, and pours well. It's also pretty consistent. Clean Shot was cleaner burning than Clear Shot, but would clump together into a solid lump in the can if you didn't use it quickly. Clean Shot would also have a lot of extremely fine powder in the bottom of the can, so it was very inconsistent in burning rates.

    From my experience with 777 so far, I like it the best. It performs well, is very consistent, pours well, and is reasonably clean burning. It is hotter than the others however. As an example, I have a custom made Hawken in .40 cal with a 1:14 twist barrel. I usually shoot a 400 grain lead bullet with 65 grains of Goex ff. With 50 grains of ff 777, it seemed to have more punch than with 65 of Goex. With 55 grains of 777, it would actually blow the hammer back to the half-cock notch on every shot. I called Hodgdon, and they recommended 40 to 50 grains of 777, with 50 being a maximum load. As far a cleaning: with Goex I had to clean the bore on every second shot, or it was almost impossible to load the third bullet; with 777 I could fire about 20 shots before I had to clean the bore. Give it a try.
    0
  • hornet
    I have been useing Clean shot for a couple of years now. I just bought a can of the American Pioneer. I still have some of the Clean shot left so I will use it up before going to the New name American Pioneer can.
    I use the stick powder instead of the loose in my T/C Omega. It makes clean ups after shooting a snap, about 4 pass with a patch and my barrel is clean. In my muzzleloader it is the most accurait powder I have ever used. On several groups of 3 shots at 100 yards I had the holes touching each other. And the best part I can shoot about 20-25 shots before I notice the bullets are getting a little tight to load. A few spit patches down the tube and I am ready to shoot again. If you use American Pioneer( same thing as Clean Shot) you will be very happy with it.

    Hornet.
    0

Please sign in to leave a comment.

Recent Activity