Curtis and Harvey black powder

They quit importing it some time in early 70's I got into shooting a couple of years before they quit importing it. My opinion is it was far superior to than Dupont. The gran size was more consistent and it burned cleaner. I think it was coated if I remember right. I had nothing but praise for it in revolvers. and rifles burned cleaner and left less fowling. I think it was made in scotland. after it was not available in the US it was still available in Canada.can't remember the year they quit production. it was a very old company, I wish I had the foresight to have bought several pounds and very sparingly used it you could buy it by five pound cans almost like a small keg. I no you guys probably won't agree with me, just remembering my good old days. Tom B

Stuff changes. It was good powder. And, I believe, sold under several various brand names. Today's available powders are excellent. Changing might require some adjustments on your part but Goex, Swiss and others will serve you well.

Yes it was a good powder I used it till they stopped manufacture in Scotland my first tin of 3FFg cost me Five shilling and Sixpence English old currency Image shown of their different grades
Feltwad

You have other good powders such as Olde Eynsford (by GOEX), Scheutzen, Wano, Graf's (by Wano) and KIK. Swiss and Olde Eynsford will burn the cleanest and most energy.

Real black powder may be hard to come by in some parts of the country, so you may be forced to use one of the substitutes such as Triple 7 or Pyrodex.

Back in the early 80s I bought 25lbs. of C and H in a gun store in Phenix City, Alabama for about $2/lb.. The fellow brought it out to me in a cardboard box. The box contained a plastic bag with 25lbs. of 3F in it. I had to go home and pour the powder into Goex cans that I had saved. I was sweating bullets the whole time. It was good powder.

it was marketed for the states under meteor brand. think Im write

Grenadier1758 said:

You have other good powders such as Olde Eynsford (by GOEX), Scheutzen, Wano, Graf's (by Wano) and KIK. Swiss and Olde Eynsford will burn the cleanest and most energy.

Real black powder may be hard to come by in some parts of the country, so you may be forced to use one of the substitutes such as Triple 7 or Pyrodex.

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thank you for the information . you certanly know your powders. Tom B

i guess you remember Curtis and Harvie quite well.

Feltwad said:

Yes it was a good powder I used it till they stopped manufacture in Scotland my first tin of 3FFg cost me Five shilling and Sixpence English old currency Image shown of their different grades
Feltwad

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Today, those empty cans are probably worth much more than you originally paid for them full.

Would not like too say how many empty C&H tins I have thrown away over the years
Feltwad

Rifleman1776 said:

Today, those empty cans are probably worth much more than you originally paid for them full.

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If you find a guy called Bill Curtis on one of the British militaria forums, he will be able to give you chapter and verse on C&H powder. The clue is in his surname

As a kid in the 1970's I bought Curtis's and Harvey Powder for my Pat 53. I still have a little half pound tin that held FFFg which I bought for my late fathers' Remington .44 I remember it being good clean burning powder.

We can dig through our copy of the Lyman First edition (1975) of their Black Powder Handbook. This is one where pressure was measured in either Lead Units of Pressure (LUP) or Copper Units of Pressure (CUP). The powders tested were Gearhardt Owen (Predecessor of GOEX) and Curtis and Harvey.

I will bring up a small section of the manual and one sample of a firing. Both tests were done with a 50 caliber 28" test barrel set up to use the crusher types of pressure measure. The ball was the same size for both tests, the lubrication was Crisco and the patch was 0.015". The only difference was the brand of powder. Both powders were 3fg granulation.

Gearhardt Owen 80 grains Velocity 1692 feet per second 11,400 LUP
Gearhardt Owen 90 grains Velocity 1796 feet per second 13,400 LUP
Curtis and Harvey 80 grains Velocity 1569 feet per second 6,700 LUP
Curtis and Harvey 90 grains velocity 1686 feet per second 7,290 LUP
Curtis and Harvey 100 grains Velocity 1782 feet per second 7,800 LUP

What I find very interesting is that 10 grains more C&H gives almost the same velocity at a much lower pressure. LUP can't be converted to PSI so we can't look at the second edition of the Handbook to compare much of anything. So I can speculate that C&H had a longer burn in the barrel to give an efficient boost to the velocity. It would more accurate since the recoil would be less than G-O so less flinching and better follow through.

Enough musing.

Curtis & Harvey was the only black powder offered in Georgian Bay, Canada in the 1950s. A pound cost C$1.10 and the preferred granulation for our farm guns was "#6" which was a FFFg equivalent. One thing I remember was the distinctive smell, rather like scorched ham, not at all rotten eggs which I have always associated with DuPont then later Goex. C&H burned clean and gave little problems with fouling. accuracy was always good--what's not to like?

Here is the little 1/2 lb tin, has a rubber pourer ! I remember buying several of these tins as a 12yr old for cap and ball P1030243 by Gordon Hazel, on Flickr