powder shelf life?

[bigmac]

I just got two cans of old goex bp one ffg and one fffg. My friends uncle passed away and lef him all his reloading equipment and this powder.He gave me the bp. Does bp go bad?

 

[rabjr]

BP will last forever as long as it is stored in a dry place. :thumbsup:

 

[wattlebuster]

What swampy said :thumbsup: An also save the empty cans when your done cause they will one day fetch a fair price

 

[MSW]

BP will last forever as long as it is stored in a dry place. :thumbsup:

the voices in my head tell me that the reasonable life expectancy of your blackpowder is 4,276 years and three months, give or take a week.

these voices are never wrong.

really! :rotf:


actually, the shelf life is considered to be indefinite.

 

[necchi]

I have been passed some Goex powder from a widow that kept her husbands stuff for years.

The stuff was clumpy, not wet at all but there was chunks in the can, I springkled it on the lawn,,
Makes good fertilizer, High in Nitrogen.

 

[Dphar]

I have been passed some Goex powder from a widow that kept her husbands stuff for years.

The stuff was clumpy, not wet at all but there was chunks in the can, I springkled it on the lawn,,
Makes good fertilizer, High in Nitrogen.

Shake the cans and the lumps will go back to grains.

Sealed in cans, or even in a bag if its kept dry, good BP does not go bad.
20 bucks or more a pound is 40000+ a ton for fertilizer.

Dan

 

[PreserveFreedom]

The 2F powder I have been using looks exactly like the can of 2F in your pic. My dad gave it to me in June. The date stamped on the bottom is 1977. No problems here.

 

[tom deinek]

Makes good fertilizer, High in Nitrogen.

Don't worry about shelf-life. Worry about adulteration.

"Widow has had it for years; birthday gift to her husband 17 years before he died from his drunkard half-cousin who was gonna use it in a Coehorn mortar they built on lunch hours at the plant but somebody bought the wrong granulation at the bp closeout sale when that gun store over in Otisville went BK in the end of the 1960's, I think. They were gonna shoot golf balls in it but didn't bore it out big enough. Or, that's what Clara thought when I visited her last month in the Home. Probably nothing wrong with it."

Throw that half a can on your compost heap.

 

[Tumblernotch]

It will last far longer than any of us will. Even if it gets damp it can be dried out. Back before and during the Civil War, it was common practice to empty kegs of powder onto tarps and allow the sun to dry out powder that had drawn dampness. If you're given powder that you're not absolutely sure of, you probably should empty it onto a clean sheet or something and inspect it for foreign objects or other types of powder mixed in. Especially if there is any sign of smokeless powder, get rid of it. Sometimes pieces of thread or some such item can get in a can and it can be picked out, but watch out for odd flakes or grains of powder and pieces of metal.

 

[Zonie]

Just in case bigmac doesn't know, smokeless powder can be gray, tan, charcoal or black in color. There may be more colors but the important thing to note is it can be charcoal or black, just like real black powder.

All of the smokeless I've used did have a peculiarity that does make it look different than regular black powder though.

It is often shaped into little cylindrical rods or flat flakes. I don't doubt that there may be some very round spherical shaped powders too but I have never seen smokeless powder that looks like it was crushed into odd broken little chunks like real black powder.

By the way, as long as there are no flames, sparks or glowing embers around black powder when it is laying on something, it is not dangerous.

You can handle it or drop it or even hit it with something hard that won't spark and it will just lie there. It also is not poisonous although I don't recommend eating it.

If you pour out the powder and you don't see some obviously manufactured shaped powder mixed in it is very likely safe to use.

Oh, if you have a "significant Other" it's probably best to not say your going to pour your black gunpowder out on the kitchen table.

Most of them have watched too many movies and they will start picturing one end of their house (notice it is not "your" house) disappearing in a large flash and a cloud of smoke.
Generally speaking, they take a very dim view of things like this. :grin:

 

[necchi]

Don't worry about shelf-life. Worry about adulteration.

Good point, cause I did try shooting some of that clumpy can, and it didn't act right. It just plain wasn't worth saving, :shake:

 

[Tumblernotch]

I should have pointed that fact out. The only smokeless I've been using is Hodgdons Clays powder and it's a grayish green flake. I used to use IMR 700x that was also a flake but closer in color to black.

 

[Tumblernotch]

Don't worry about shelf-life. Worry about adulteration.

Good point, cause I did try shooting some of that clumpy can, and it didn't act right. It just plain wasn't worth saving, :shake:

It's possible that while breaking up the clumps some of the fines got separated from the larger grains and some shots had more of them than others.

 

[paulvallandigham]

If you "inherit" powder that may be damp, or has "clumps" in it, you can save the powder by Screening it. Graf & Sons used to market a powder screening drum- and may still do.

But, you can buy the proper sized screen wire from McMasters.com for a few dollars, make a frame to hold the wire mesh, and separate out the larger powder granules from the "Fines", easily.

According to my Hodgdon Data manual, Black powder granulation is as follows:

Fg powder should not pass through 14 mesh( 14 wires per inch)
FFg powder should not pass through 24 mesh
FFFg powder should not pass through 46 mesh
FFFFg powder should not pass through 60 mesh.

Look for wire mesh made from brass or aluminum.

You probably will only need 2 screens: 24 mesh to sort out FFg; and 46 mesh to sort out FFFg from the "fines". All the fines can be used for priming flintlocks as "flash powder".

When my brother bought his drum from Graf & Sons, we used the drum to screen a couple of pounds of powder- one can new, and one can old that we inherited from our father. We got many more " Fines" from the older can of powder than we did from the new can. My brother then chronographed the powder from both cans, and compared them to the data he got from chronographing another can of new powder, bought at the same time, but which was not screened.

In both cases where he had screened the powder he got lower Standard Deviation of Velocity readings, compared to the unscreened new can of powder. Based on those results, he decided that screening the powder was a worthwhile exercise to get small MATCH grade groups.

He saved all the fines to use as priming powder, and some of those fines were way smaller than 60 mesh- giving a much faster flash when ignited. Since he would never put 4F powder in his barrel, the speed of the flash was exciting, but doesn't make a difference in group size.:hmm:

 

[Billnpatti]

As long as it is sealed tightly so no moisture can get into the can, it will last nearly forever. If moisture does happen to get into the can, it does not actually ruin the powder but it may cause it to clump. If this happens, you can gently break up the clumps and run the powder through a sieve to remove the large and small particles. Then your powder will be as good as new.

 

[mhb]

The real enemy of BP is moisture: if the powder is merely damp, it won't ignite or burn properly, but can sometimes be dried carefully and still used.
If it actually gets wet, however, the saltpeter (which is more soluble than the other two components) will be partially or wholly dissolved-out, destroying the usefulness of the powder, which depends on intimate and complete incorporation of the ingredients.
Powder which had been previously wet to the point that it no longer functioned properly was sometimes in earlier days 're-made' by returning it to the manufacturer who could properly dry it, make up lost saltpeter as needed, re-mill and re-finish it to new standard.
But keeping your powder dry is the best policy.
mhb - Mike

 

[necchi]

Everyone is right, even powder pulled from cannon barrels lifted from the bottom of the ocean from a wreck has been proven to be "valid".
In other words it's dried, the clumps broke down and it will burn,,
,,but to what degree of reliablity and proper preformance ??

If your really looking for superbe preformance in a hunting load or a target load is 20+ year old, comprimised powder really worth it?

Sure burn it up, have fun. But don't base the experiance to what the makers powder is capable of.

Like I said 1/2 a pound of old cruddy powder still makes good fertilizer.

 

[Tumblernotch]

That would be the best way to do it. Of course, it might not be worth the cost and work for someone with only a pound or two of powder that's clumpy.

 

[paulvallandigham]

I don't see how you can lose money owning a SQUARE FOOT of the proper size mesh to screen powder for the two most common sizes of powder. You might not use them today, but if you belong to any club, there will be others will will gladly "borrow" them for their powder, and you always have the chance to 'inherit" BP from friends, family, and acquaintances that know you are into the sport.

A friend who has No interest in shooting BP gave me some stuff- including a partial can of BP-- that he got from some relative,who had sold his BP rifle, and gotten out of the sport. I have a CVA short starter( I don't need), some kind of capper, and some odds and ends that can all be "blanket prizes" at some shoot.

 

[Nappers]

That's how I got my gun, from my Dad who got it from his cousin when he passed away. My dad gave it to me when he passed away along with a ton of BP accessories, minus possibles bag and horn.

I may get a hawken gun from a buddy at work for nothing as he has no need for it and it has no value to him whatsoever. He told me he'd use it as a bat in case someone broke into his house!

I said, I'm your man!