Swiss Powder Designation

[N.Y. Yankee]

What is the difference between Swiss 4f and Null-B? How are they used?

 

[Bassdog1]

Both are used as pan primer. Null B is very fine and is sold half pound in a 1 lb bottle. I have used both in a 32 CVA flint squirrel rifle that I owned and couldn't tell a difference in them. When I run out of Null B and 4F powder I will use 3F Swiss as I also find it to be excellent in the pan.

 

[Erwan]

That's right, I just use the 4F (Swiss Nr 1) for priming or with very small calibers like and for example .31...
The 3Fg (Swiss Nr 2) works also for priming but sometime with a small delay not very sensitive in normal use but sometimes a bit too long for target shooting...

 

[rodwha]

Depends on where you live. In Europe they use 4F in handguns. Note the designations of their previous powder bottles:



4F was used in Hazard’s paper cartridges during the Civil War. 36 grns of powder that was found to be energetic much like Swiss 4F and pushed a 211 grn bullet. It’s how they launched heavy bullets with smaller powder charges and still kept them potent and how they moved from the Dragoon to the ‘60 A

A museum curator disassembled late 19th century metallic cartridges and found many, even in the bigger calibers, to be loaded with 4F and even finer powders.

With energetic 3F powders I don’t see a need to use 4F though. Ruger stated their testing showed poorer performance with 4F compared to 3, but then they weren’t using Swiss.