Powder purchase FTF?

fabsroman said:

The thing that really bugs the hell out of me is that there is no carve out for a storage area outside of a residence. For instance, why can't I store more than 5 pounds of powder in a tool shed a specified minimum distance from a dwelling?

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I guess it comes down to the legal definition of "possess" and "store" as applied to this law. For weapons, IIRC, you're "in possession" if the weapon is on your body or in your immediate physical domain. Otherwise the you'd be unlawfully in possession of a pistol, while at the grocery store, of a gun that's back home in your safe. Then again, maybe I shouldn't be giving the MDAG or AACO SA any ideas.

The scope of "store" is ambiguous, too.

Shamr0ck said:

I thought the powder log had long been done away with...


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I think you're thinking of the ammo log which was never a law in the first place but the brain child of the MSP.

Allen65 said:

I guess it comes down to the legal definition of "possess" and "store" as applied to this law. For weapons, IIRC, you're "in possession" if the weapon is on your body or in your immediate physical domain. Otherwise the you'd be unlawfully in possession of a pistol, while at the grocery store, of a gun that's back home in your safe. Then again, maybe I shouldn't be giving the MDAG or AACO SA any ideas.

The scope of "store" is ambiguous, too.

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My guess is something along the lines of access. A felon can own guns, but they can’t ever be in possession/access last I checked. A gun store could hold my guns if I was convicted and I don’t suddenly lose my property rights to the guns. I just can’t touch them. I can still have the store sell them, transfer ownership to a buddy, etc.

Allen65 said:

The metal cans aren't as unsafe as you might think. The thin sheet metal would tear and the cap would strip off long before pressure would build enough to accelerate the deflagration rate of the propellant significantly. Nitrocelluose's burn rate ramps up significantly with pressure, which is what makes it a good, safe propellant. It burns relatively slowly at room pressure (unlike black powder), but at chamber pressures it quickly burns to create a high pressure mass of gas to move a projectile.

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Exactly.

Heck, a loaded round, not in the chamber of a firearm is a big POP and the case just splits.

Shamr0ck said:

I thought the powder log had long been done away with...

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SOME retailers still do them.

Bass Pro did last time I bought powder from them.

There's definitely some kind of shenanigan level logistics for retailers and powder in MD.

There was a thread on here a few years ago about Dicks Sporting Goods dropping Black powder stuff because they goofed up on some record keeping or something, so the story was.

A short time after that thread I was in DSG in Bel Air gawking at something in the aisle when the guy next to me goes "Where dah fuq is the black powder primers" and then he asks the sales guy, who says they don't carry it anymore. Dude starts babbling about "Ohh yeah, it's that new federal law" and the sales guy just nods away. LOL

I think he told him to go to Autumn Sky Outfitters or Bass Pro.

lazarus said:

Yeah, that bothers me too. I’ve got a perfectly good shed 200ft from my house. No reason I couldn’t store 5lbs out there too. Or more. Or heck, what if you had two homes.

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I wouldn’t recommend storing powder outside for any amount of time. Any moisture that builds up from temperature changes and that powder won’t be the same.

fabsroman said:

The thing that really bugs the hell out of me is that there is no carve out for a storage area outside of a residence. For instance, why can't I store more than 5 pounds of powder in a tool shed a specified minimum distance from a dwelling?

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Hmmm, not sure how the laws read, but when I was doing High power rocketry, post 9/11, we had to obtain a LEUP, Then we had to have magazine storage. Here is where it got stupid. In order to meet min distances from homes, roads ect you basically had to live out in the middle of nowhere. This was a problem for a LARGE percentage of the folks who did rocketry. Now, if you had a friend who had a magazine, you ould get contingency storeage in their magazine, but this lead to all sorts of BS as far as logs ect. HOWEVER, if you had a seperate building, you could get a "portable " magazine, as long as building was locked. My shed in Reisterstown met the requirements! It was not attached to my home, locked, my small magazine had 6 tumbler lock, was non sparking ect ect ect, blah blah blah. Now, because I bought what I needed and flew it, I only had to keep purchase and disposal logs, and my magazine logs read inspected, and no materials were ever stored. It was a total PITA having to meet requirements for inspections, ect. Knowing and allowing BATF could stop by my home ANYTIME they desired, had to keep keys secured, (locked in my gun safe) and living with the fact IF someone ever broke into my shed, and walked off with my magazine, it was only maybe 24x18x18 12ga steel, I'd have to treat it as if they got a hold of explosives even if it was empty, was annoying. Why was it better than my safe bolted to my floor?

Anyway, That MAY be an option, like I said I'm not sure how laws read about powder vs low explosive. I dont keep more than a couple lbs anyway.

SgtKope said:

I wouldn’t recommend storing powder outside for any amount of time. Any moisture that builds up from temperature changes and that powder won’t be the same.

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Yeah, I've had a 4 pound container of Clays in my parents' shed for over a decade and I've just got around to using it. Every shell has gone bang so far. Granted, it was still a sealed container. Plenty of temperature changes in my basement too where I do my reloading.

Think we would need to look at how condensation occurs inside a sealed powder bottle, if it occurs at all, before we start jumping to conclusions about storing powder outside in a non-climate controlled area.

Have to wonder how they stored powder 200+ years ago when there wasn't electricity or climate control, other than a fireplace/stove.

lazarus said:

My guess is something along the lines of access. A felon can own guns, but they can’t ever be in possession/access last I checked. A gun store could hold my guns if I was convicted and I don’t suddenly lose my property rights to the guns. I just can’t touch them. I can still have the store sell them, transfer ownership to a buddy, etc.

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I seriously doubt a felon can own guns.

Need to look at something called constructive possession.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/constructive_possession

https://goldsteinmehta.com/blog/constructive-possession

After reading the law in post 6, if it's not in the original containers, the 5 lb limit doesn't apply. That makes No F sense.

It is unlawful to transfer the powder into a different container.

Powder purchase

I know this has probably been brought up before concerning powder. Can powder be stored in a non-climate controlled outbuilding and maintain the same shelf life of powder stored inside with climate control?

Cuddlefish said:

I know this has probably been brought up before concerning powder. Can powder be stored in a non-climate controlled outbuilding and maintain the same shelf life of powder stored inside with climate control?

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Probably not. But that's not to say that powder kept in non-climate-controlled conditions is going to go bad in a hurry. Plenty of powder as fixed ammo stored over the years by .mil was not kept in climate-controlled conditions and there are plenty of people on this forum who probably reload in their non-climate-controlled garage. Several years ago a dealer in the Arnold area kept powder out in a Connex container, non-climate-contolled. The cans developed some corrosion on the outside but it still went bang.

If I had to store it in an outside shed though, I'd dig a root-cellar in the floor and keep it in that inside a cooler with some desiccant.

K31 said:

Probably not. But that's not to say that powder kept in non-climate-controlled conditions is going to go bad in a hurry. Plenty of powder as fixed ammo stored over the years by .mil was not kept in climate-controlled conditions and there are plenty of people on this forum who probably reload in their non-climate-controlled garage. Several years ago a dealer in the Arnold area kept powder out in a Connex container, non-climate-contolled. The cans developed some corrosion on the outside but it still went bang.

If I had to store it in an outside shed though, I'd dug a root-cellar in the floor and keep it in that inside a cooler with some desiccant.

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If sealed with an oring, moisture isn’t really an issue. Heat can be. Most powders will break down in heat over time. Now, 90F for a few years probably won’t cause a single issue. 110F for decades will for most powders. Look at a lot of the Somali and Ethiopian ammo. It cause the powder to break down in to different sizes so burn rates are inconsistent (often too fast). Can also cause primer issues.

Ideal is sealed container at about 40F.

Chemical reactions double about every 10F.