Using Old Powder??

[trickg]

That's info I just learned, regarding IMR 3031.

Again, for me, it may just be an abundance of caution - but when it's involving a controlled explosion close to my face, I'm going to err on the side of caution.

Old powder if anything becomes less powerful over time, so there's very little chance of a kaboom with old powder. If anything, you just wouldn't get top velocities you'd normally expect.

With that said, Alliant has a batch of Unique that was produced in the late 1800s that they test now and again - it still burns at original spec.

I get it though, and with reloading, it's always best to be safe rather than sorry.

 

[DealeBill]

Thanks all. Wanted to start some discussion and see where it went. Enjoy this forum for all the info that is shared. The cans are indeed the original unadulterated powder. TrickG is correct that powder becomes less powerful over time. Look up the powder used in the 18 inch guns of the Missouri Class battleships and you will learn a lot about powder degredation. Thanks all!

 

[My Toy]

So long as whomever was alive and could tell me its the right powder in there, good enough. Maybe I wouldn't accept powder from an enemy or disgruntled neighbor, or the dude whose wife I was banging.

Now handloads, I'd only shoot from someone I trusted a lot. So many ways to accidentally screw that up. Powder in a container? You'd have to be doing something deliberately dumb or malicious, especially to not remember you swapped what powder was in there, or were trying to "mix your own blend".

It doesn't have to be a deliberate act. Carelessness. I had Sid Goodling (PA expert gunsmith rest his soul) build a couple of rifles for me. In his shop he had a beautiful rifle on display which the action and first part of barrel was literally shredded. I asked him about it one time and he said a handloader was loading pistol rounds with 2400. Got distracted and when switched to loading for that rifle changed over everything but the powder. KABOOM.

 

[lazarus]

It doesn't have to be a deliberate act. Carelessness. I had Sid Goodling (PA expert gunsmith rest his soul) build a couple of rifles for me. In his shop he had a beautiful rifle on display which the action and first part of barrel was literally shredded. I asked him about it one time and he said a handloader was loading pistol rounds with 2400. Got distracted and when switched to loading for that rifle changed over everything but the powder. KABOOM.

Yes, but to store a different powder in a container takes a deliberate action. Or that "accident" requires someone to almost be an idiot. You'd have to regularly store powders in different containers, which is an incredibly stupid thing to do. Or you'd need to be working with multiple powders at the same time and accidentally put the powder from a dispenser back into the wrong container. Which, same deal. Takes a level of extreme negligence that is effectively deliberate.

Killing someone while drunk driving you can argue is negligence. But you took a deliberate action you knew or should have known made it likely you were going to get in to an accident and could kill someone.

If you do NOT remember that you are swapping powders into different containers, same deal. That's effectively a deliberate action intended to cause bad things to happen.

 

[Biggfoot44]

Good thing the OP has two cans of the Same powder , so he can compare that they are the same .