Dirty brass

oldrodder

oldrodder

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One of my grandsons, who is new to shooting, bought himself a Marlin GG in 45-70. He also picked up several boxes of Barnes "Pioneer" ammo and to "make brass" for reloading! When he brought it over to reload, the empties were very dirty. Now, if these were reloads, I would blame a low powder charge not generating enough pressure to seal the chamber. Anyone else experience this with this ammo?
 

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oldrodder said:
One of my grandsons, who is new to shooting, bought himself a Marlin GG in 45-70. He also picked up several boxes of Barnes "Pioneer" ammo and to "make brass" for reloading! When he brought it over to reload, the empties were very dirty. Now, if these were reloads, I would blame a low powder charge not generating enough pressure to seal the chamber. Anyone else experience this with this ammo?
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yomomma said:
ONe would think the were black powder rounds at first glance
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I"d clean that gun in a hurry.
 
That's certainly bizarre...I've reloaded for many calibers/cartridges, and never in any of the lowest or lightest powder puff charges have I seen a case that sooty and smoked up. According to Barnes Pioneer ammo page, it's either a 300 grain bullet going 1,900 fps or a 400 going 1,700 fps. Should be enough jam to not see any soot or smoke smudge at all.

Edit to add: Did he throw the brass in a ziplock and there was still snow or water on the brass?
 
saskgunowner101 said:
That's certainly bizarre...I've reloaded for many calibers/cartridges, and never in any of the lowest or lightest powder puff charges have I seen a case that sooty and smoked up. According to Barnes Pioneer ammo page, it's either a 300 grain bullet going 1,900 fps or a 400 going 1,700 fps. Should be enough jam to not see any soot or smoke smudge at all.

Edit to add: Did he throw the brass in a ziplock and there was still snow or water on the brass?
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No to both. Empties are stored in a plastic jar.
Subsequently, we cleaned the brass and loaded 5 test rounds each with H-322, Varget, IMR 4198 & 5744. The empties came out of the rifle as clean as they went in!
 
I'd say they were shot with black powder last too!
The green gives it away. Smokeless doesn't turn green.
Clean that barrel well with hot water and window cleaner with ammonia in it. Then clean it like a normal gun.
 
oldrodder said:
One of my grandsons, who is new to shooting, bought himself a Marlin GG in 45-70. He also picked up several boxes of Barnes "Pioneer" ammo and to "make brass" for reloading! When he brought it over to reload, the empties were very dirty. Now, if these were reloads, I would blame a low powder charge not generating enough pressure to seal the chamber. Anyone else experience this with this ammo?
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Did he clean the gun well before he started shooting those pioneer rounds?

Couple things - if the Pioneer rounds are made for "levers and revolvers," they're not going to be loaded to high pressures. They're likely using a full case of a relatively slow-burning powder, which makes them safe for handguns and older rifles, but they won't seal your chamber as well, and will cause soot etc. on your brass. I get this sometimes (though not as bad as you did) when I load light for cast lead plinking.

If the gun was new and still has grease/oil/rust inhibitor or whatever in the chamber, this will also cause a bad seal and get you dirty, sooty brass. Most people clean and patch out the bore, but don't always thoroughly scrub and dry out the chamber - it's not so easy to do in lever guns because you're cleaning from the muzzle end, or using a pull-through system. The chamber should never have any oil or clp or whatever in it when you shoot.

If I were a betting man, I'd say that mess is some combination of the above.

Not saying this is your issue, but it's something to consider.

Sounds like your hand loads are coming out fine now, so either way, I wouldn't worry about it too much.
 
oldrodder said:
No, these were factory rounds. After reloading, they sealed well. No dirty brass. Grandson still has a few rds of 300 gr & 400 gr. We will pull them to look at the powder charge.
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If you have a chrony, I'd check the speed of them to see if they are a cowboy action load. Aren't those supposed to be sent downrange slower than hunting type? I'm just punching holes as I'm still trying to find one before I go down the rabbit hole.
 
oldrodder said:
One of my grandsons, who is new to shooting, bought himself a Marlin GG in 45-70. He also picked up several boxes of Barnes "Pioneer" ammo and to "make brass" for reloading! When he brought it over to reload, the empties were very dirty. Now, if these were reloads, I would blame a low powder charge not generating enough pressure to seal the chamber. Anyone else experience this with this ammo?
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Well, they were either low pressure reloads, meant for a weaker action, such as the Springfield Trapdoor rifles, or they may have been loaded with "black powder" as mentioned by Yomama
 
I'm a bit late to the party here but I'm in agreement with RJ on low chamber pressure causing that mess. Except for the chambering my first few batches of 8x56R handloads came out looking exactly the same way by virtue of too low of a chamber pressure. In my case caused by cold weather, standard primers with harder to ignite ball powder under too small of a charge of said powder. Came out of the gun looking just like those, sooty and dirty as hell.
 
Further to this story.... I broke down one round each of the 300 grainer and the 400 grainer.
The charge for the 300 gr. was 52.6 grs of a spherical powder. (Unknown type)
The charge for the 400 gr. was 54.7 grs of what appeared to be the same spherical powder.
The left pic is the 300 and the right pic is the 400gr. Black powder is ruled out!!!
 

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oldrodder said:
Further to this story.
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so you have shot reloads as a comparison? How did they print, same poi?
mystery loads, if powder-puffs, should have hit different, likely lower?
would also sound different

also surprised the heavy bullet has the larger powder load, unless they are different powder formulas, will never know for sure
 
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