Boomer, I know we are venturing off topic, but I can never find reliable information on the effects of cold on powders. Everyone seems concerned with the effects of summertime heat, but I shoot from 70 degree temps to -30. I am more interested in what happens when the mercury is low than high in the tube. Mind sharing some more of that wisdom, or at least point me in the right direction?
.30 cal vs. 7mm
- Thread starter vikingocazar
- Start date
- Location
- Somewhere on the Hudson Bay Coast
As I said, Hybrid 100V seems to work well in the cold, if your cartridge(s) can handle the burning rate, which I found to be similar to R-19. I use it under heavy for caliber bullets in the .375 Ultra, .30/06, and .243, its too slow for the .308 though. In the .375 Ultra, I was driving 380 gr bullets 2300 with H-4350 but this increased to 2350 with H-100V. At one time I was pretty much sold on 4350 which is wonderfully versatile, but slowly have moved to H-414/760 for my plinking and practice rounds, primarily due to my dislike of compressed charges. While H-100V doesn't have the loading density of ball powders, its better than even short cut extruded, and it now seems like a long time since I used the original version of H-4831.
For a number of reasons I believe that regardless of the powder chosen, adequate priming is essential for cold weather shooting. If the word "adequate" is a bit vague, then let me say Federal 215s, I use Remington 9.5Ms, mostly because I had lots. While the violence of a magnum primer might not be the best recipe for bench rest accuracy, particularly in mid sized cartridges, it sure beats not having enough flame to ensure consistent and reliable ignition when the mercury can't be coaxed out of the bottom of the glass, and at -35 I don't spend much time on the bench.
- Location
- Somewhere on the Hudson Bay Coast
I think that like the .308, the 7-08 doesn't have enough capacity for the powder to give optimum performance, where as the .243 is somewhat overbore even though the cartridge is from the same family. I've never bothered to go slower than 4350 in mine, but in the .270, you'll be impressed.
