Blending Powders.............

Michael458

Michael458

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I have on many occasions blended powders here, but this is NOT the proper way to go about it............

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About six years ago, I took a reloading class that @Bailey Boat held. One of the first things he said was don’t ever mix powders. If there is one thing I remember from the class it’s that.
 
I imagine that you sometimes need specific performance characteristics that aren’t available from retail powders, and you have the experience and testing equipment to do it safely where very very few others do, but I’m curious how you do it mechanically.

The powders are different physically, so mixing in bulk won’t produce a consistent blend. Do you have a mixing trick, or do you weigh or measure the volume of each powder for each case you load?
 
Jim......... First, at my level, and or OUR level, we have to choose powders that are nearly the same physical characteristics....... Ball with Ball, such as WW296 and Lilgun. Stick with Stick, such as RL15 and RL 7. These blends will not separate once blended.

Basically sometimes with some cartridges, we are looking to either speed up the blend, or slow it down, depending. We use % of each. In easy terms, lets say I wanted a blend that was a little faster than RL 15. Then I would look at various stick powders, such as RL 7, or maybe IMR or H-4198. I might blend up 75% RL 15 and 25% RL 7, to speed the RL 15 up a little. Lets make a easy load, 100 gr of powder, so weigh out 25 RL 7 and 75 RL 15. Put it in a small container and shake things up. Easy...........

For normal beginning test work I would only load 3 rounds, so I would mix up 3 rds of powder and go with that to the range.

In some of the big bores I have had some success with a Blend of RL 15 and RL 7, at that point I would mix by the pound. Just weigh out the RL 15, and RL 7, put it in a container and mix well..........

I have blended several different cartridges, some of the big ones were 500 MDM, 500 B&M, and even 500 Nitro. I have blended several loads for various 458s and 416s.......... Some smaller cartridges I have blended for are 358 MGP, 7.62X40 and such as that.

I only blend when I think I am coming up short in a particular cartridge.............. Blending in extremely time consuming. And it is rare that you can exceed performance. I have equaled performance many times, but it is rare to exceed.

I don't advocate blending by any means. You absolutely have to have pressure equipment on hand to know where you are with things. It is fun, it is going into the unknown where few have traveled, but it is time consuming and like I said extreme performance is rare and hard to come by.
 
Given that different powders (even with ball-ball or stick-stick) may not be the same size grains, or same density, I think it would be possible for the powders to 'settle' during handling, so the resulting mix may not stay homogeneous - one case may end up with more of one type of powder than another case. The only way I would attempt this is to measure each powder directly into each case.
 
Does anyone combine partial bottles of the same powder?

i.e., Dump 1/2# Varget into a partially empty 5# Varget bottle?
 
Michael458 said:
Jim......... First, at my level, and or OUR level, we have to choose powders that are nearly the same physical characteristics....... Ball with Ball, such as WW296 and Lilgun. Stick with Stick, such as RL15 and RL 7. These blends will not separate once blended.

Basically sometimes with some cartridges, we are looking to either speed up the blend, or slow it down, depending. We use % of each. In easy terms, lets say I wanted a blend that was a little faster than RL 15. Then I would look at various stick powders, such as RL 7, or maybe IMR or H-4198. I might blend up 75% RL 15 and 25% RL 7, to speed the RL 15 up a little. Lets make a easy load, 100 gr of powder, so weigh out 25 RL 7 and 75 RL 15. Put it in a small container and shake things up. Easy...........

For normal beginning test work I would only load 3 rounds, so I would mix up 3 rds of powder and go with that to the range.

In some of the big bores I have had some success with a Blend of RL 15 and RL 7, at that point I would mix by the pound. Just weigh out the RL 15, and RL 7, put it in a container and mix well..........

I have blended several different cartridges, some of the big ones were 500 MDM, 500 B&M, and even 500 Nitro. I have blended several loads for various 458s and 416s.......... Some smaller cartridges I have blended for are 358 MGP, 7.62X40 and such as that.

I only blend when I think I am coming up short in a particular cartridge.............. Blending in extremely time consuming. And it is rare that you can exceed performance. I have equaled performance many times, but it is rare to exceed.

I don't advocate blending by any means. You absolutely have to have pressure equipment on hand to know where you are with things. It is fun, it is going into the unknown where few have traveled, but it is time consuming and like I said extreme performance is rare and hard to come by.
Click to expand...

I've heard of others blending powder, but I've never understood the what the goal of blending was. Could you please expand your reasoning some more?

In your example above, you wanted to speed up RL15. What was the goal of speeding up RL15? How did mixing RL15 and RL7 change the pressure curve of standard RL15? Did speeding up the RL15 give you the performance boost that you desired?
 
Tim said:
Does anyone combine partial bottles of the same powder?
Click to expand...


Absolutely yes............ You cannot count on many powders, even from the same Lot# to burn exactly the same. The Reloader or RL powders are terrible for this. You can have two kegs, same powder, such as RL 7, with same Lot # and both be different. I have seen this many times over, and so much so that you can have serious pressure issues. An example of this is my 308 Win load with 100 Raptors. For several years I used a "Blend" of RL 7 that I made, consistent 42/RL 7 would give 2950 fps in 16 inch guns at 51000 PSI, worked perfect in the AR 10s, and other 308 rifles I had.

I ran out of that Blend, and loaded some from another keg, same lot# as what I was using in the past. Suddenly the velocity jumped to 3154 fps and over 58000 PSI, brass started sticking and it was a major issue.

I ended up with about 15 or 20 lbs, dumped the entire batch in a 5 gallon Lowes bucket, stirred and mixed until I was satisfied that it was throughly mixed, then poured all back into 5# containers. Marked each container the date of the Blend and retested.

Now I ended up at 39.5/RL 7 and back to standard velocity of 2950 fps or so...... and 51000 PSI......... A drop of 2.5 gr over the previous load, which was over pressure with the new powder blend.

Yes, I mix up and blend most of these type powders, and especially ALL the RL powders..............

I have seen serious differences from 1# to the next, same lot number........ When changing powder it is good to check these things. In most of your scenarios if you see a major change in velocity, it comes at a cost. Beware. There are only a few cases where I have seen "Magic Powder".............
 
cold1 said:
I've heard of others blending powder, but I've never understood the what the goal of blending was. Could you please expand your reasoning some more?

In your example above, you wanted to speed up RL15. What was the goal of speeding up RL15? How did mixing RL15 and RL7 change the pressure curve of standard RL15? Did speeding up the RL15 give you the performance boost that you desired?
Click to expand...

The Goal of blending is increased performance of course.

We are very blessed with extremely good powders and variety these days. So there really is very little need to blend today. But, to try and answer your question properly......... and to stay with characteristics of RL 15 and RL 7.

RL 15 is a rather slow powder in some cases, depending on case capacity. For example, in my 500 MDM RL 15 is slow. Case capacity around 100 grs. With a 450 gr .500 caliber bullet and 102.5 gr RL 15 you get 2266 fps at 45000 PSI.
and you are getting close to max case capacity. Even an increase of 5 gr or more is not going to get you there.

OK, now we decide we can speed the burn rate of the load up by reducing the amount of RL 15 and adding in its place some RL 7.

Lets make a Blend of 75% RL 15 and 25% RL 7 and see what happens with the same exact bullet of course...........

450 Raptor with 103/75%/25% Blend......... 2427 fps at 53300 PSI.

Lets change the blend now.... 65% RL 15 and 35% RL 7

450 Raptor 103 gr of this Blend...... 2487 fps at 58400 PSI

Lets change the Blend again to........ 60% RL 15 and 40% RL 7

450 Raptor 100 gr of this blend...... 2518 fps at 60000 PSI

In this particular exercise I tried a 55% RL 15 AND 45% RL 7, but there was no gain over the 60/40 Blend.

And at 50/50 Blend I gained nothing either, I was able to drop to 98 gr of the blend for 2502 fps at 60000 PSI, so no real gains over the 60/40.........

As you can see, we were able to get far better results with the Blend, than just the RL 15 alone. The 500 MDM is a 65000 PSI cartridge, but I normally try to not exceed 62000 PSI for all around use. I could not get enough RL 15 in the case to build up pressures, so, we speed the burn rate somewhat to get there.

Yes, there are better powders to use than RL 15 in this cartridge, IMR 8208, H-4895, and V-N530 are the better choices straight out the Keg. I have blended these as well in search of that better mouse trap, and have equalled but rarely exceeded.

Example 450 Raptors and 99/V-N530 gives 2543 fps at 62000 PSI-------450 Raptor 99/IMR 8208 gives 2492 fps at 60000 PSI------450 Raptor 99/H-4895 gives 2518 fps at 59500 PSI

Why do I blend sometimes......???????

When I first developed the 500 MDM I burned a 5# Keg of RL 10X. This ONE PARTICULAR 5# Keg allowed me to drive a 500 gr Bullet at 2650 fps at 62000 PSI with 102 grains. That is substantial, incredible, and under max pressure. I published this data at the time, and since I kept extremely tight controls over each 500 MDM in the field, it was not a problem. My next 5# Keg started to be a problem. I was running into pressure problems at 95 gr of RL 10X. The next 5# keg was DANGEROUS...... at 88 gr RL 10X it was OVER MAX Pressures. Imagine dumping 102 grains of this into a case and what could happen????? I immediately pulled the published data and started over, leaving ALL 10X loads OUT of the Data..............

But that One 5 lb Keg of RL 10 X was truly "MAGIC POWDER".................. So yes, I would like to get my hands on that "Magic Powder", just one more time, and figure out exactly what the mix was....................
 
In another area that Blending could be extremely valuable is with certain cartridges because of numerous factors, there are only a few powders that is available that will work well. They may not be optimum, one would know know until investigated, and all this talk about blending, I might put it on my schedule to do so.........

In particular the case of my own Super Short Big bores, 458,475 and 50 B&M Super Short. The only powders to look at with all three of these is WW 296 and LilGun, everything else is either same, or too slow, or too fast. I am thinking a Blend possibly of AA 1680 or probably CFE Black, and maybe WW 296, or even a faster powder might make a blend that would exceed what is available.

Another case could be 300 BLK. Basically I have found nothing that can exceed WW 296 with my 100 Raptor load. Everything else, too slow or too fast. A blend of LilGun and WW 296 might do well???

Same with 7.62X40, its LilGun or WW 296, not much other choice...........

These cartridges that are short on powder choices might could be enhanced and performance increased and keeping within pressure limits...........

I think if I don't get too lazy, we might investigate this in the near future...........
 
Thank you for the explanation
 
cold1 said:
I've heard of others blending powder, but I've never understood the what the goal of blending was. Could you please expand your reasoning some more?

In your example above, you wanted to speed up RL15. What was the goal of speeding up RL15? How did mixing RL15 and RL7 change the pressure curve of standard RL15? Did speeding up the RL15 give you the performance boost that you desired?
Click to expand...

The idea of "blending" ie duplex and triplex loads is to get benefits of the differing burn rates to help accuracy and/or power.

If you don't have a means of accurately measuring pressure, it's quite dangerous and best avoided.
 
Dave951 said:
The idea of "blending" ie duplex and triplex loads is to get benefits of the differing burn rates to help accuracy and/or power.

If you don't have a means of accurately measuring pressure, it's quite dangerous and best avoided.
Click to expand...

No worries, I'm perfectly happy with factory powder and published loads. I'm not looking to get into Wildcatting or development.
 
Michael458 said:
Jim......... First, at my level, and or OUR level, we have to choose powders that are nearly the same physical characteristics....... Ball with Ball, such as WW296 and Lilgun. Stick with Stick, such as RL15 and RL 7. These blends will not separate once blended.

Basically sometimes with some cartridges, we are looking to either speed up the blend, or slow it down, depending. We use % of each. In easy terms, lets say I wanted a blend that was a little faster than RL 15. Then I would look at various stick powders, such as RL 7, or maybe IMR or H-4198. I might blend up 75% RL 15 and 25% RL 7, to speed the RL 15 up a little. Lets make a easy load, 100 gr of powder, so weigh out 25 RL 7 and 75 RL 15. Put it in a small container and shake things up. Easy...........

For normal beginning test work I would only load 3 rounds, so I would mix up 3 rds of powder and go with that to the range.

In some of the big bores I have had some success with a Blend of RL 15 and RL 7, at that point I would mix by the pound. Just weigh out the RL 15, and RL 7, put it in a container and mix well..........

I have blended several different cartridges, some of the big ones were 500 MDM, 500 B&M, and even 500 Nitro. I have blended several loads for various 458s and 416s.......... Some smaller cartridges I have blended for are 358 MGP, 7.62X40 and such as that.

I only blend when I think I am coming up short in a particular cartridge.............. Blending in extremely time consuming. And it is rare that you can exceed performance. I have equaled performance many times, but it is rare to exceed.

I don't advocate blending by any means. You absolutely have to have pressure equipment on hand to know where you are with things. It is fun, it is going into the unknown where few have traveled, but it is time consuming and like I said extreme performance is rare and hard to come by.
Click to expand...

Wouldn’t that mix be RL10x? Something faster than 15 and slower than 7?

Good for 223 Rem up to 458 Win Mag

They USED to make RL12 but not anymore.
 
11B CIB said:
Wouldn’t that mix be RL10x? Something faster than 15 and slower than 7?

Good for 223 Rem up to 458 Win Mag

They USED to make RL12 but not anymore.
Click to expand...


Yes, RL 10 X would fall in between the two, leaning more towards RL 7 I believe. Yes, I still use RL 10X in my 223 load with 50 Raptors. Excellent powder, and the only one that shoots in all the 223 types of rifles I have accurately in all........ with that load and that bullet.

But that one Magic 5# Can...... Oh my! No more..............
 
Toprudder said:
I have done that, for pistol powders.
Click to expand...
I've done this but I try to stay within lot. The last time I did this the new lot of Titegroup was measuring 2.9 gr instead of 3.2 gr. Had to adjust my powder throw to compensate.
 
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Burt Gummer said:
English?
Click to expand...
He means:
There are old pilots, and there are bold pilots, but there are no old bold pilots.
The meaning is that you can only push the boundary so many times until things go badly against you.

When it comes to mixing powders I think he’ 100% right as relates to most reloaders. Michael is something different, he really seems to run a one-man development lab with the tools needed to safely develop loads in much the same way that commercial loaders evaluate and adjust their loads based on the lot of powder delivered to the factory. He admits that there is limited upside and that it is a very time consuming process even with the right tools, it’s clearly just a fun part of the hobby for him.

Most of us should not, and will not, ever play with this, but I’m always happy to see other folks safely exploring the boundaries.
 
JimB said:
He means:
There are old pilots, and there are bold pilots, but there are no old bold pilots.
The meaning is that you can only push the boundary so many times until things go badly against you.

When it comes to mixing powders I think he’ 100% right as relates to most reloaders. Michael is something different, he really seems to run a one-man development lab with the tools needed to safely develop loads in much the same way that commercial loaders evaluate and adjust their loads based on the lot of powder delivered to the factory. He admits that there is limited upside and that it is a very time consuming process even with the right tools, it’s clearly just a fun part of the hobby for him.

Most of us should not, and will not, ever play with this, but I’m always happy to see other folks safely exploring the boundaries.
Click to expand...

not many folks, Bailey included have done the kind of reloading Michael has either. He didn’t respond to me cause he never has anything positive to say these days
 
Ikarus1 said:
I have blended all the powder off my bench and thrown it into the fireplace, it makes sparkly lights and impresses small kids
Click to expand...


That's fun too. Over on B&M some of my guys were talking about the recall on some of the Accurate powders and how Accurate said to pour the jug full of water. I said hell with that, go make a nice little pile out back, run a powder trail and have some fireworks..... Way more fun..........
 
Tim said:
Does anyone combine partial bottles of the same powder?

i.e., Dump 1/2# Varget into a partially empty 5# Varget bottle?
Click to expand...


This type of "Blending", if you want to define as such, is the only Blending I very very Highly recommend for most any serious handloader. These are powders you normally use, but run out of the batch, keg, can, that you developed the load with. If you intend to use that powder and load in the future, then buy enough of it to suit your needs for whatever time period you deem, then mix it all together well, and pour it back in the kegs, cans, jugs, and label it properly. This way you have a "Known" powder until its gone.

How do you Know, if you don't have pressure equipment?

Velocity. Velocity is not cheap, and it costs somewhere, its not free. If you are getting HIGHER velocity than the load you worked up, then you are getting HIGHER pressures too. They go hand in hand. Assuming same brass, same bullet, same primer and so forth.......... Drop the load to match your previous tested velocity, and you are good to go. Low Velocity? Then you are under, so you can increase the charge to match your previous tested velocity.

I rarely do this with handgun powders, with the exception of WW 296 and LilGun. The reason I mix large batches of these powders is not for the handguns, but for the rifles I use those powders in. Lets assume you shoot 45 ACP or 9mm or such, use common powders and buy 5-8 lb cans, jugs or kegs....... I would not worry too much about bulking and blending that, but I would do a small test when opening a new can/keg.

Same Lot # means absolutely NOTHING. Do not go by that and assume the powder is the same, it might be, it might not be. It may have all started in the same batch. However, you do not know where it has been, how it has been stored and temperatures and humidity that it has been in since leaving the factory. These are but a few factors that can change how powders burn or ignite. Never assume the same lot# will be the same as your previous one.

Last year I blended 40#s of WW 296, poured everything into a 5 gallon bucket, stirred, shake, rattle and roll, and poured it all back into containers, marking it by the date blended........ Then Tested extensively to make sure I had the right Pressures and Velocities in loads I use the WW 296 for. This should last me for some time.

About the same with the last Batch of RL 7 I blended too. The last date on that was 2016.

Different kegs of powder, even the same lot # can get you in a bind if you are not careful with it, and pay attention. Believe me, if you are getting extra velocity, that you didn't get from the last batch, its not because you found a magic keg, or can of powder! Velocity comes at a cost, and that cost is pressure.
 
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