Alliant has a lot of shotgun powder that appears to have narrow (according to them)usage, but in comparison seem very similar to some of their existing powders.

For example: their 20/28 is supposed to be for said gauges for Sporting Clays but a quick comparison in 28 and 20 gauge data would indicate it's very similar to Unique.

e3 seems very similar, or maybe a tad faster than Red Dot.

I bring this up because I wonder how useful these would be in handgun cartridges. I have no doubt that Alliant "410" would be similar to AL2400 or WW296/H110. Hence, it should be useful in magnum handgun cartriges. I've noticed while some of the powder wholesalers may be out of the popular handgun powders, they have in stock the more obscure "shotgun" powders such as those mentioned.

Thoughts?

I have used kegs and kegs of red dot, green dot and herco in hand guns.

Knowing the burning rate and useing safe reloading practices and good load work up.

I belive most any shotgun powder could be used.

Start low work up.

I wasn't clear in my original post. I'm intimately familiar with B'Eye, Red Dot, Unique, etc. and their use in handgun cartridges. My question was with regards to other shotgun powders for which there is no handgun data such as e3, Steel, 410, 20/28 et al.

quote:

Originally posted by 35Whelen:
I wasn't clear in my original post. I'm intimately familiar with B'Eye, Red Dot, Unique, etc. and their use in handgun cartridges. My question was with regards to other shotgun powders for which there is no handgun data such as e3, Steel, 410, 20/28 et al.

Depending on how much faster the shotgun powder is in relation to the published data, I would reduce by 10% and go from there.

There is no doubt that these "new" shotgun powders are just as adaptable to handgun loads as the older shotgun powders we're all familiar with. The problem is establishing some parameters for their use without insturmeted tests as a guideline.

I don't shoot much handgun ammunition anymore, but when I did most of what I used was "midrange" loads for targets. Those loads generated relatively low pressures to match their modest velocities. If you are interested in midrange loads I'd suggest that you would be reasonably safe in using a given powder which shows a burning rate in shotgun loads similar to a known powder you have used. If loaded very conservatively and checked through a chronograph to assure that velocity was within the expected range, I suspect you could work up satisfactory loads with various of these "new" powders for which no handgun data exists.

Sporting Clays may be substituted for Unique.

I use green dot for target/practice rounds in a 12 ga and a 28 gauge and a 357 Mag. So I don't have a need to even try their other powders.

I use both those powders in the shotguns but,looking at my notes, see that I haven't tried them in any hand gun loads. It would take a lot of work to see if they offered any advantage over the more common pistol powders. I tend to use up what I have on hand, maybe when I have used up my stash of AL5 and Herco I will give them a try.
C.G.B.

I’ve used Alliant’s American Select in my 45 Colt with excellent success. I use that powder for our shotgun loads and it always impressed me how clean burning it was. When I worked up a load in my Ruger Blackhawk 45 Colt with a 255 grain cast bullet it was very accurate and really clean burning. I’m going to try it in my 45 ACP.

Good luck

Paul