The Author and the publishers of The Complete Guide to Handloading herewith authorize any reprint of this chapter in full without royalty"

"And the angels sing..." There was a song. the angels do sing. And they keep right on singing forbthe handloader who once read a catalog and blossomed into an expert. The boys who want to magnumize anything, the boys who want the heaviest loads, the boys who disregard all loading information and feel that their guns will stand more...
For all of these the angels sing.
The chap who pays no attention to approved loading data, but feels that his gun is stronger, or the source of information was foolish and loads should be heavier, had better look forward. Undertakers-pardon me , they do not like that term, -funeral dirrectors do not like to play with gunbugs who get blown up-invariably the face is torn up. Perhaps it would be a good idea to talk one of your local funeral directors into letting you sit in on an embalming. When the carcass is drained of blood and pumped full of formaldahide it still looks very thin. Formaldahyde shrinks flesh. but that face. Torn up? Pieces of metal dug out of the skull by the coroner?
Right there, your funeral director is an artist. First thing he does is politely to ask a relative for a photograph. Sure, of you. He is supposed to fix up what is left so someone will recognize it. Holes, mangled tissue, are no problem. the mutilated flesh is cut away-you dont mind, then-for you it is all over. Hot, opaque wax is poured into the holes; pressed into place. It doesn't burn, because you don't feel it. The artist then goes to work. Does a fine job, applying makeup. Your friends file past that coffin, look in, shed a tear and say "George looks so very natural".
OK, suppose the under-sorry, funeral director-finds the mess too much to patch up with wax and makeup. Easier. The coffin is closed, sealed and no one gets a look.
Is a choice good? Would you prefer to see those friends? Would you like to say "hello Joe. hello charlie, hello jack"? or be a nice piece of sculpture by the cadaver boys?
Not a word of this is funny. Not a word is levity. Not a word is acrude attempt at humor. all is deadly serious-so very deadly serious. Thereis nothing the matter with handloading, but there is a lot the matter with the PEOPLE who handload. All you have to do, they seem to think, is to take a cartridge case, pour in all the powder you can get into it, push in any bullet-and that's that.
"And the Angels sing..." The blasted primer blew out, spitting gas back through the action into your face? That was Gabriel, blowing his horn- for YOU.
Your Author has grey hair. it came on gradualy. Perhaps age had something to do with it, but most of it was caused by the incoming mailbag. It takes cement to keep those grey hairs from standing up. Don't laugh. It isn't funny. Writes a chap,"In my .30/06 I have been using 47 grains of 3031 with a 150 grain bullet. There is plenty of Pistol#6 around. What would be the ballistics of the same charge of Pistol#6?"
"And the angels sing..."
Then there is the chap who complains that his loads all stretch primer pockets so that a new primer can be dropped into the pocket and shaken out. He wants to know what the matter is. Maximum charge recomended is 52 grains of that powder. Someone said that the powder people are nuts. You can use 57 grains. That is what he is using-And living on borrowed time! Primers leak, blow, and primer pockets strech at a little over 70,000 pounds per square inch. Greatest pressure approved by any maker of arms and ammunition in this country has been 55,000. Heaviest proof load used here in any caliber is 72,000-and in that cartridge few leak. They commence to leak at 75,000. All blow at 78,000.
When this volume was first printed we had a country of serious handloaders. They were boys seeking good-shooting loads. They asked for accuracy, long barrel life, low recoiol ecconomy. But times have changed, and it is not for the better. This author is left holding the bag. He spent a fortune gathering the dope in this book. The powder, arms, ammunition makers, and others interested contributed data costing more than $100,000.00. But the sudden experts dont believe.They are being held back.
"And the Angels Sing..."
This author has no desire to be a killjoy. Handloading is safer than driving an auto. In a car, you drive for yourself and for everyone else on the road. In handloading, you load for yourself. If something goes wrong, it is your fault-alone.
In the past five years, dozens of blown-up guns have been reported-some with fatal injuries, and others serious but non-fatal. Many of these are traced to double charges of light loads. If you have a cartridge calling for a load of 50 grains of a certain powder for full charge, it is impossible to run a double charge-the case will,perhaps hold 60 grains, level full. Hence the surplus runs over, spills and is easily spotted.
But you are using a light bullet for a reduced charge calling for 20 grains of a fast burning powder. You get two charges into the case.
You fire it. Ergo-you get more loose parts than was originaly used to assemble the gun.Sometimes you gather them up. Sometimes they dig them out in the hospital. Sometimes the coroner says, "whats the use?" and they stay there.It is all so very unnecessary.There is no possible excuse for a double charge in handloading.
Use a loading block. Hold the block so you can see into the charged cases. Run your eye over them, line by line. Terrible job. A block of 50 takes almost 10 seconds.-and any unusual powder level is spotted-high or low. Throw those back and try again.
It can't happen to you? It has to me. I have been handloading for something over thirty-eight years. I have no idea how much ammunition I have loaded. but many a double charge has been thrown. The one thing that kept the angels from singing is that i caught it before pushing a bullet into the case and pulling the trigger. It is so very simple to inspect that i cannot stir up much sympathy for the fellow who won't, despite the letters and explanations and pictures of wrecked guns he sends in.
The angels sing. they are out looking for business.
May I close this brief warning chapterwith a story about the Sunday School Teacher who had worked long and hard to impress her class. Finally she came to the point."All who want to go to Heaven, please stand up."Everyone did, but one little chap."Jimmie," she reprimanded, "everyone stood up except you. Dont you want to go to Heaven?"
There was a profound silence for several moments while Jimmie deliberated. Finally he heaved a deep sigh and muttered:
"Not yet!"
In this volume we have tried to give you loading data and information available from no other source. The tests reported herin are so extensive that no individual in this country could afford to finance their repetition-or live long enough to see them completed. Your author has tried to give you factual data, but he is still a little soft. He can kill a deer-or an enemy soldier, but it still pains him to see a rabbit uselessly killed by a car.
And so you can keep disregarding facts, loading poison-while
The Angels sing...for YOU!

If the writing was from pre-WWII then I would guess that the pressure Phil Sharpe is talking about is/was measured in Copper Units of Pressure. A lot of the old books refer to pounds per square inch when talking about pressure. To the best of my knowledge, most all of the pressure testing in those days was with copper crusher equipment.

In handloading, the term PSI has apparently recently come to mean pressure measured with a Piezoelectric Pressure Gauge. CUP is now used to designate pressure measured with copper crusher equipment.

If I'm not mistaken, 60,000 PSI (Piezoelectric) is about the same as 50,000 or 52,000 CUP (copper crusher).

-Bob F.

[ 08-02-2003, 02:43: Message edited by: BFaucett ]