After 20 years of reloading I finally made a big mistake. I had some loads that were showing signs of high pressure so I broke them down. When returning the powder to the container I by mistake poured some of the Varget into a 8 pound can of IMR 4350. The 8 pound can had about 6 pounds of IMR powder remaining in it. The amount of Varget mixed with the IMR was about 630 grains. Now what do I do??? I figure the remaining IMR has about 1 or 2% Varget mixed with it. Big problem or not? Thanks for any replies. Make sure when you are reloading you dont have your head up your behind like I did.

Another reloader did the same thing a while back and a lot of folks said to use it and ignore it.....and so did I...but the ratio was a lot less than this.

Personally in this case I say burn it outside in the snow somewhere.

Why take a chance? Powder is cheaper than Steel.

Well 6 lbs is a lot of waste. Is it really mixed or can you skim some off the top.

Or can you make sure it is really well mixed and use reduced loads to use it up. The burn rate is not a lot different.

My little mixup (no pun intended) was thankfully a small amount and I relabled it as a "special blend", just in case I get desperate one day.
John L.

630 grains out of 42,000,(7000X6), works out at .0142 percent, not enough to make a difference. I'd say work up loads for the 4350 and watch for pressure.

I think those kernel sizes are too different to be able to count on them staying mixed well. Then you'd never even be sure the mix was consistent over the life of the keg.

Varget is a fair bit faster than IMR4350. I think Varget is higher energy too.

You could always package it up as fire starter packs for camping trips.

I have to say that I never put anything back into the big cannisters. I have 1 lb cans that I work from. When the 1 lb can gets low I top it off from the bigger one. I have had to dump a fair bit powder so far due to back into the can errors. It's painful, but not so bad as pulling a bolt out of your head. Sometimes I burn it, sometimes just sprinkle it on the lawn .

quote:

Originally posted by grizz:
630 grains out of 42,000,(7000X6), works out at .0142 percent, not enough to make a difference. I'd say work up loads for the 4350 and watch for pressure.

630/42000=0.015 which is 1.5%.

My inclination would be too drop back to the min suggested loads, and work up again.

I never was any good at math!
As far as mixing powders goes, I once made a similar mistake. Fornatually it was ball powder into extruded. I used a sieve to allow the ball powder to fall through, seperated it and went about my business.

I didn't go check between the size difference from IMR 4350 and Varget, but maybe a sieve could be used to seperate them? I used one of those spatter covers for the top of a frying pan?

IIRC they are also disimilar powders...one is single based and the other is double based.

My "dump it" recommendation is unchanged.

Spread it on your lawn this coming spring, and learn from your error.

i guess i'd listen to steve on this one........