After all of the years of reading about the relative difficulty of using modern powders as a replacement for cordite, ie; lower case filling volume, use of wads, etc, I have to wonder... why has no-one come up with a bulky, long grained(but not the original sticks) 1 to 1 replacement? I have also never read anywhere about the burning rate of cordite, was there only one cordite that was used in everything from 6.5 to 600? It would almost seem to be unlikely that one did it all, but maybe!?! With all of the interest in our beloved doubles and also magazine rifles, add to the fact that there are more powder manufacturers with more different types of powder than ever, I wonder what it would take to get someone to step up to the plate? Hell, they make plenty of specialized powders for the 50 BMG boys and surely we are almost as big a market. Maybe we need to petition one of them! Any thoughts on this? Lee.

No, it wasn't used in everything. Most of the small bores and many of the mediums were loaded with NC. There were various forms of Cordite - Cordite Mk 1, Cordite MD, Cordite SC, Flat-Strip (Eley's Moddite, Kynoch's Axite), etc.

Cordite burned fast and hot. Current rifle powders that bulk up as well are much slower burning. The closest substitute by weight seems to be IMR 3031. Cordite was never practical for handloading because of the long strands. Factory ammunition was necked after the case was charged.

At one time or another, the British military used it in everything from the .303 to the 15" 42 caliber naval rifle. I imagine that, due to the limited usage in sporting ammunition, the demise of these contracts made continued manufacture of Cordite unprofitable. As much interest as there is in the nitro expresses today, a close substitute would probably still have too little demand volume to justify.
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"Serious rifles have two barrels, everything else just burns gunpowder."

Lee, I suggest you read Graeme Wright's Book, "Shooting the British Double".

This book deals extensively with load development, discusses the loads with cordite and black powder and their modern replacements.

I refere to it often.

My 450 No2 is marked 75 Cordite 480 Max, which is the Tropical load for the 450 No2.

My rifle shoots to the sights and is regulated well using 350, 480 and 500 gr Softs and Solids with 81 gr of IMR 3031 [80 grains for the solids], 100 grains of IMR 4831, and 88gr of RL 15.
With the excellent 450gr North Fork FP and CUP Points, I use 89 grains of RL 15.
I must use fillers with all loads in the 450 No2.

I like the RL 15 loads the best, except for the 350 gr Hornadays where I still use 81 gr of IMR 3031, as I have a lot of it on hand.

As long as your filler is compressed you should not have a problem. I have used dacron and 3 doifferent types [in firmness and thus density] of foam and cannot tell ANY difference in performance. I prefer foam.

I, for one, will never mourn the passing of cordite. That stuff was the ruin of more fine rifles than any other factor, IMHO. Gas-cut breech-faces and chamber walls, eroded throats, frosted rifling, etc, etc... I do like the smell of combusted cordite though, reminiscent of the old .303 rifle-club days in Australia.

Most of us have no trouble at all assembling perfectly-regulating re-loads for our doubles with modern coated cool-burning single-base powders, of which the Aussie ADI powders (now marketed in the US by Hodgdon as their 'Extreme' range) are among the best. Where once there was only 'cordite', now there is AR2207, AR2206, AR2208, AR2209, and AR2213. One can now tailor one's load perfectly to the cartridge at hand, without being confined to one powder (cordite); one burning rate. Pressures can now be reduced by 1 to 2 tons on average across the board for the same ballistics in most NE cartridges. Bloody marvellous!

I can see where you're coming from, Lee, but they wouldn't sell much nouveaucordite to me!

Now a modern Shultz powder, that's another story!

As much as we dislike using RL-15 and filler, RL-15 has a pressure curve that comes close to Cordite. What I really like about RL-15 is the very consistant velocities you get with RL-15.
I am always impressed with the chronograph readings.

Marrakai,
I have 500g of Mulwex ar2209 do you have a load for a 9.3x74r & a 270 grain bullet ? This is for a German sxs double.
T.I.A.

Boy, this one was dug up from a ways back! What I really meant by a replacement was a powder with the burning rate close to R-15, but with a bulk that would fill the case to avoid using wads or fillers. I don't believe that making it would be much of a problem with the technology they have nowdays, just low demand would preclude interest by the manufacturers. Then again, who would have thought that the market for all of the other components would get to where they are today, fifteen years ago? We can always hope!

Cropduster:
Remembering that ADI's AR2209 IS Hodgdon H4350, the data are interchangeable.

Hodgdon's recommendation for H4350 is a compressed charge of 68 grains behind the 270gr bullet, for 2403 fps at 41,600 CUP.

Here's the LINK.

The compression suggests to me that AR2209/H4350 is a little slow for optimum results in the 9.3x74R, and you might be better off with a slightly faster powder, but if you could be happy with, say, 2350 fps you could maybe drop a few grains of powder and avoid compressing the charge.

Your reference to Mulwex indicates that the can of powder in question has 'seen a few mango seasons', so in the interests of safety, start well below and work up, with the usual warnings etc.

Hope this helps.

Marrakai,
Thank you ! I bought this powder in 1988 when I was huntin in Australia. I hunted not far from you with Earl Gano.Had a great time with him shooting water buff & pigs with my 416 Hoffman.