777 and round balls

[Mark Harmes]

Anyone use 777 and in their roundball guns? Just wondering since it is so much  easier to clean up with just water?

[Good time Charlie]

I shoot 80 grains of 777 in my GPR and it shoots fine. That said I am switching to Goex because of price and I like the real Mccoy. I don't find that clean-up is that much harder with goex. And at nearly $25 a pound for 777 and I bought 25 lb. of Goex for $9.11 a pound I'll be shooting Goex.
                                     Old Charlie

[S.S.]

I can find no one in my area that even sells black powder!
It is Pyrodex and 777 only!  (WEST GEORGIA).
I would love to find one of those 25 pound kegs of goex !!!!

[TKO]

www.powderinc.com


www.mainepowderhouse.com

[Ramrod]

Anyone use 777 and in their roundball guns? Just wondering since it is so much  easier to clean up with just water?

The cleanup issue is a big marketing ploy. I don't find blackpowder any harder to clean, it just takes a few more patches. And you don't really need anything but water. Thats all they ever used back in the day.

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

Yeah, BP isn't hard to clean at all.  The big buggaboo with BP is that you HAVE to clean it promptly.

Sometimes after a day at the range and the kids are running wild around home cleaning the gun is one extra chore you could do without.

However, I've found there is some ways around this imperative.  

One, use a good quality real BP and you don't have to clean right away that day if you keep it in a dry place.  Sometime in the next day or two and you'll be fine.

Two, douse it with WD-40 or some type of veggie oil if your afraid of petroleum - then clean it sometime in the next week or so.

Three, oil it up good and just make sure you shoot it again the next weekend.  Keep this up indefinitely and clean it good if it gets wet.

I wouldn't try this with Pyrodex - that stuff is way more corrosive than a good BP.

[Mark Harmes]

Thanks guy's, i am pretty new to the blackpowder thing, only thing I shot until this year was pyrodex and tried 777 this year, stuff sure packs a punch and money is an issue so I guess i'll look for the black powder and give it a try.

[Edgewood NM]

I shoot both 777 and Goex FFg. The 777 gives a lot more punch for a bit less powder. In my Traditions Shennendoa (32" barrel 1:66 twist)  shooting 90 grains of FFg 777 I get about 2150 fps and a calculated energy of about  1700 ft lbs of ME. To come close to that I would have to shoot about 130 grains of FFFg and that is way above my rifles safe loads.   Hodgdon's website gives max loads of 777. I called and asked why there was such a differance in the lvelocities listed and what my chorno is giving. Turns out they use a test barrel of 26" with a 1 and 48 twist. That extra 8" gives the powder more time to burn complety. The fouiling is minimal. One day I loaded 40 shots (Ended up with a very sore shoulder) using 777. Only on the last 5-6 did the ball start to get tight. This was a hand cast round ball with a .015 muslin patch and home made Wonder lube. Now using the smae load in FFg I could get maybe 5-6 shots before the ball was getting REAL tight.  The best thing I can say about the 777 is that my wife now shoots with me. 777 Doesn't smell. I kind of smells like Red Dot and sugar. She hates the buffalo fart smell of the Goex. Clean up is about the same but you can leave the 777 for a few days with out damage( YMMV This is MY rifle and a well seasoned bore) In my NMA Remington I shoot 25 grains and a cut  wad and a .454 round balll.  This will shoot all day with no problems other thana wipe down of the pin after  bout 6 cylinders. Now the report of both my rifle and pistol are totally different between the two powders. the 777 gives more of a crack where as the Goex is a dull boom.  Both FFg black and 777 are good powders. and I shoot both but the 777 is easier to come by and for a while was cheaper than the BP 17.99 a 1 lb bottle VS 18.50 a 1 lb can. But the sale is over and it is back to 24.99 a bottle. Both are good it is a matter of what you like and more importantitly what you r RIFLE likes


Chuck\\\Edgewood NM

[D.E.C]

JUST TO PUT MY 2 CENTS IN. I STARTED USING 777 IN CAP& BALL AND BP CARTRIDGE REVOLVERS BECAUSE THE CLEAN UP WAS SO MUCH EASIER.  (NOT MUCH OF A PROBLEM WITH RIFLES , I KNOW.) WHEN I BOUGHT ANOTHER MUZZLE LOADER, A 5O. CAL. PERC. , I KEPT USING IT. I ROUTINELY GET 11/2 TO 2 INCH GROUPS AT 100YARDS. IT'S VERY RELIABLE AND I GET 40-50 SHOTS WITH OUT WIPING THE BARREL, OR ANY LOSS IN ACCURACY. ALSO I GUESS IT MIGHT BE BECAUSE I LIVE IN THE SAME AREA AS HODGENS BUT I'M BUYING 777 AT 20.00 A POUND ABD GOEX AT 16.00 A POUND. NOT MUCH DIFFERENCE WHEN YOU FIGURE THE 15% LOAD DIFFERENCE.

[filmokentucky]

TOW will sell you GOEX in 25lb. lots @ $11.02 per lb. including shipping and hazmat fees. The Maine Powder House will sell Elephant brand in 25 lb. lots @ $8.76 per lb including all fees. UPS delivers it right to your door.
If you shoot a lot, this is definitely the way to go. 25 lbs. of 777 will run you $500.00 against $218.00 for Elephant or $276.00 for GOEX. Savings
of this magnitude, especially if spread over a group of shooters, are definitely worthwhile. Of course, if you subscribe to the belief that real BP
is difficult to clean up after, 777 and the other artificial powders may seem like a bargain. The most important thing to have when cleaning C&B
revolvers is a good set of gunsmith's screwdrivers- the parallel ground kind. Colt and Remington revolvers are so easy to take apart and reassemble that I always completely disassemble them for cleaning after a shooting session. Since crud buildup in the lock work is a prime cause of wear and failure in these guns, I'm not sure that avoiding a full strip down and cleaning is a good idea even when using artificial powders. You will still get material blown into the mechanism, and cause problems, even if it doesn't cause rust. The hand spring is particularly vulnerable.

[propredator]

Fellers look at all the time the modern muzzle loaders have to give to their breech plug threads when shooting 777 or they caint get em out.777 leaves a very hard baked on residue in the breech plug face.
 If your gonna shoot the 777 it would be wise to use a breech plug scrapper and a tight fiten brush for the patten breech.Sum good stiff pipe cleaners run threw the clean out hole an nipple channel into the breech aggresivley werent hurt none either.
 All this after a good water bath.777 was made for the modern guns an works good once you figuare out how to keep the breech plug from freezing.
  Any body that has shot a modern muzzle loader with 777 knows about the hard baked crud on the breech plug that does NOT remove with soap and water,think what it is doing down in a patten breech over time if a lot of time isnt spent on every nook an cranny down there.
 Besides 777 has the same phercholites junk in it as pyrodex.Not as much but its there,Its sum kind of cholroites added to the powder so it can be sold over the counter as not being a explosive.The stuff is only parcially water soluable.
 I wil shoot real black powder as long as i can get it

[Danny]

I can find no one in my area that even sells black powder!
It is Pyrodex and 777 only!  (WEST GEORGIA).
I would love to find one of those 25 pound kegs of goex !!!!

I live in north Georgia, and there are some folks here that do Civil War reinactments. They use black powder, so if you can hook up with some of them they can get you some.

Danny

[filmokentucky]

The GOEX comes in lots of 1 pound cans. This is an advantage because you can mix your order. For example, you might want a can or two of ffffg
to prime your flintlocks and some fffg for C&B revolvers and .50 caliber and under rifles and the rest in ffg for large caliber rifles and fowlers and such. Track and will happily mix the order up for you and UPS will bring it to your door or shooting range. I believe the Maine Powder House will do the same. Both have web sites. I've done a good bit of business with Track over the years and they are great folks to do business with as they are knowlegeable BP enthusiasts themselves. As I said before, if you can get a friend or two to split the cost with you, you can get a supply of quality powder for very little money. Real powder, too. The holy black.