I though I would share some of my recent experience using Swiss BP. After all the hoopla about how much better Swiss powder is than Goex, I couldn't wait to get my hands on some to try in my muzzleloading slug gun and Sharps rifle. First I tried it in a .45 cal muzzleloader behind 420 and 500 gr bullets. By the way here we are talking about 1 1/2 fg Swiss versus 2fg Goex. Surprisingly the Goex didn't foul or cake as bad as the Swiss. Accuracy was about the same with both. Then over the past few weeks I have been testing loads using Swiss 1 1/2 fg and Goex 4FA in my 45-90 Sharps. ( 4 FA is not a missprint, it is a little more coarse than Goex 1fg) Guess which one burns the cleanest?? Goex fouling stayed soft and easily wiped out of the barrel while Swiss caked up and came out as hard flakes. Accuracy was about equal for both. By volume--Goex 4 FA was a little heavier than Swiss, 62 grs versus 63-64 grs. So my next question would be, is Swiss worth the money?? ($22.00 lb versus $12.00 lb for Goex) Not from my personal experience. Years ago I got a bag of black blasting powder---it's about as coarse as 4 FA but has been tumbled more and has round granule that are heavily graphited. Eventually I tried it in my 45 2 7/8 Sharps and a 45-70-500 with amazing results--it was very accurate and fairly clean. When it ran out, the next best thing was Goex 4 FA. Today I shot the best BP loads from my 45-90 so far using the coarse powder behind 550 gr PP. I have shot lbs of 2ffg without the level of consistency or accuracy. Has any body else tried black blasting powder in a bpcr?
