Old powder Hercules 2400

[orygun]

Contrary to popular belief, older reloading manuals do have data for rifle loads for H2400. Calibers included are 7.62x39 and 30-06 among others.

Interesting.
I have an old (60's-70's) Lyman that I should check out.

 

[gmerkt]

Contrary to popular belief, older reloading manuals do have data for rifle loads for H2400. Calibers included are 7.62x39 and 30-06 among others.

Yes. Same comment for Herco and probably others. Maybe because over time, better powder applications came along.

This is why I never throw away "obsolete" loading publications. I keep them all, back to and including Phil Sharpe's book which dates to 1937. You never know what's going to come along.

 

[Bobbygun]

Contrary to popular belief, older reloading manuals do have data for rifle loads for H2400. Calibers included are 7.62x39 and 30-06 among others.

Interesting.
I have an old (60's-70's) Lyman that I should check out.

You guys got me curious, so I pulled a 1964 Speer manual off my shelf (just a few years newer than me). There were a few rifle cartridges with 2400 loads listed. They tended to be on the more anemic side, such as .22 K Hornet, .256 Winchester, .218 Bee (one of my all-time favorites) and M1 Carbine (the only .30 caliber I detected using 2400). No loads listed using it in .30-06 in this Speer manual. Didn't see any listing for 7.62 x 39 at all.

That manual is so old. I wonder how many sets of dies I have that it doesn't contain information for that cartridge.

ETA: Located a Lyman manual from 1957. It has a lot of rifle loads for 2400, particularly for cast bullets with gas checks. Even has one for 120 grain gas check bullets in .300 H&H Magnum and several for .30-06 with cast bullets from 110 grain to 165 grain.

 

[orygun]

I dug out my old Lyman. 45th Edition from 1970. Taking a quick peek, I saw a load using 2400 for a cast bullet at 2100fps in a 257 Weatherby!

 

[Bobbygun]

I dug out my old Lyman. 45th Edition from 1970. Taking a quick peek, I saw a load using 2400 for a cast bullet at 2100fps in a 257 Weatherby!

Wow. 2100 fps seems awfully slow for a .257 Weatherby. I wonder what the thought was behind that.

 

[orygun]

Wow. 2100 fps seems awfully slow for a .257 Weatherby. I wonder what the thought was behind that.

Cast bullet for target shooting. Downloaded cast bullets used to be a very popular thing.

 

[Bobbygun]

Cast bullet for target shooting. Downloaded cast bullets used to be a very popular thing.

Well, if it helped tame the recoil on that Weatherby, I'd be all for it. I had a Weatherby Vanguard in .257 Wby Magnum and I swear that thing kicked twice as much as my .25-06. I didn't think the 10% gain in ballistics was worth the punishment, so I sold the Vanguard.

I've never messed with cast bullets and gas checks. In fact, when I was about 30 years old my FIL gave me his reloading equipment and supplies. Even though I had been reloading since I was about 15, I had no idea what those boxes of gas checks were, or what they were for. I put them in a box with a bunch of other old reloading stuff deemed of no use to me and sold them on Armslist. I really made some guy's day. His wife said he spent hours going through the treasures in that box. He felt like he got too good of a deal, so he bought me a six pack of Alpha Centauri and insisted I drop by his house and pick it up.