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I got back into shooting this year after 20 years out of it. I have a 40S&W and a .380ACP to play with and decided to set up a reloading bench. I really had no idea about the current hoarding/shortage on powders until I already had my Lee press and some supplies. I managed to get some SR4756 and Bullseye powders from friends to play with and scored a lottery win at the Lacie Cabellas with 2 lbs of HP-38, but I was worried about long term supplies. I saw the listing on Gunbroker for the American Reloading Commercial #5 powder and got interested. It turns out it is a Spanish powder called MAXAM CSB-5, and the price with shipping was about $27/lb, but you have to buy in 8 lb, 16 lb or 32 lb lots. I got 8 lbs of it 2 weeks ago and have been working up loads based on the limited load data they have. It is a large grey/green flake powder. It is a pretty bulky powder that matches N310 for density. I have a comfortable target load of 5.2 gr behind a 165 gr Rainier Ballistics bullet. I tried using it for my .380 loads, but that bulky powder doesn't work well in my lee loader for charges as small as 3.0 gr. It seems to be a relatively medium speed shotgun powder. My friend wants to try it on 38 special and 357Mag, but there is no published load data yet for those rounds. Anybody have a guess as to starting loads?
BTW the only powders I have that work well for the .380ACP are Bullseye, HP-38 and SR4756.
I found 1lb cans of 700X at Pintos and grabbed some to try, but it is even bulkier than the #5 powder.
I think I can make the 700X work for the 40S&W, but I like the finer powders for for loading ease.
BTW the only powders I have that work well for the .380ACP are Bullseye, HP-38 and SR4756.
I found 1lb cans of 700X at Pintos and grabbed some to try, but it is even bulkier than the #5 powder.
I think I can make the 700X work for the 40S&W, but I like the finer powders for for loading ease.
