Burn Rates for dummies

[GasLight]

Pardon my inexperience with this stuff. I try to do as little reloading as I can, so I am just learning.

My question is this. How much different are the numbers on a burn rate chart? Like how much slower is #96 than #85? How much slower can you go on a powder that what people find working and still get acceptable results? Will I see much of a difference between a couple of numbers, or does it take a big jump to notice?

Are there speed classes? Like a group of powders that all perform about the same, then another group, with the difference between the groupings being a big jump, but not from powder to powder?

Sorry and thanks

Dave

 

[dksd39]

Re: Burn Rates for dummies

I use Quickload and try different powders if I am trying to work out a specific prolem...gives me a good starting point. Looking at the powder numbers makes it difficult to judge burn rate but here is a burn rate chart to look at to give you an idea. There are dozens online so you can search and see others if you like. Also every loading book has more info in it as well if you have one handy
http://www.reloadbench.com/burn.html

 

[buffybuster]

Re: Burn Rates for dummies

The Powder Burn Rate charts are a guideline. Also they are not linear, meaning there is not a defined change in burn rate from let's say #95 to #96 that there is from #96 to #97. You cannot accurately extrapolate the burn rate based upon their burn rate number.

Many powder manufacturers publish their own burn rates and very often there is disagreement of the burn rates, especially in areas where multiple powders that have similar burn rates. This can be attributed to how the powder is tested and also the lot-to-lot variance of the powders.