1970s Powder VS Swiss 2fg

Well, I bought this oldie back in June and finally put it through the hoops! Today, this old powder, put swiss powder to shame!

Doc White made many fine rifles, and as it turns out, he also made one hell of a black powder as well!

Green River Sporting Powder 2fg, 1970s.

Ardesa Mountain Rifle .54cal with 1:66 twist
.020" patches ( alcohol-Murphy oil soap lube mix ) .530" round balls. No swabbing was needed.
70gr Green River 2fg
50 yards





Swiss 2fg, same patch, lube, ball size, distance.

Red dots indicate the 70gr 2fg swiss 3 shot group.

Jonathan, it is a damned shame someone connected to Doc doesn't have that formula to produce it again. Be nice to find more of it.

The formula is easy the same raw materials is the problem ?

FrontierGander wrote:Well, I bought this oldie back in June and finally put it through the hoops! Today, this old powder, put swiss powder to shame!

Doc White made many fine rifles, and as it turns out, he also made one hell of a black powder as well!

This powder was short lived, but probably the best of the best according to the magazine writers as well as the folks that tried this product.

I have yet to find a "dog" in anything Doc had to do with. Jonathan can tell you about the last rifle he built (seen in his videos) testing and shooting a H.E. Leman Trade Rifle built by Doc.

He will be missed by all that new him or used his products.

The quality ingredients for BP are available and almost always can be had.  BP is simple stuff, chemically pedestrian and is only a mix with no chemical reactions required in manufacturing.  The quality difference between different brands of BP is basically in the extra time spent in milling and getting it mixed well.  Unlike smokeless where the performance depends on the exact formula being chemically identical each run, bp is just a mechanical mixture.

I see no reason we could not have more than one brand of high quality, true sporting rifle BP.  Yes, it would likely cost more as more time would be required in its manufacture.  But I would expect it to cost less than imported BP of the same quality due to domestic production.  I see, surprisingly, that from time to time some "home made" powders out perform their commercial counterparts in both accuracy and velocity.  Time isn't such a problem at home.

Agreed ...