AusVarmint

Has any one here tried this new Trail boss powder in a 300 whisper or equivalent?
I'm tossing up whether to get some to try in my "6.5 coota". Would have bought some already if it wasn't for the fact it's only available in 1.5 kg tins. At around a 100 bux a can could be an expensive experiment. Looking for velocities of around the 1000fps mark with cast pills. Any info would be very helpful. I thought there were a couple of blokes on here with 300 whispers. Might have been on AHN though.
Regards Brett

I'd be interested in this too. Sounds like it could be the bee's knees for low speed loads. (Low signature too if you know what I mean).
Probably come up with something better than my existing load for my .264mousefart.

I have a new container of Trail boss to try in my 300 whisper with 155gn bullets. I was hoping to make up a subsonic load with light pills. I was hoping the small amount of powder and subsonic load would make it fairly quiet even without a suppressor. I will get around to trying it soon and will post results. It seems to be a bulky sort of powder, like little donuts to look at, hopefully it will fill the case up with light charges.

I'd be interested in it too. Would like to try it in the .310 cadet for comp loads with 122 gn pills

One of the guys at my pistol club uses it in a 303 and 45-120 to keep his velocity down to range maximum with cast projies, i know he was using 30-30 loads as a start for the .303, not sure about what he was using in the 45-120 though.
I will be buying some to run through my 458 AccRel, just no one has any in stock here atm.

Paz

OK, just tried it in my whisper.
4.3gns trail boss is subsonic with 85gn bullets
4.6gns trail boss is supersonic with 85gn bullets

6.4gns trail boss is subsonic with 155gn bullets. I will load up again later to see at what load they go supersonic, but I think 6.4gns is pretty close. This load is slightly compressed, but it is a spongy easily compressed powder so a bit more will be no problem.

The subsonic loads still have a load muzzle crack, but nothing like a normal hunting cartridge.

RDavies wrote:OK, just tried it in my whisper.
4.3gns trail boss is subsonic with 85gn bullets
4.6gns trail boss is supersonic with 85gn bullets

6.4gns trail boss is subsonic with 155gn bullets. I will load up again later to see at what load they go supersonic, but I think 6.4gns is pretty close. This load is slightly compressed, but it is a spongy easily compressed powder so a bit more will be no problem.

The subsonic loads still have a load muzzle crack, but nothing like a normal hunting cartridge.

Arrgh sweet, thats excellent. I'm working with a case capacity of 57 gns H2O in my 6.5 and from what I can work out about 8 gns should be in the ball park to launch a 140gn cast at around 1000fps. Have you grouped any of these loads to see if they're any more accurate. I'm hoping with the improved loading density that velocity variation and accuracy should improve. I have had the odd unfortunate excursion on the wrong side of the sound barrier on occasion too. It does sound like I should get my hands on some of powder though. May be I can sell some off, as the smallest container of it will do nearly 3000 rounds and probably last me 20 years. Thanks for the info, please keep us up to date with how it goes.
Cheers Brett

Hey Rum, what size lead chunks you planning on throwing out that thing? Want to give that powder a crack in the 6.5 squeaky mauser.

Ive just finished cronying loads with trail boss and 155gn moly bullets which I am trying to use up. NO GOOD. Once I get past 5.8 gns, the velocity stays at about 900 fps even if I keep adding powder. I went up to a compressed load of 7.2 gns but velocity stayed the same or lower, so 900 fps was its ceiling. With non mollied bullets it might get a tad higher, but I think the powder would best suit 130gn or lighter bullets. I think the problem is that it doesnt like compressed loads in the whisper.

RDavies wrote:Ive just finished cronying loads with trail boss and 155gn moly bullets which I am trying to use up. NO GOOD. Once I get past 5.8 gns, the velocity stays at about 900 fps even if I keep adding powder. I went up to a compressed load of 7.2 gns but velocity stayed the same or lower, so 900 fps was its ceiling. With non mollied bullets it might get a tad higher, but I think the powder would best suit 130gn or lighter bullets. I think the problem is that it doesnt like compressed loads in the whisper.

Now thats a bloody strange phenomenon if I've ever seen one. I've had that with slow powders in magnum handgun loads where more powder just means more blast and lovely flame with no more velocity. But with trailboss being such a fast powder thats a hard one to work out. I wonder whether cast bullets would help your 900fps situation. I do know when I switched from jacketed to cast pills I got less variation in velocities with less powder as well. Stuff knows whether that would get you more velocity with a heavier pill though. Also from the research I've done on ballistic coefficients of projectiles at subsonic velocities it seems a bullet with a nose like a 22lr apparently has a better ability to slip through the air than a typical spire point.
Anyway I lashed out and got a bloody great bottle of trail boss and will hopefully get time soon to give it run. Found some guys on youtube using trailboss in suppressed and unsuppressed 308W's. Sweet to see a 308 with a case full of powder (10gns T.B) making next to zero noise with a can on the end.
Thanks for your input on this one, I'll update with results when I get to the range.
Cheers Brett

With a 308 it might work great as it wont be as compressed. My guess is that the little donuts squash in together and stop the flame from having as much surface area to work on. Maybe 130gn bullets will be short enough and require little enough powder so that it wont be compressed?

If anyones interested heres one of the youtube links about subsonic trailboss loads I found.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=KnrK9qC2V ... re=related" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Regards Brett

Bit of an update on the Trail boss loads in a couple of our rifles. Last weekend "walking_death" and I loaded our reloading gear in the cars and dragged it all to the range. We started with a 10gn load of trailboss and the 140gn cast bullets from Hawkesbury River. This turned out to be well over done with a velocity of 1300 odd fps.
We worked our way down to the point where 7gns gave 1050 fps in my mates 29 inch barreled 6.5 mousefart and 7.4 gns produced 1050 fps in my 23 inch barreled 6.5 coota. I have to say right now this powder is bloody brilliant for this application. The velocity variation was in the order of 15-20 fps despite the fact the cases are slightly less than half full.
As usual we attracted a fair degree of attention from people walking past with the predictable comment when they found out what we're doing of " Gee that would be great for the mongrel cats in the back yard".......
Accuracy started out pretty good from the word go but with the occasional flyer wrecking things. Just before range closing time I tried seating the bullets in stupidly deep to see what would happen. Well bugger me 3 shots went into under an inch at 100 yds. So with time running out I loaded another 4 the same way to make sure it wasn't a fluke. Well the picture shows the results there too. We'll have another session at the range to verify things and get some scope settings for various ranges. Then we'll be off to a mates block (the mate that shoots the pigeons and sparrows trapped in shopping centers as well as other ferals for government agencies and the public with his licensed silenced rifles) outside Gympie to give them a try out. He just happens to have a 30 cal silencer that should go straight on our rifles. Its a bit big being 30 cal but it will be interesting to see how they go none the less

You just have to be impressed with a rifle that was designed to shoot jacketed projectiles at over 2000fps but it can still throw cast pills into MOA at 1000fps don't you?

Yeah makes you wonder why it comes with a 1 in 7.5 twist barrel to start with...........