Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Gun powder shortage

We bought the full 200 pound copper lined keg of WC852 that time. I forget what it was but was thinking like 600-800 bucks for it. Made in 72. Still working just fine and storage here has been in the heat, not AC like it should have been.

And we bought a case of Du Pont black powder years ago from a friend. Case of 25 cans 1 pounders IIRC. Still using it, was made in 64 IIRC.

I inherited a big plastic can (maybe 8 lbs.) of unopened Vihtavuori N133. ?Would it work for .223/5.56, or 6.5 Grendel? Using 62 gr .223 and 129gr Grendel.

Shortage of powder caused by a surplus of optimists who think they are long range precision shooters?

Gunpowder is made underwater. It's last production phase is going thru the dryer, then packaged.

Yes it would and is the bomb in 45/70.

Bought a couple pounds of H 4350 today.

Man, just what I was told was IT, for 223/50 ttsx ammo... I have no clue locally who even sells VV powders. We used to order 200 pound lots of the stuff through Graf and sons...

I’d rather look at powder on the shelf than look for it. Try to be one president election ahead!!!!

Me too

We don't get many powders here in Australia. Of course we get the ADI stuff as it's made here (sold as Hodgdon). Reloder powders turn up about every two years as there is only one ship that carries explosive materials. At least that's what we were told by the Reloder powder importer. Hence I guess there is only one shipment of ADI powders out every two years which might help explain the shortage of some ADI/Hodgdon Extreme powders.

I just checked on the Winchester Ammunition Australia site as they distribute ADI powders here and AR2209 is listed as OUT OF STOCK. That is the powder sold as H4350 in the US. So it might be unavailable for quite a while yet.

Uh, H4350 wasn't introduced until 1983.

My shop is supposed to have some Varget next week.

n 1946 he began by selling 4895 powder which had been used during the war to load 30/06 cartridges. ... Hodgdon H4350 was one of the powders that Bruce Hodgdon began his business on back in 1946, H4350 began distribution in 1949. Current production H4350 is made in Australia by Australian Defense Industries.

Mine must be the Mil-Surp but it does say H4350 on the container, not just 4350. So military or pre-ADI manufacturer.

Well that isn’t actually true. Sources have put IMR 4350 production to have started in 1940. And the first H4350 name didn’t show up until source change to I believe Scotland in the early 70’s.

In 1949, he began acquisition of powder salvaged from disassembled Oerlikon 20mm cannon cartridges. This powder resembled IMR 4350 in appearance, and with a slower burning rate, was initially marketed as "4350 Data", and later as 4831

Wrong. The powder you presently know as H4350 was introduced in 1983. There was 4350 manufactured by DuPont and later surplused out by Hodgdon and others, then there was IMR 4350 which was produced by DuPont to mimic their earlier military 4350, and then there was H4350 which was Hodgdon's proprietary powder and introduced in 1983.

Interesting history on 4350. On rethinking it my oldest are from the 70s so probably Dupont. I was trying to talley up all the 4350 variations and got confused after five or six versions, are there more?

There's also AA 4350. At any rate, I've never understood the obsession over H4350; it's a good powder, but it ain't the only game in town. I've moved over to RL-17 and even plain vanilla IMR 4350 in the absence of the Hodgdon version. (I bought a gross of RL-17 on the cheap from some local yahoo who didn't know what he could load with it. I need to use that up before I start doing any load work with RL-16 or IMR 4451 or break into my stash of AA 4350.) The same goes for any powder: there's nothing that occupies an exclusive spot on the burn rate chart. I still miss H450 and AA 3100, but other things have taken their places.

Hodgen is shipping more than ever, but shipping more than ever to the military.

Hodgdon has had several versions of H4350.
First was surplus- first named data 4350, then found to be slower, so renamed 4831.
In the early 60s, H4350 was made in Scotland and was not surplus.
Then it moved to Australia.
There was a long cut and short cut at the same time in one period.
Then was changed to be more temp stable and short cut as it is today.