I posted this on the single shot section and am not getting a ton of response (Yhanks to the one who has) so I thought I'd try here also. Okay, I could use a little help here.
here's my project.
I inherited this 1885 from my 90 year old Dad. It was built in 1887 and has not been fired for 75 years. Chambered in 32-40.
The only brass I could come up with is 30-30 and one pass through the 32-40 dies sized them beautifully. I did a little research and came up with a load using H4895 and 170 gr special bullets from Speer. Loads say 16-22 gr of powder. My first load was 16.5 gr and I have not shot it over the Chrony yet but will as I work up loads. I just fired a couple of shots to see if was all good to go. I did have a gunsmith look it over and give it a thumbs up before I shot it.
Here is my Question.
In the last photo you can see the brass after being shot. My concern is the black mark up near the neck. What is the cause and should I be concerned?





I'm very excited about this gun
and so is my Dad!

Cartridges loaded to low pressures can show signs of powder blackening because the brass did not make a good seal against the chamber walls. The condition will disappear at some point as you increase your powder charges and thus pressure. I find H4895 to be particularly dirty on brass at lower pressures. You might want to try some faster burn rate powders. If this is not a nickel steel barrel I would switch to cast lead bullets if the bore condition will handle them.
I recently loaded some .30-06 casings with 125gr. bullets starting with 40grs. H4895 and the casings exhibited soot like yours sometimes all the way to the base. By increasing the charge it went away and by 44grs. it was no longer.
P.S. I wish we could all have your non-problem. Nice gun.

For cases I'd probably use 38-55 and run them through a 32-40 sizing die. By all means find some cast bullets in the 150-220 gr weight. Probably around .321-.323 dia. Slugging the barrel would tell what dia. For powder I'd use either SR 4759 or IMR/H 4227 at around 13-14 grs. Date of Mfg would steer me away from going for anything high velocity. If it has a good bore it will surprise you on accuracy.