A local gun shop guy was telling me that the new powders with anti-copper fouling properties tend to burn dirty and build up a carbon ring in the leade of the barrel. He cited Hodgdon CFE 223, Alliant Reloder 16 & 23, and other new IMR powders as culprits. Have any of you heard of this issue or is it just gun counter babble?

Who cares. The older H414/760 and other ball powder were always cited as burning dirty but so what. I shoot and clean when necessary no matter what the rifle or powder is so in the end, if it shoots well every time I use it. it is a good powder.
Just my thoughts....
John

^^^^^^^^^^^^^
What he says.

I'd have asked the gun store cowboy how he knows that they build up a carbon ring.

I did. His response was that several folks have told him the same thing. I failed to challenge the notion further since I was there getting a generous donation for my RMEF Chapter’s banquet! Happy Trails

I don't know as I am the clean it every time I shoot more than 40 rounds type but I suspect some think that because the powder has anti copper agents you never need to clean it.

I havent noticed CFE 223 to burn dirty and I ran about 6 lbs of it shooting prarie dogs last year.

Mr. Walker - tell me what you do to "Shokting" a pd ?


Jerry

Easy,now....this is a family site....

I have burned a bunch of CFE-223 in my .223's and have yet to run into much powder fouling and very, very little copper fouling at all.

I think your LGS guy needs to get out more and shoot the stuff he sells.

Ed

Pressure has a lot to do with cleanliness of the burn, too low and it will be dirty. As for the powders you've cited, I tend towards it being a little babble..

That would explain my experience with CFE-223. It likes to be run at max or near-max loads for accuracy in all of my rifles.

Ed

WAM,

I've the powders the gun-counter guy mentioned clean-burning as long (as somebody else already mentioned) the powder charge is near published max. Have also found the decoppering agent works, but exactly how well they work in a specific load and rifle depends on several things, including the bullet, and size of powder charge. But that's been true of decoppering agents since they were first used over a century ago.

Powder is the one thing reloaders seem to have the need to get hot and bothered about but in my opinion matters much less than brass lots/brands, bullets or even primers. Some worship it in the tenths of grains.

I look at carbon fouling as "lubrication", so long as its soft. Hell, some guys roll their bullets in moly like its a pancea for cramming in more powder....

Maybe he has lots of old stock he's not shifting as everyone is buying the new stuff.

After shooting a couple of cases of FFg black, nothing seems dirty burning in the smokeless area.

Mule Deer, No worries about running loads much below max in my case! Thanks to all for your responses. I have only fired about 18 rounds of CFE223 through my .35 Whelen and it didn’t appear to be dirtier than normal. It’s not like it’s going to be a high volume shooter in a dog town anytime soon. Happy Trails

With my fat thumbs I have not mastered typing on a smart phone yet.

Superformance seems sooty in 22/250 but speed and accuracy with 65 grain Sierras is TOPS ! Still looking for something to best H4350 and 127 LRX in the 6.5 CM.

I don't think the fouling is carbon so much as it's the decoppering agent.

Apparently this is quite true.

The 7mm magnum book starting load using Ramshot Magnum & the 139 grain Hornady is one of the filthiest loads I've ever had to clean up after. It sure shoots well though, my last three shot group at 100 yards out of a cold barrel was a perfect triangle @ .50"

41

I'm on my 3rd 8#dr of CFE223 all in 204s I find it 2 be a very good powder, easy to clean up a barrel and I have a bore scope.

lol......

I've shot a lot of CFE BLK and CFE Pistol, and found them to be pretty clean in comparison to other powders I had been using in the same cartridges.

Sounds like the same problem as the new M16s in Vietnam that "never needed cleaning". People see anti-fouling and quit taking care of their rifle.

And why do think that?

FWIW since we are talking about carbon. CRC GDI intake valve cleaner works very well for removing carbon.

That is interesting. I have recently been shooting some loads with powder that has the decoppering agent in it and the bore looks pretty clean afterwards. Very easy to clean up too.. I didn't know what to expect, so I kept an eye on the bore. Time will tell, but it looks like a pretty good concept to me..

Bsa,

I have used a bunch of different decoppering powders in the past few years, my experience is they don't leave as much powder fouling as many other powders, especially with close-to-maximum loads. But that's pretty common, except with older-style spherical powders.

In fact they've work so well than during some of my recent "load test" articles I deliberately alternated handloads with decoppering powders with "standard" powders--and checked the bore with my Gradient Lens bore-scope after each range session. Never found more than a faint trace of copper--partly because decoppering powders will indeed remove copper left after firing standard powders.

One of these tests involved around 150 rounds in a Mauser M18 7mm Remington Magnum. I never cleaned it throughout the tests, and it was still grouping great, with very little coppering. In fact, I have generally come to the conclusion that using decoppering powders will will "break in" new barrels (like the one in the M18) without the tiresome process of frequent cleaning. This is because they leave so little fouling that the bullets are pretty much running through a clean bore, allowing bullets to smooth the bore.

Of course, the other factor is that so many of today's factory barrels are very smooth, even in inexpensive rifles.

Thanks for the info John. When I first saw powders like CFE223 that claimed to have decoppering agents in the powder, my first thought was it was going to wear the barrel more. With posts like the ones above where they used multiple 8 pound containers worth of powder in their rifles, that makes me feel better. I know most of you guys DBC your barrels and that should help with wear as well, but from what I've seen with some of these powders, it looks pretty good.

John, very interesting info. Much appreciated! Now that IMR has discontinued the Enduron line of powders, are the Alliant R16, R23, R26 etc powders the only currently manufactured powders that contain the decoppering agents? Just wanted to make sure I wasn’t unaware of others. Thanks!

The Hodgdon CFE line all have decoppering stuff in them. CFE Pistol is with absolutely zero doubt the cleanest stuff I've ever used in any of my handgun cartridges.I can shoot 100 rounds of CFEP loads in my 327 Fed and the gun is less dirty than if I shot 10 rounds loaded with 2400.

I'm not John, but VihtaVuori has decoppering agents and is supposed to be very temp stable. FWIW I have become very fond of N140.

I'm not John, but VihtaVuori has decoppering agents and is supposed to be very temp stable. FWIW I have become very fond of N140.

All Reloader series powders have a decoppering agent since 2002 except RL17.

From ATK

Both of these new Reloder powders contain decoppering agent to help reduce coppering up your barrels, but this is nothing new for us. Bofors began adding decoppering agent to our Reloder rifle powders in the 2002 timeframe, and all our Swiss Reloders except 17 contain their proprietary additive. (We may include it in 17 at some point also, but right now we like it just the way it is.) Sorry we didn’t have a snappy name figured for the decoppering agents, we just did it.

And I like RL-17 just the way it is also! Don't do anything to it as far as I'm concerned. It gives the best performance I've found for my 9.3 x 62, and I rarely ever need to clean the Sako match grade barrel.

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

Some bore guides will allow crud to build up i the leade area. After a good cleaning using a bore guide, I remove it and push an alcohol soaked patch through to get and crud left.

Rl 17 and 26 leave something black on cleaning patches, I do not believe it is carbon because it cleans out easily and fast

I've become a fan of CFE223 and even use it for my 30-30 handloads.....works well. Higher velocity than standard powder loads! Using my hand cast gas checked bullets that drop at around 180 gr make for quite a stopper in a light trapper barrel length firearm!


Frog----OUT!

I shoot a lot of CFE223 and it does not burn dirty in my experience

I have found that some decoppering agents must work better than others.

I was working up loads for a new barrel on my benchrest gun in 6ppc, the two powders I was using were VVN133 and IMR8208XBR. I would shoot 20-25 shots then clean before switching to the other powder. Every time I had copper fouling with VVN133 and not even a trace of copper with IMR8208XBR and it also burned much cleaner........as luck would have it my rifle shot tighter groups with VVN133 as most do

I reload for a lot of rifles using a lot of different powders. I don't clean very often but never had a problem with a carbon ring until the last couple of years, and solely with RL26. I have a custom 7saum and a RR prefix factory 700 270 and both are shut down right now with carbon rings thick enough that its hard to chamber a round. This has never happened on any of my many other rifles that have round counts much higher than these two. I've tried a few products to remove the rings and am trying CLR right now. I'm quite sure that "its the powder" in my case, as that is the only variable that's changed.

One of the "problems" here is that what people are calling "carbon" fouling is not necessarily all carbon. Yes, smokeless powder is partly carbon (one of the basic chemicals in nitrocellulose), but one of the reasons very slow-burning powders--such as RL-26--burn so slowly is powder-granule coatings that by definition resist burning. Thus they leave some residue in the bore.

Which is one major advantage of the Belgian-made Ramshot rifle powders. Their deterrent coatings are apparently designed to burn once pressure (and the accompanying heat) reach a certain level. Which is exactly why they leave considerable fouling until pressures reach around 60,000 PSI--whereupon the "carbon" fouling almost disappears.

Personally, I haven't been that impressed with RL-26. While it does result in an increase in velocity in many cartridges, I have found it more temperature-sensitive than Alliant implies during my testing from zero to 70 degrees--which has resulted in significant point-of-impact shifts. To me this is more important than another 100+ fps at the muzzle--which makes less difference than the ballistic coefficient of the bullet. But ever since "affordable" chronographs appeared around 30 years ago, many handloaders have been obsessed about another 100 fps....