Types of Gunpowder for Reloading | Learn About Gunpowders

This guide is for the beginners who are curious to know about different types of gun powder for reloading. Different powders come in different shapes and they functions different from each other. So if you are a gun enthusiast, you are going to love this guide!

What Is Powder Metering?

The gun powders have a different shape for different types of cartridges. Depend on gunpowder it directly impact gins metering. In an easy word, metering means how consistency you can reload cartridge. If anyone says this gunpowder is difficult of metering that means it is difficult to reload in the cartridges.

Ball Powder

In simple words, ball powder is one of the best gun powders which have a very tiny ball shape. The feature of the gun powder is amazing. It has Low-cost gun powder. Shelf life is greater than any other gunpowder. It can load more accurately than gun powder because it has better meters than others.

Also, it can easily endure high temperatures where other gunpowder burns at low temperatures. It has resistance max at about 3400 Fahrenheit. Burn temperature is very much important when you fire thousands of shots. Because of the hit, it can easily burn at that time.

Flattened Ball Powder

The flattened ball is powder is the flattened, oval shape version of ball power. After running a roller in the ball powder it becomes in this flattened shape. It has almost all the features of ball gunpowder but in an oval shape. Ball gun powder cannot put directly into the shotgun shell.

A shotgun shell is big and the ball gunpowder has a trend to max movement in the big shell. For this reason, the ball gunpowder transforms into a flattening shape to minimize movement.

Flake Powder

The shape of flake powder is like tiny discs. This is the most essential powder and mostly converted into tiny dices. Then cut them into small dices. The flake powder is so tiny that it looks like tiny summer sausage.

For their tiny shape, this powder is used in a handgun and shotgun cartridge. But it has some cons. As these powders are the tiny shape they are difficult to meter. As a result Reloading cartridge with this flake powder is not so smooth all the time.

Stick Powder

Stick powder is the most popular gunpowder. They are mostly used in rifle cartridges. The shape of this stick powder is like a small cylinder. This gun powder is the most difficult to meter than the other gunpowder. As a result, it is difficult to maintain the consistency of reloading the cartridges.

The main drawback of this powder is it burns easily at high temperatures. Through it have some drawback, it popular gunpowder. This gun powder can shot consistent and accurate. This feature makes the stick powder the most popular gun powder.

Different type of Gun’s Gunpowder Use

Pistol Powder

People use a handgun for short distances. So handgun powder needs to burn fast. The barrel of the shotgun is also shorter so it needs most energy in the shortest distance. The maximum explosion needs to burn within six minutes.

If you use a slow-burning powder in shotgun then it will not burn when it hit the area. It is a total waste of your money and time. Some newbie thinks the fast-burning gun powder is not good. But you have to understand that depend on your gun distance you have to gun powder.

Rifle powder

Riffle shotgun has a long barrel. Long barrel guns demand to increase power. So it needs powder which burns slower than the other. Slower gunpowder makes an explosion in the longer barrel and increases the power.

So it makes a perfect shot. If you use fast-burning gun powder then it burns the bullet in the barrel. It will cost you as a miss the shot. It also has the chance to damage your gun barrel.

Shotgun powder

Different types of shotgun available in the market. People get confused about which types of gunpowder to use. So you have to choose gunpowder wisely for your shotgun. Shotgun verity means its shot load. For heavy shot load, you have to use slower bun powder.

If you fast burring gunpowder in heavy load shot then it will easily burn in cartridges. It will cost you damage to your firearm and barrel. It will miss you shot easily. On the other hand in a light load shotgun, you have to use fast-burning gunpowder. As a result, it will accelerate the power velocity. It will also make the perfect shot.