Well Miller, you always quote your machine shop background. Me, I spent a few years in the propaganda business, which is a whole lot like advertising. You don't target YOUR OWN products with an ad; you target the other guy's. If IMI were testing two of its own powders, no reason--from a "bottom line" advantage standpoint--to "prove" that powder A recoils less than powder B, unless they're trying to REPLACE powder B with powder A. I look at it as providing valuable information to the shooter. Do you want to go with the old standby, more 100 straights (was that as a percentage, or was that because so many more shooters reloaded with Red Dot?), or with the new kid on the block that gives less recoil? As for Burma Shave, maybe more profit margin in the canned stuff than the brush etc? Or maybe they wanted to play CYA, providing something for both markets--until the brush etc became obsolete? But I think that's a harder case to make for powder . . . especially in the case of Alliant, since it's clear they had absolutely no intention to dump Red Dot in favor of powders producing less recoil. (So demonstrated, most recently, by the new and cleaner burning Red Dot.)

As for the burn rate of powders . . . you being one of the guys who believes pretty much strictly in what can be MEASURED, not what one "feels" (which, admittedly, is quite subjective) . . . explain this, if you can: If you look at any Alliant book, you will often find a choice of the 3 powders we've been discussing--RD, AS, GD--with all other components exactly the same: hull, primer, wad, listed velocity. So why is it, then, that Alliant lists loads exactly the same, the only difference being the type and amount of powder, that the supposed "reduced recoil" AS and GD loads ALWAYS require more powder? 2 grains more of either AS or GD is quite typical; I can find one GD load requiring 3.5 grains more than the same load using RD. So . . . that much difference should surely show itself in MEASURABLE recoil, should it not? So why does Alliant promote powders requiring a heavier charge as having less felt recoil? Does not compute, if you're working strictly from the math in the formula.

Last edited by L. Brown; 04/19/10 06:52 PM.