doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion Classic & Custom Single Barreled Sporting Rifles @ doublegunshop.com Lightning Powder by Hercules

The next step in the evolution was Dr, Baker's Borchardt. It uses the Krag case also and a base-band bullet seated in the mouth of the case.

When the rifle is fired the case(s) are de & re-primed charged with powder and then a bullet is seated into the case. The cases are never resized, this is the Mann-Niedner chamber.

Next came the new chamber that would accept a factory bullet but still retained the Mann-Niedner chamber. Fired cases were never resized, they were reloaded using only a re&de-capper and straight line bullet seater.

This rifle has that type of chamber,



Confused yet? These were all .25 High-Power's the .25-Krag as we know it would come along later. There were other variations of the .25HP as well.

He is a picture of the set-up while using the above rifle.

The chuck hunters, the rifle Dr. Baker is holding in the picture is the Borchardt above with the cocking-piece.

A goal of mine many moons ago was to get a rifle that belonged to each of the four men in the picture.

In the photo, Leopold and Niedner are wearing Mills belts. Were they carrying fixed ammunition directly in the belt loops? Or were the cartridges carried in tubes? The base band bullets seated in the mouth of the case would have been rather fragile.

If you ever disassembled any pre-WW2 Italian ammunition for the Carcano rifle, do you remember the inside of the case mouths? Pretty close to a base band bullet design.

[quote=waterman] The base band bullets seated in the mouth of the case would have been rather fragile. /quote]

I also believed that and went so far as to publish it in "Rifle" magazine back in 1994.

I have seated .050" base-band bullets into a case fired in a Niedner chamber, not resized, and there is no way I could pull the bullet out.

When these new ideas hit the sporting press back before WWI the same criticism was published. Mann sent a cartridge with a BB bullet to the publisher of "Outers Book" and he and others could not get the bullet out.

OK, Now I know that I can take Lightning off the list of powders to use.

Michael, how old is the Lightning you were using? I'm 70 and I'll bet that the Lightning was older than that. I don't think it was sold post-WW2 and that any still on the shelf dated from late in the Depression. I'm not as spry as I once was. Perhaps that Lightning is beginning to age a bit also.

After thumbing back and forth through Sharpe's Complete Guide and a lot of 20 year old loading manuals, I find myself thinking that the only 20 or 30 year old Reloader 7 is just a relatively modern incarnation of Lightning. If you have any Re7 on the shelf, try that in the 25 HP.

I have no idea how old it is but had to try the original stuff ;-).

I'll try some Reloader 7, I've tried H-380 but keep coming back to 3031. The problem with 3031 and none of my powder measures will measure it at the bench so I have to fill a bunch of glass vials at home then take them to the range.

I have not looked at AA No. 9 which I have used in my schuetzen rifles to see if there are .257 Roberts load info to start from.

Have you tried an old Belding & Mull powder measure? Mine works with 3031 in my reloading setup at home, but I have never taken it to the range.

I also find that I use 3031 more than any other powder.

I've used my B&M with 3031 and there seems to be less "Cutting" but still charge to charge seems no better than my Redding. It's been a while so next trip I'll try that as well.

Fact is I use a Harrell with my Schuetzen rifles and I'm spoiled.

Now if I could get my hands on a Mann-Niedner powder measure I would be a happy camper.